To not want my children to go to a private school

[TooLaidBack27]

Very big discussions with DP about future school for our DCs. DC1 is 9 and we have started thinking about it. DP wants to try get her into private, whereas I think we do not have enough money. It is £17k a year. DP earns £50k, but that involves lots of weekend and evening work for him, I only work part-time and take home £12k. We live in London, have a mortgage, good car, go on holiday twice a year, have savings, but definitely are not "rolling in it". DP thinks that we somehow could make it happen, I am sure we can not afford it, as £17k is just bare minimum, not including school trips, expensive uniforms and school lunch is £250 per month! Yet, DP just called me too laid back and not wanting the best for my children :( He even said that I could do full-time- not sure how's going to work, as we have younger DC2, who just started primary school.
I understand where he is coming from, but really can not allow to put us in financially unstable position and agree with his grandiose plans.
AIBU or is he?

Sadly no you can't, look for grammars or outstanding academies maybe even out of area.

There have been many comments that you cannot afford it. So far all the discussion has been on the amount and not what that amount buys you. TBH it sounds suspiciously cheap to me. Is the school actually any good? For that amount in London it would seem to suggest that there could well be some compromises in terms of subject coverage or sports facilities for example. Have you looked at the school, visited, is it right for your DD? Will you pay for your other children? What happens when you have one in uni and perhaps 2 at senior school age?

So 62k gross? For 1, and eventually 2 children? Thats's just not enough, it really isn't.

Apart from the extras, how will you be able to afford to send your younger child in a few years time? Two sets of fees that increase year-on-year, a mortgage, bills etc are too much for that income. Unless one of you has a cast iron promotion in the pipeline, how much can you realistically see your income increasing by?

We both work full-time and have 2 children at private school. Our net income is enough to cover the fees ok, but we live quite modestly. I do get where your husband is coming from, but he has to be realistic. It just won't work without a lot more income, or family chipping in. You could look at bursaries - my kids both have a music one, but they are hard-fought, and you still have to pay a fair bit unless your income is really low. If you have assets, you are expected to use them for fees.

2 of ours got offerred 100% fee remission at the private school where DH works. It's very academic and very competitive.
We decided against it.
They have loved the local state school and have made lovely friends. Youngest aiming for Durham next year. Doubt he would have done any better at the private school.
No regrets here.

Do you have £1,500 spare at the end of each month?
Agree with this and this is for one set of school fees. If you have low monthly outgoings especially with regard to your mortgage, then you could afford it. Compromises in lifestyle & priorities are different for everyone.
It's easily 3K pcm currently for 2 sets of day school fees (excluding extras) plus 5% uplift year on year. You'll need to increase your income because this is basically £48K gross.

You say you have a mortgage. You cannot afford private school for 2 children on £62K.

Your best bet is to choose private at either primary OR secondary. Primary only makes sense if you have grammar schools in your area. Otherwise, if you really want private, do it at secondary as the GCSEs are important exams. In the meantime, save save save. Go full time now if necessary.

Unless you’re going to come on and say you’ve got no mortgage and have a secret trust fund then no you can’t afford it.

^^ Just what I was going to say.

I had a private education, my DH did not. We both got the same higher qualifications and have earned on average the same pro-rata.

I’ve always not thought it was worth the price tag, but now my DC are at that age I do wish we could afford private - local schools not bad but not guaranteed great which I feel we’d have if we went private and think my particular DC would benefit.

But there’s no way we can afford it, and we earn combined more than you and live well outside London!

As soon as you make the calculation for more than 1x DC it is at such a high cost it’s out of most people’s reach. We definitely couldn’t afford 2+ DC at all, and even with just 1x DC it would mean a massive burden in the future of tiny retirement savings, mortgage around for longer etc. It’s simply not affordable even with bursaries.

Tell your DH to do the sums.

Not only are there lots of extras, private school fees go up by 3-5% every year and there is a big jump in fees between junior and senior school. It is the equivalent of climbing a financial cliff face.

Once your dcs are in private school, you will be very reluctant to move them even with an unexpected change in your financial circumstances e.g. redundancy. You might almost prefer to downsize the house than pull them out. It is a yoke and a serious financial commitment.

Why? Is he delusional? Nothing wrong with good state school. Main thing is parental support and interest. Do you want them to be better than others or just the best they can be. You are not in that league and your dc will always be aware of it. Better to be at a local school where they can shine

I'm not against private school (am considering it for toddler DD) but it does sound very tight on your budget. Some of the private schools in London have good bursaries/scholarships, so I would still do your research into the options, but your DC would have to be very bright to get through the entrance exams and be in the top candidates, and for the scholarships she'd be competing against prep school pupils.
If you're looking at the top private schools in London, they will all be highly selective and even if you were prepared/able to pay, it's tough to get through through the selection process, and probably even harder if coming from a background where she doesn't have friends going through the same thing. So that's another thing to consider.

There are some excellent grammars in London, on a par with private schools, so those are worth looking at too, but she'd probably need a lot of tuition and practice to get through the exams (again competing against prep school pupils). And possibly need to travel far, as most boroughs don't have them.

And lastly there are some excellent state schools in London - some have places depending on things like musical aptitude if that applies, or you could consider moving into a good catchment (that would probably be the most cost effective method, as it could guarantee a place for your younger DC although you don't state if they are the same sex, so if they are different it would only work for a mixed school, but a lot of the better schools are single sex). But you'd have to plan that carefully to get the location right and time it before the applications deadline.

Get yourself a copy of the Good Schools Guide and have a read through all the options. Have a look around the various school options (private and state) if you haven't already - there will be a lot of open days/evenings taking place this term.

I probably wouldn't on that income tbh, but I'm not at the stage of looking at senior schools yet.

I think you need to go to the open days that are happening right now (as state school applications for the year above your eldest have a deadline in 3 weeks) to give yourself some real info about the differences.

I would love for my DC to go to a state school. I think comprehensive education is the best path. But when even an outstanding comprehensive is clearly massively underfunded and unable to resource a broad education but is cutting back and narrowing down, and has unmanageable class sizes and high numbers of teachers off sick with stress, sometimes you have to do stuff you don't want to, if you possibly can - though I agree private is not always better and some of the private schools I saw were distinctly worse than the best state schools.

If after the open days you are then feeling that it's worth considering then as a pp suggested upthread, you have a year to practice. That's what we've been doing. The amount we have been putting into savings is a bit less than the monthly fees but then when fees kick in we will be able to draw down out of those savings.

If you can make ends meet during the coming year with the practice fees, you will he OK till DC2 is 11. If you can't then you will have a nice savings pot for additional enrichment and activities. You then have an excellent chance of getting a bursary for the years in which DC overlap.

Nb though you have raised the spectre of other additional costs, private school fees do cover a lot of extras too - loads of sports and activities clubs that you might be paying for if they weren't at a school that offers these things. A state school tends to stop at 3:30 and that's that. A private school will have extracurricular going on till 18:00 with a huge number of enrichment opportunities.

If your daughter is academically strong , consider some of the grammar schools in London (check out 11 plus forum which lists them all out). There are a couple without any catchment. You'd probably need to tutor to stand a chance but home tutoring is Ok.

Don’t do it. The burden of keeping them there is awful. Find a good secondary school, attend lots sports/music/drama clubs outside of school & enjoy your holidays.

Friend's son was at local school and is going to Oxford.

Are there bursaries available? Is your DD a music student or sporty? All 4 of ours went through private primary and secondary.
Last year we spent 26k on everything including coaches, trips, uniform, sports and music etc.
We spent similar for both DDs and for DD1 she left before 6th form and DD2 is doing an apprenticeship with the NHS degree level.
School wasn’t for DD1 and I definitely think it’s the student not the school.

See if you can save £1.5K pcm over the next year is a good idea. Let DC1 sit the entrance exams of the preferred schools and the choice, if there is one, can be made then. This is London, state secondaries are in a far better state than the rest of the country!

Meanwhile, increase your hours/income/get a raise/savings/better paid work - whatever, so that when the time comes, you can review whether you could afford/want DC2 to have the potential choice between the state/independent sectors then.

Money gives you the luxury of choice - life's priorities are different for everyone. Holidays, travel, eating out, drama/music/sports lessons, living in a good school catchment, individual tutoring, etc - don't we all want the best for our children?

I think you would be mad to even entertain the discussion with those figures. Mad. YOu' can't afford it.

Lots of replies and lots of sense. If it is possible, have an open discussion with your husband about why this feeling that private school is the only way you as parents can do your best for your child/children. Of course good parents want to do that and wanting to make sure that we do can get overwhelming. There is often a lot of emotion (for the best of reasons) and a lot of assumptions and fears involved. It is important to remind yourselves that a financially stable and happy home with encouragement and unstressed parents is the very best base on which to build academic and emotional success and stability. It really isn’t worth undermining that for any real let alone perceived advantages of a private education. If you have undermined the stability of your children’s home base in order to fund a private education then the pressures and visible sacrifices are just counter productive. And don’t even go into the real possibility that you cannot do that for the other child. London can be very frustrating with many very good state schools and yet it can seem you are always outside the catchment area so your children won’t get in. If that is the situation and you have the possibility then make a plan and move if you possibly can. If you can’t then take an objective and open minded view at the options where you are. Go on secondary school visits as soon as you can so you really get some idea of what they are really like. That might assist you in having a more informed and objective discussion about it. If your daughter is happy, unstressed and doing well then all you really have to do is keep that going as best you can.

OP I earn more that your DP. My DW has a small business that brings in about what you earn (but she's full time). We reckoned we could not afford a private school and, on the figures you quote (and in London) I think your DP is being wildly optimistic.

I wouldn’t bother discussing it further. Your income is far too low to cover that. Tell dh that’s it’s up to him to sort out and leave him to it.

We earn about 30k more than you and live 'up north'. We couldn't afford private school even if I wanted to which I don't!

I agree with everyone else. You can't afford it, unless your child/ren win very generous bursaries. And even then there are always extras that aren't covered such as sports equipment, music lessons, school trips etc. Plus there is no guarantee that a private school is better. I went to dreadful state schools myself, and my husband was educated privately. When we had our first child we were both keen to send her to the local prep school, me because I didn't want her to have an experience like mine and he just assumed " everyone" did it. There was nothing wrong with the school - in some ways it was very good - and we could afford it though had to cut back on luxuries. But as she got older and I learned more about what other people's children were doing in our local state schools I realised we were spending a lot of money for minimal gain. In fact our DD was missing out on extra curricular activities etc that her state educated peers were having. So we swapped her to our local village school in year 5 and never regretted it. The education was broadly similar, we had spare cash for a lot of other activities and she had masses more energy due to the shorter days and less travel. Oh and more local friends. The only downside was no longer being able to go on holiday outside of the main school holidays due to private schools breaking up sooner.
Obviously I appreciate not everyone has good state provision, and if we lived somewhere where the only alternative was schools like the ones I attended, I would have done everything possible to privately educate. ( I did very well academically but general school life was hideous.) But the point is, I didn't look hard enough. I assumed private was best without really looking into the pros and cons and my DH just went with what he knew. We wasted a great deal of money before we realised.
Look properly at all your options and don't let your partner push you into debt for something that may not even be any better than state provision anyway.

Where did the OP go 😕

Hi OP. Just wanted to offer my perspective,

I went to a private primary and secondary school. The primary was excellent however the high school was a nightmare. The rules enforced were ridiculous, the "rich" students were awful and there were always excursions that cost extra dollars. I ended up developing server depression and anxiety, resulting in my not being able to graduate.

My DH on the other hand went to a state school and he is a very successful smart man. If the kids want to learn, they will learn and will benefit from a home life where parents are not stressed about money.

I know my situation is probably very unique to me, however to boil it down, my private school was very elitist and seemed to mow down anyone who didn't fit in. I really wish I went to a state school