Wibu to consider private school due to wrap around care costs?end

[Yeahthatthing]

School application time for DC1. We have good local state primary schools and I always assumed that he'd go to one of them. But I've been looking in to the wrap around care and it's going to be a £14.50 a day for the cheapest option. So around £2700 per year. Which is the same price as the prep school attached to his current nursery.

The prep school has the breakfast and after school club onsite and run by the teaching assistants and lunch time supervisor where as the local wrap around care is off site with a 'walking bus' arrangement.

We will absolutely need wrap around care.

Also the local holiday club is school hours at £25 per day and wrap around care needed before/ after that as well (so £39 per day) where as the prep school has onsite holiday provision at £25 per day, full hours.

Seems ludicrous that a private school will be a cheaper option?!? What am I missing?

So WiBU to send him to private primaryfor financial reasons?

Yeah, I still don't get the economic feasibility, unless the teachers are very poorly paid, have no pension, are very young or something.

22 children at c. £2500 per year (once sibling discounts etc included) = £55,000. To pay the full costs (and on costs like NI and pension contributions) of 2 staff, plus heating, lighting, books, maintenance, after school care, food, people to cook the food...??

Do the fees rise VERY sharply after the first year or so? What do their accounts look like?

Ah - you can of course pull your child out of it doesn’t work, but will the local state primaries you like have spaces?

This. My DD's primary class took its first child from outside / off the waiting list in Y2 - not a single child left, so not a single child could be admitted, for nearly 3 years, and that's a 2 form entry primary. Getting 'in at the beginning' for a popular state primary is critical, as when you apply for reception, you just have to meet the over-sudscription criteria well. To get an 'occasional' place in year, there has to be a vacancy AND you have to be the top of the waiting list.

Small private primaries closing due to financial difficulties have also, IME locally, led to a scramble for state places and many families having to accept places in much less good schools than they would have been able to access had they applied in Reception.

Yeah, I still don't get the economic feasibility, unless the teachers are very poorly paid, have no pension, are very young or something.

Yeah the costs dont make any sense at all. It doesn't seem to even cover a standard school day nevermind all the wrap around care.

Yes, the risk of it not working out has been considered, and we will not get a place at a local school (all over subscribed with long waiting list). So we've decided to look at other local preps, just to make sure we are covering all bases.

Plan currently is to view the local primarys and preps. Apply for the state schools as normal and the prefered prep and make a decision once places have been offered.

If wrap around wasn't an issue we wouldn't be considering private primary, so we are also considering other options, e.g. a nanny or au pair - not sure either will be viable (nanny unaffordable, au pair can't look after under 2s). It's a total minefield! We were prepared for the cost of childcare/ children generally but not the difficulty in fiding provision!

Not working out as in DC doesn't settle/ school goes bust.