To ask Dh’s boss to fund private school for our Dd school

[Justallabitblahreally]

Hear me out, feeling a bit desperate, so maybe not thinking straight about it

We live abroad, Dd has been ill for a while and whilst being bright, she’s had to miss a lot of school and I feel it’s too much of a struggle for her now in her local school, even though she is fluent in the local language.
There are various fee paying International schools nearby, which I feel she’d be so much happier at and they would provide much more support.
They don’t cost as much as in the uk, but it’s still out of our price range.
Dh works really hard for a good wage for where we live, but the wages are very low compared to many other countries.
Dh is an essential member of the team and they really need him as can’t find workers of his level in the area, they’ve told him this and are keen to keep him.
The main shareholder in the company he works for is an extremely wealthy, multimillionaire and a thoroughly nice guy. One of his Dd’s has had similar issues to our Dd and he’s offered to get us appointments (him paying) with various specialists in America, luckily Dd is improving and should be ok 🙏
I was reading about how many companies recruit from abroad to bring skilled workers to their workplace. They sometimes provide them with an apartment or with school places at a nearby International school as part of the package. We own our home and his wage, although its considered good for where we are, isn’t comparable to the work he puts in.

I feel like it’s crunch time, Dd needs an English speaking school and style of teaching. If we can’t have her in a school like that, I believe we should return to the uk.

Would it be crazy to propose this idea to the boss, that as part of his working contract it provides schooling for Dd? We would of course explain the reasons why and that we would have to return to the uk

Yes, and it's a lot of pressure on DH to continue at that particular place of employment, even if he becomes unhappy there in the future and wants to leave to work elsewhere.

She can catch up, but it’s more than that, the environment and style of teaching isn’t good enough

Yes this is something to think about too

We are an academic who's done a fair amount of international teaching + a foreign office civil servant, so all our colleagues and many of our close friends have a lot of experience with this, mostly in Africa, Asia, Middle East (though somehow not Dubai! but Dubai is considered weird even by expat standards).

You'll be very disappointed that right now we are back in Western Europe for a few months ;-).

And yes, some of the teachers are fucked up. Much more so, I think, then at the local secondary school where my mum has worked all her life. In no particular order:

• The teacher who had a massive drinking problem, showed everyone dick picks of another teacher, and on one drunken sobbing occasion just suddenly bit someone. She was a foreign service child herself and had grown up with a fair bit of trauma (bombings etc). Ended up in the international lifestyle for the same reason - that was just her life.
• The student who was evacuated from Pakistan and then later was evacuated from a next posting in central Africa and sent away from her single mum (who stayed on post as the civil war raged, to do her job), to her grandmother. She later found her grandmother after a stroke. Later went back on post.
• The wife met her husband when he was a diplomat in her home country. She loved the lifestyle and the glitter and mostly him. Got married, pregnant, followed him to a next posting. Eight years later two kids, she lives far away from family, and the weather is snow not the hot climate she is from. She is miserable. The kids feel it. There is no grandparents or village close by to keep an eye out. These are your classmates now.
• The local kid that can pay the fees because their father is in local politics. Local politics are... complicated.
• The mum died of corona. Her husband and toddler daughter's visas were tied to her job. Not much later, that child was gone from the school.

It's often just hard, and the schools bring a lot of that together.

They can also be the most wonderful schools, of course.

Why don’t you just ask for a raise in salary, to cover school fees?

I don’t understand why all this guessing and conjecture and backstory. It’ll be a yes or no answer and mumsnet can’t tell you either way!

It should be asked and done under the scope of wages increase. Otherwise, it would set a precedent the company might not want.
Is it France or Italy? Countries with a high work load? The argument for private schools would be harder to present compared to China or India.

We had it in our relocation package but this was from the first posting we had decades ago and it just rolled country after country. New staff has far less generous packages, school fees are strictly linked to countries. For those coming now to Australia, it has been removed.

Boarding 😬

??? Why is Happy valley being mentioned 🙈sorry i’m so confused. Yes I’ve seen it, but why is it relevant to this post?

Dh is an essential member of the team and they really need him as can’t find workers of his level in the area, they’ve told him this and are keen to keep him.

It's always nice when employers tell their employees this but please don't overestimate it.

There are plenty of 'indispensable' staff in the dole queues.

@Zezet I believe there is a fair amount of drama and complicated lives in any school!
@TheSquareMile how could they afford boarding in UK if they can’t afford the local 10K fees.

9500 whether £ or € is quite an uplift. As PP mentioned, there may be some negative tax implications too. I would chicken out of asking but if you’re desperate and determined, go for it. If your DD is only 7 are you thinking of staying there 10 years? That’s a big commitment for the business to be paying for school and your DH would be expecting some regular year on year pay rises too (if these still happen nowadays).

Plus there’s no way i’d put my child in boarding, especially my 7 year old, who has been ill 🙈

My relative was very happy with the education that their child received in an international school in the Netherlands.

On the other hand, a former colleague whom I wouldn't trust with a hamster got a job in an international school in Dubai.

I had missed the age detail! Best of luck, I hope it works out! I would probably just ask for the pay rise and say why you need it.

I was wondering whether the fees for boarding might be different for a child with a particular diagnosis, if the school were specialised.

I think that some schools offer scholarships; others offer particular packages for certain children, such as those from Armed Forces' families.

It doesn't sound as though boarding is an option OP would like, though.

I've just seen the update about the child's age, I hadn't realised that she was only 7.

Boarding not an option at this juncture, I would have thought.

@Justallabitblahreally

Would it be possible to ask for an appropriate amount which could be repaid as a deduction from his salary?

It sounds like a really unusual situation, I'm not sure what the outcome will be.

Rather than asking directly, what about your husband speaking to the boss telling him that you are thinking of returning to the UK for your daughter’s education as you can’t afford to fund private education and leave the ball in the boss’s court

Like a loan? I think we’d be paying it off for years 😬

It is all a bit pie in the sky, it was initially a thought, then I got a bit carried away and felt so happy envisioning her there, it really would solve so many problems. But, in reality, will he really say ‘Of course, will pay school fees each month’ or put up his wages by almost a thousand per month, not going to happen is it!

If I was the boss and was told this, the first thing I'd do is start scouting around for his replacement.

But she is/will be so fluent in a language that isnt English - thats such an amazing skill that most kids educated in English schools will never have. Plus of course a lot of schools in England arent great at all.
Could you maybe supplement what she does at school somehow? (hard to advise without knowing what country you are in/how old she is) Taking GCSEs privately is an attainable option. What does she think about the school shes currently at?
Im wary of assuming that a private education is automatically better.

Re Happy Valley - its a fabulous 3 series BBC TV drama starring Sarah Lancashire plus a fabulous cast of others. The plot of series 1 includes a family who think their daughters would be better off at a private school so the dad, Kevin asks his boss if he will consider financing it..........

Definitely worth seeking out and watching!

I think that she's 7, I think that's in one of the later posts.

To those that think I should give it a try, how would you write an email phrasing it?
I do want to include the part about Dd having been ill, not to try to gain sympathy (boss already knows) but for him to understand this is the reason and it wouldn’t be an issue otherwise

I’m rubbish at thinking about how to approach it…maybe that we were wondering if there were any opportunity for school fees to be included somehow due to..,(all reasons explained) saying we are contemplating returning to the uk due to this reason etc etc? 🤷🏻‍♀️

Because of your refusal to name the country you are, the advice you receive will be limited but depending on where you are, have you looked at faith schools? They can be smaller, less expensive and a possible solution?

I think you have grasped the idea of an Int. school being the one and only saviour for your DD when there may well be alternatives that could help.

Maybe but you could change the wording a bit

Yes, I think if we do it, we have to be much more direct?