Private school fee increases

[stripedpenguin]

My DH and I are trying to do the sums to see if we can afford private education for our DC. Last year's fees in a couple of North London schools seemed to increase by 6%. If you have DC at private school, what have been the average percentage increases over the years?

I've seen the recent thread on a similar topic but didn't get a sense of what the average annual raises have been (I confess I skimmed it a bit!)

Thank you in advance

Quite a few Europeans and some USA at my DS's school. A fair number of international students are European but with bases in other countries such as HK, USA and the UK.
Wealthy Germans seem to like the idea of a British education particularly in schools offering IB.

Some Europeans (Spanish in particular) only send them for year (Often Year 9) in our school.

We have an odd German and a French student. We have five Spanish in Year 9.

I think that the housing market in London and low interest rates have meant that, even without corresponding salary increases, enough parents can absorb fee increases through remortgaging, however unwillingly.

Private education has always been expensive, but back in the 80's when I started secondary school, many London independents had only just stopped being grammars and many pupils had assisted places.

Nothing lasts for ever - eventually interest rates will go up and government policy will change again.

(Although I'm not suggesting anybody puts "2020, school converts back to grammar - quids in!!!!" in their spreadsheet!)

Some people are just fabulously wealthy and will always be able to afford the fees.

I work at an expensive school (Think c.£30k a year) and some parents have four children currently at the school, all with ipads, macbooks, iphones, designer clothes etc. All go on the trips and holidays the shcool offer.

Now, if you can easily afford the £120k+ a year in fees alone, then adding on another £5k all round is not going to affect you.

The people that are affected are the wealthy who can just about afford to send their child. Now, these are not poor people, they just cannot stretch another £3k out of their salaries.

For the fabulously wealthy, the fees may as well be £300 a year, not £30,000 that's how little effect it has on them. :/

summerends there are usually three terms to a year, so it would be £60k day and £90k boarding, if you only do annual sums at your school.

Of course that is only to begin with, these changes have to be phased in. Over time funds will reduce reliance on current cohorts. Bursaries are usually only available to UK residents, and that need not change.

Of course need-blind is a optional policy. Any parents wishing to avoid such schools must vote with their feet.

Ponzi schemes, granolamuncher, are fraudulent ventures that result in losses to investors. How does that apply here, or to any top university offering bursaries to poorer students without obligation? Should those be frowned on, too? Why?

"Of course need-blind is a optional policy. Any parents wishing to avoid such schools must vote with their feet."

Not possible. No school in UK is needs-blind. There is a group striving towards it. But no schools have achieved it.

maryso yes I understand what you meant now, I had missed that critical 'termly' word.
I don't think the sums would add up though unless the schools had a pre-set quota of full fee (90k [no comment]) DCs for their admissions selection criteria. Since that would probably have to be up to a third of pupils to support the fees discounts there would not be enough places for a true needs-blind policy. Also needs-blind still entail the MC parents forgoing their assets to qualify.
BTW at least some of the big name boarding schools award bursaries to overseas candidate.

What you propose is a Ponzi scheme, maryso, because inflated fees paid by some parents would be used to pay other parents' bills in the same school year and it would not be long before the whole edifice would come crashing down, causing misery.

As I said upthread, there remain, thank goodness, some honourable schools, even in London, which have chosen (this all about choices) to keep costs (such as head's pay) within reasonable limits in order to keep fees affordable by a greater number and by the same token allowing bursary funds to go further and help more families. That's the model that works.

Sorry, granola. Needs blind is NOT a Ponzi scheme, but does require the accumulation of a large endowment to cover fees for those who need them. One of the Phillips schools in America, can't remember exactly which one, is needs blind, and it is funded from an endowment of over a billion dollars. The others Phillips schools cannot call itself needs blind because its endowment is only about $900 million, but it is very close to being needs blind in practice.

What is required is not increasing fees from current parents, but from having dedicated staff recruited specifically for fundraising principally from alumni/ae.

the problem with raising money in the alumnae (girls) in particular, is hat., traditionally, they don't have the money, the boys schools will often get the lions share of bequeaths.

Girls schools do get some, but they struggle.

Also, if someone leaves the money for a specific purpose, (e.g I'll leave you £150,000 but the money to be spent on a Mrs Jones Music Scholarship for 12 year olds.) it poses a problem for the schools as it can only be used for that purpose. They do try and redirect funds, and gtry and get a 'blanket' donation, but there's not much you can do about it if it's left as a legacy with restrictions.

maryso's proposal was for a Ponzi scheme; funding pupils from inflated fees paid by others.

A needs blind fund made from capital donated by former pupils would be different. It's great in theory but if you keep putting fees up for new luxuries and lifestyle services, the bigger the fund you'll need. Many former pupils are so disgusted by the rush to luxury and the pandering to the super roch that they've stopped donating.

As I say, a reality check would help.

granolamuncher, it ain't so just because you say so, even repeatedly...

Clients have little say over how finances are structured. Funds can be raised in lots of different ways. Disgusted pupils can step aside. Harvard, Princeton, MIT, Yale, did not need the permission of the likes of you or me to establish funds for need blind admission.

My musings are simply that paying £60k day or £90k boarding is fine for those who choose to pay to be at over-subscribed schools. Those who cannot, can apply for bursaries. The point is that need blind needs a kick start to help those who cannot afford fees. Your way could be construed as keeping at bay those who can afford less than you, when actually if you can't afford market rates, then you are no different, only wishing to claw your way over those who can afford slightly less.

"Clients have little say over how finances are structured."

Parents, parent governors, governors appointed by a church or university, former pupils, prospective parents, the Charity Commission, all of these stakeholders can influence how a school structures its finances.

I urge MNers to scrutinise school accounts on the Charity Commission website precisely because they can reveal how a school does structure its finances and what it actually spends its money on. Accounts can expose a school's hypocrisy about bursaries and about its alleged attempts to become "needs blind".

There might be an appetite for the kind of scheme you describe, maryso, but I hope no London day school (to get back to OP) ever tries it because it could easily be destroyed by it. All it would take is a political, economic or fiscal change or an enquiry by the Charity Commission for the whole delicate structure to collapse, reliant as it is on the uninterrupted confidence and commitment of a small number of super rich parents.

If anybody who is unable to afford fees of £60k per child per year is eligible for a bursary, you will be hard pressed to find enough parents who can afford that much to fund all those bursaries while their own DC go through the school.

When schools appeal to former pupils for funds, they like to aim for those who don't have children themselves and those whose children have flown the nest: they are the most likely to have disposable income to spare.

Anyway, "needs blind" admissions at Harvard have not made it as accessible as it pretends: the average income of parents of students at that university has been calculated to be $450k pa, which is the average income of the richest 2% of American households (Piketty p778).

I'm in favour of independent schools fulfilling the duties imposed by their statutes, offering free places and building up bursary funds but keeping costs and fees at moderate levels, in keeping with principles on which they have operated for generations, maintaining the loyalty of stakeholders and earning respect.

Paying a head £300k pa (NLCS) and raising fees by 37% in 5 years (SPGS) are grotesque. These aren't "market rates". They're the products of greed and stupidity. Frances Mary Buss and Dean Colet have been betrayed.

Granola: I don't think you quite know what you are talking about. I have a different perspective because alumna/e donation drives are common in American schools, university level and below, and they are targeted at all levels, and contributions of all levels are encouraged. In terms of access, a high school like Phillips Exeter has about 50%, yes 50 per cent, of its student body on some kind of bursary. Andover is similar. These enormous endowments are used not only for bursaries, but also to keep fees down. To give you some perspective, Exeter has facilities and a campus better than many universities, and spends over $60,000 to educate each student, however fees are less than $40,000 for full boarding - less than what I am paying for day school fees. On top of that, half of its students are on some kind of bursary, with a "free ride" for those from families making less than $75,000.

These needs blind policies are possible. The problem in this country is that the large capital campaign drives which are common in the US required to acquire these large funds, are not "done" in the UK.

Mominatrix I know US schools and unviersities have enormous endowments.

London day schools don't and girls' schools, in particular, are on a back foot. They are never going to be able to build big funds if they abandon good financial management, spend on luxuries, pander to the super rich and alienate their former pupils.

It just ain't going to happen here. Schools would do better to revert to moderation and to being careful with what they've got. Keeping fee rises low would be a gesture in that direction.

Is christ's hospital what you would describe as 'needs blind?'.

I get the impression that there are far more private day schools in London (if not the UK) than most other parts of the world. Unless they really change their customer base I don't think the economic resources are available to, for instance, turn every gpdst school into a christ's hospital.

A starting salary for an inner London teacher is £30k, not an average salary.

At my school the average salary is more like 40 to 50k.

OP our fee increases have been anywhere from 0-4% in the last 5 years.

Independent schools also contribute £10.5 billion pounds to the UK economy every year. The ISC (Independent Schools Council) reports that that is bigger than all of Liverpool.

Some other interesting facts and findings:

Report here

"Is christ's hospital what you would describe as 'needs blind?"

No. Needs-blind means that offers are made irrespective of parental income. And only after offers made/accepted is need for fee assistance considered, and every single entrant whose family income falls into the category for reduced fees would get that reduction in full. Even the schools that are the most generous at present still have a maximum number of reduced fee places (as the bursary pot just isn't big enough to back the reduced fees for more than a certain number of pupils per year).

TBH any private school in the UK can now survive without a local base. Having said that to have a majority of local students in the school is a very good selling point. Many overseas parents will always ask the taboo questions how many Chinese in her year? The school may think we are asking because we want a Chinese group for our daughter. Yet the truth is the opposite.

So schools have to be careful with their intake. Increasing fees and increasing the number of busaries is a good way of maintaing the status quo.

If only the inflation busting increases in fees did go towards increases in the numbers and in the thresholds of bursaries, Kenlee. They don't.

These increases are dictated by the cost of things that the richest available parents tell the schools they want in parental surveys and in private dinners with the head.

The schools' accounts demonstrate that the extra income goes on additional staff (for ever smaller classes and for new fashionable but non-academic subjects like "mindfulness") and on new buildings, not on widening access.

Surely if you attend a day school you must live locally.