2025 Private School Costs (just a rant)

[sherbsy]

Just a rant ladies as I wanted to get something off my chest...

My DH and I were lucky enough to go to private schools as kids. These schools weren't exactly posh, they were just former grammar schools (i.e. academic student factories) that converted in the 70s to private schools because the Labour government at the time told them to.

I know it's a privilege to go, there's a choice involved, a compromise etc. Neither of us ever went on holiday as kids or had many luxuries and our parents endured a lot to be able to afford it. I'm grateful for all they did and I wanted to do the same for my children.

But despite having good jobs...we just can't.

My rant is just at the excessive cost of it all in 2024. We both earn well and it's still beyond our means. With VAT being added in January, I'm not even sure it's worth it anymore.

When I left in 2000, it cost our parents ~£6,500 for a year. Inflation adjusted, that's about £12,000 in today's money. By no means cheap but both the schools we went to are now charging ~£22,000 per child, per year. That's before you factor in uniform, lunches, trips, exam costs etc.

Finding £44,000+ after tax every year with today's marginal tax rates, mortgage costs, food costs, energy costs etc just isn't possible for us...and I'd surprised many people can find it.

I know it's a middle-class rant, I know there's privilege involved but can anyone else empathise with us? It just feels like the Labour government have twice pulled the ladder away from capable kids (once in the 70s and now in 2024), offering it only to the rich ones.

Many intelligent working class kids went to grammar school (my parents and my husbands parents for example). They all went to uni too.
I went to a comprehensive school in the 80’s, no 6th form just local college. Utter pile of crap I’m afraid. And worse today I believe. I only did well because I was supported by my parents and relatively intelligent. Most kids at my school went into building, shops, admin etc.
From my experience I fully support grammars but they’d need to be more widespread than today. Obviously there are too few now resulting in being even more highly selective based on who can and who cannot afford tutoring etc.

If some of the children in my year at school (many from less supportive family backgrounds, to put it mildly) had been able to access a grammar school opportunity, there’s no doubt in my mind they’d have been more successful in life.

You wanted to send your dc to ‘academic student factories’? I’m sure your dc are thrilled that successive fee increases have put that out of your reach!

If private education was a consideration before VAT was added, I’m sure you can manage to afford to move to a grammar area if that floats your boat - of course there’s no guarantee that your dc will get a place though.

For the rest of us on average wages, good state schools do a fantastic job at educating our dc and in our case offer far more subjects and extra curricular activities than our nearest private school which is too small to even field a rugby team. You may be pleasantly surprised.

This is an interesting read if you want a better idea about grammars, the 11+ and why Thatcher rode the tide with continuing to close grammar schools:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/sep/07/thatcher-grammars-poison-theresa-may-tories

The tl;dr is that, essentially, it would have been political suicide not to.

Personally, I don't like private schools (or the idea of private schooling in general) but at the same time it's clear that politics and children's education are a bad mix.

I find it really interesting that the issue seems to be at least in part - that the middle class were once made to feel they weren’t so dissimilar from the rich - private education, lifestyle etc.

Now things have gone backwards again the middle class are suddenly not so different from the working class and have to put up with the same shit.

No wonder they’re unhappy. The fact is the world is set up for the very rich to remain rich. This doesn’t involve upward mobility between the classes.

Cry me a river.

I think it’s more that once those who didn’t come from wealthy backgrounds believed that if they worked incredibly hard, perhaps get a second job or sacrifice by giving up holidays and cars, etc, they would be able to provide a better education for their children through the independent sector. It had always been my hope to be able to do this. Rishi Sunak’s parents would have fallen into this bracket. The independent sector has now priced this group out.

The people I know who send their children to private school are firmly wealthy, or they just send one child, or they are funded by grandparents.

The answer should be to have a better state sector. Where I live, the closest two state secondary schools are below the national average. A lot of local families I know don’t seem to mind this, but it’s a huge problem for me - I do not come from wealth but have had a good life because of my education. I want the same for my children.

In terms of options, the local religious school is oversubscribed, my children are not in a religious feeder school, and my family is not religious. There are two excellent private schools close by, but with VAT added the fees are not affordable even with both parents working full time on professional salaries. There is no state grammar school.

The answer may be to move closer to a better state school catchment but I honestly don’t know where to go. This is the midlands, not the leafy home counties. I expect there are many places around the UK that are like this.

We can blame past governments or the current government but none of that blaming will help me work out what I can do for my children’s education right now.

Also, many mumsnetters are quite flippant in suggesting one can simply move to a better catchment. I have two sets of elderly parents close by who depend on my family. It is not so easy just to shop around for a new life when you have family responsibilities.

@DiamondGoldandSilver I so agree with your comments. And mumsnetters seem to act as though jobs and a daily commute don't exist - "just move closer to a good school". So many things to triangulate. Children and schooling, an affordable nice place to live, elderly parents needs, near friends/familiarity as we need support - and a relatively short commute to work to pay for it all so that all these needs are met. The thing that has fallen for us is schooling. We thought we were buying near a good school. We missed the boat on that one due to changing catchments so the school our children actually got is poor. We had our eye on the private school nearby as it would have been cheaper to pay for that than to move house (stamp duty omg) but with VAT that's totally out of the question. We really don't know where to go now or what to do. The worst thing of all is that our older child is very very bright - astonishingly so, and we feel like we are failing him by giving him a substandard education just because of where we live and all the other things on our plate.

I went to private school, as did DH. Our kids don't. Private schools now seem to offer so many fancy things that they didn't in the past, and to have spent so much on fancy buildings that fees are inevitably way higher than they used to be... so yes, they are now unaffordable to many many more than they used to be.

Yes, it is a shame. Fees were already ridiculously high. The VAT is even more upsetting as this is money already taxed for most high earners at 45 percent. Anyway, you are right to be ranting. I also find annoying how people suggest that you move to a good catchment area. Like it is that easy. In fact apparently are not enough places available as reported by parents moving to state this year and next year. Hopefully you find a way to make something work for your family.

I have cousins who went to private school for primary and secondary…they are now a nurse and an art teacher. I just think that was the biggest waste of money to be honest!I would have expected a lot more…

It's not even that @DiamondGoldandSilver , I just wanted to offer my kids the same level of education that I enjoyed! I wasn't really aiming all that high.

For all the MNs that seem to think state education is great - it's often not. It's the same for us as many others - a handful of good schools are surrounded in a sea of crap (or at best, average) ones.

If criticising ambition and ability makes you a snob then I guess I'm a snob. It's just a shame so many parents stick up for dreadful public services.

I definitely agree with pp that this has had a big impact because some of the middle classes are now on the wrong side of the privilege wall, inequality wasn’t such of an issue when they were on the right side….

Salaries are generally crap in the UK and housing is very expensive. PE has seen huge inflation before the VAT increases.

@sherbsy you aren’t wrong for wanting a good education for your dc though.

I understand what you mean on the inflation. I went to a small private school in the 90s, no flashy facilities, and my friends’ parents weren’t super wealthy. It cost about £1000 a term, and I also had a scholarship for most of my time there that was worth £1000 a year. Now the same school is £6000 a term, and the scholarship I had still exists, but remains at £1000 a year.

Although we have a good income, we have 3 kids and there is just no way we could afford it (and seeing others with kids at private schools I wonder how they manage it).

Having said that, my older two are both in different state high schools, neither are selective or especially well regarded ones, but both are happy and doing well.

I was at a decent private school in the 80s and 90s and whilst I have a good clutch of exam results under my belt and went to a good university, I don't feel I've done "better" than many of my contemporaries who were at state.

My children go state (we could never afford private) and seem to be doing ok. We have the ability to spot when they're struggling and last year my youngest had a general tutor as I felt was she falling behind. I guess a private school may have spotted this sooner but the state school did put measures in place to help too.

Your old school sounds expensive. A very good private one here (Solihull) charges about £16k for secondary per year. Maybe shop around for a less fancy one.

I have read that private school fees have increased by an average of 55% over the last decade, with some schools increasing their fees by 10% a year. It's not the government that has priced out the middle classes: it's the schools themselves.

It's likely that the parents priced out by VAT may not have been able to afford a full seven years of secondary education anyway.

If my partner and I had been born 30 years earlier but done the same jobs, we would have been able to afford private school. I have a few privately-educated friends in the OP's position. I'm grateful that I wasn't, in a way, as this way it doesn't feel that I'm giving my kids 'worse' than what I myself had.

@AnnieRegent that sounds about right from what I have seen - when we looked at private school 12 years ago when our eldest was starting reception I think it was about £4k per term, now £6k before the VAT increase is applied.

Agree on all counts.

I think the private schools have basically killed their own market, by pricing out their core customers. As another poster said - in the arms race to attract more and weather pupils.

Plus - I think the next generation of potential pupils’ parents, are spending so much more of their disposable income on housing now… there just isn’t space for school fees. Thinking about when I was at school - housing was so much cheaper, I’d imagine a lot of parents would have no / small mortgage by secondary, or could remortgage to pay the fees.

Fees have rises far, far above inflation. And the schools aren’t doing that well - I’ve seen (in particular prep) schools closing, going co-ex etc locally. I just don’t think they can find the pupil numbers.

I live in a fairly wealthy part of London and I’ve only known of one person going private for prep. No one else is able to justify the cost - looking at more like ~£21-25k prep fees now, and up to £30k at secondary. You have to be very, very well off to feel confident you can afford that.

The average parent I know locally probably has a high household income, but also didn’t buy a house or have a kid till their mid-30s so they don’t have masses of cash floating about. A small house is £1m+ - and they probably haven’t had the mortgage that long.

VAT might just be the straw that breaks the camels back for these schools - but it’s largely a problem of their own making.

I once read that private school fees have risen 800% since the 1980s. And I read that about ten years ago…

Not true

Yes, I’ve had this conversation with friends. Several of us were privately educated, and are now in the same kinds of jobs as our parents were - doctors, dentists, senior civil servants, head teachers - but none of us can afford private school for our kids. The only people I know who send their kids to private school do so because their parents pay - so those parents have paid for two generations. Though it’s not just the increase in private school fees - mortgages for smaller houses at bigger proportion of pay makes a huge difference too!

Well yes, for people used to privilege then equality does seem unjust.

The subject of private schools is always going to be a bit contentious but I think that just focusing on affordability of private schools is missing the point. Take a step back and look at the cost of everything compared to 25 years ago. Wages haven't kept up. The standard of living has gone down massively. It used to be the case that professionals could afford a decent house, holidays, private education, meals out etc. the only people I know who have a comfortable life now either work in finance or bought their house in the 90s or early 00's