Independependent school fees so cheap?

[nicp123]

Just checked the fees charged by some local independent schools in my area, and wonder if I am correct. The average price per term is around £ 2.500. Does it mean £ 7.500 per academic year? It can't be true

Aye, I know what you mean

Because when they go to prep, it seriously can be (and was for us) much cheaper than the childcare bills we'd had.

But it is a long term commitment though.

Good luck

but they may do scholarships Verity?

so 52.5K for primary plus 77K for secondary then uni

plus extras - uniform, trips, equipment keeping up with the Jones

GULP

then potentially professional exams

I reckon if you were to educate one child privately through to being a solicitor (assuming a law degree) it's around £200k. Per child.

Fortunately the independent schooling thing isn't obligatory

When you add in extras I used to pay about double the fees.Buses, lunches, music etc

our extras are around 500 per term.

Books are an extra

Bit of a hijack here ......Do any of you get unexpected fee hikes? Are they allowed to do that? A riend of mine has just got a letter that says the fees are going up by another 1,500 a year. I thought they usually did this in September. She is rather distraught.

Why on earth don't you send them to state schools, then?

I can understand at secondary level, where although the costs are greater, the choice of good state schools is smaller (or non-existent in some areas) and the rewards in terms of exam results might make it seem value-for-money in a longer-term sense.

But primary school? It's not as though the local primary kids are going to be carrying weapons or engaging in underage sex - well not in most cases, anyway.

Other than the desire to prevent dear Tristan from actually meeting any nasty poor childen, is there actually any real benefit to private prep over (a good) state primary?

Just seems an utter waste of money to me.

My opinion is different. Not waste of money if the child/adult ratio are appropriate. I believe that in this country 28 children X two or even three adults per class are not appropriate in primary schools. The independent school I am choosing for my child offers 1 teacher per 5 children, which is similar with how I was educated. We do not stereotype 'poor children', nor judge them. My child went to an infant community school, and I must say that no children carried weapons, nor engaged in sex. However, all the staff looked over tired, stressed, and although the school has an outstanding report, the noise levels and the over crowded classrooms did put me off when I was helping in the classrooms. We are all different, therefore, we want our children to be looked after, and educated in different ways. I don't think in one size fits all.

Kindle - ours rise pretty steeply once you leave pre-prep, bit of a lull in Year 3-4 then goes up. It's not as if it isn't published it's just that if you don't look ahead you get a shock when it arrives IYSWIM.

Thats a fairly normal price at pre prep and prep stage but fairly cheep for secondry education.

Granted - that all rather depends whether you have a good state primary near you I'm afraid. There are no guarantees that there are.

Also some prep schools are feeders for secondary indies and you stand little/no chance of getting in there unless you've been to the right prep so good local state primary may still lead to shite local state secondary.