'Please indicate what sacrifices you have made or will be making in order to contribute towards school fees.'

[thirdistheonewiththehairychest]

We are applying for a bursary for dd to attend a nearby private school as our local state school is terrible and she's bright enough to get in with a scholarship/bursary combination. The school has bursaries specifically available for bright local kids who wouldn't otherwise be able to afford the fees. That's us. There is no way in a million years that we would afford it otherwise and I have no idea how to answer the question in the title of this thread, which we are required to fill in on the form.

• We already run an incredibly tight budget (shop in aldi, rely on hand-me-downs, cut our own hair etc)
• We live in the dodgy end of town with virtually no scope to downsize to another area. Any move would likely make us worse off!
• We have virtually no savings, just enough to cover emergency scenarios
• We never holiday abroad. Even when we holiday in the UK it usually involves staying with relatives/friends to keep the cost down
• We drive one crappy car with all the challenges that entails (breakdowns, kids relying on public transport on the days I take the car to work)

Is there anything I've missed?

The only thing that they might pick up on is that we give a lot to charity (at least it's a lot in proportion to what we have). We're Christians and believe strongly that it's our moral duty to give to those less fortunate than ourselves. Might this be identified by the admissions department as an unnessary expense on our part?

I'm struggling to know what other things they might expect us to do?

Last year we went ski-ing in Slovenia, instead of our usual favourite Chamonix Mt Blanc.

Never again, though, some things are just too important.

@Placido

I would give your contribution to the school - it is a charity after all?

Whilst private schools may have charitable status, I don't think anyone could really argue that the school's contribution to wider society is in any way equal to a "proper" charity?

@SE13Mummy I wouldn't feel too deprived if I was you, it is a TINY proportion of the nation's children that get bursaries. 7% of children go to private school so how many bursary children are there in reality?
As a middle class, involved, educated, affluent parent (you might not feel affluent, but believe me you are richer than you can imagine to the vast majority of the population) your DC are going to be just fine so I would hop off the pity pot pretty quick if I was you.

@TwigTheWonderKid
I was being a mite ironic I confess.

@puffyisgood
Dahling I wish you had told us, you could have come to Verbs with us, although it would have been a bit tight as only 15 bedrooms and I only managed to get two Italian au pairs to come with this year and they won't work nearly as hard as the Romanian ones, so we actually had to ski with our children which was a complete bummer. Honestly though, everyone was there.

I sold our Florida beach house on the private island.
Admittedly that was for Uni costs, but similar in principle.

@Placido I don't feel deprived; I was expressing empathy with another poster.

A goat

@Curtainpoleofdoom

A goat

Only this answer is acceptable

If you still want to go for it, tell them what you said here. You will continue to go without family holidays and maintain one car. If there’s nothing that can be done to increase your income then you can choose whether or not to tell them that.

How much do you want the place?

I agree that what you describe is how (suitably paraphrased!) you answer this question; think in terms of answering "why there isn't anything else we can do to release anything more for fees".

You do sound like good bursary candidates and I hope it works out for your daughter. From our experience some level of charitable giving hasn't been an issue, if the bursar is concerned then there will be a conversation to be had and hopefully a mutually acceptable conclusion.

In terms of housing equity, the attitude of school bursars to this varies depending on the size of their bursary pot and the policies they are able to apply to how they prioritise its distribution. One school we applied to, the company doing the home visits told me we wouldn't qualify for anything due to the value of our house, that school applied an absolute cap (which was fairly unrealistic in our non-London expensive bit of the SE), despite this company trying to suggest otherwise. But that school was more limited than older public schools in the size of their pot. You sound like you would have had a good chance for a large bursary there.

We have had two children on boarding school bursaries. One school was able to offer us more than the other while we had two at school; the total has been manageable but only just. We do have a substantial amount of equity in our house but it is reasonably valued for where we live, and I doubt we would have been eligible for an increased mortgage. We have explained that on our forms and never been pressured to release more or downsize.

The question was also asked, but very sensitively, why I appeared to have a professional qualification that I wasn't using for income. (long story including a period of poor mental health) I understand that these schools do expect both parents to be doing what they can to increase household income, within reason.

It is very interesting seeing how these forms are worded. Most are extremely thorough and certainly some of the lines of question indicate that parents with greater means have had interesting approaches to trying to get support in the past!

I don’t know what they’re expecting of you in the answer but this would put me right off.. if your child is bright & has a lot to offer the school community; I think it’s a bit outrageous of them to have really high demands about ‘sacrifices’..! I would be put off by this as it implies a shit culture & sounds like you aren’t deserving enough of the place. Agree you shouldn’t be giving to charity then asking for charity in return… there must be a middle ground between terrible state school & this?? X

Thank you everyone. There are some really interesting comments here which have been food-for-thought.

We have not been asked for any kind of breakdown of our outgoings so we have decided not to make a big thing about the charitable giving. We will obviously be open about it if they ask, but I doubt they will even notice it as an extra expense on our part as I think the amount we give to charity is probably about equal to the amount we would spend on clothes/haircuts/normal spending if we were to choose to live less frugally.

The school also makes quite a big thing about instilling compassion within their pupils, giving them a sense of social responsibility and generosity etc ...so I reckon they wouldn't look too harshly on charitable giving as a sacrificial expense. I dunno, maybe I'm kidding myself there!