Private school fees (merged)

Rikki

suzybaby2001 wrote: »

Hello,
I've been off work sick for the last few days and have been following this thread//heated debate with interest. I didn't want to jump in to all this, but I wanted to express my experiences on this subject. I say experiences as I am in no way prejudiced about what school/background people come from.


Anyway, myself and my two good friends all got the same degree classification at the end of uni. I really think that a good state school can be as good as a private school, and I'll leave things there. We're all toddling along in the "nearly new graduate" rat race with similar jobs, no one is particularly doing any better than anyone else in our little group. I hope i don't cause offence to anyone by telling my story but I just wanted to share this.

Congratulations and good luck for the future.:T

These [strike]arguments[/strike] debates are always fun and heated but thats because mse is made up with such diverse range of people.

As long as its only words on a thread and its not rude then everything should be okay and I will join in. If it becomes name calling and abusive, I ignore and leave.

Don't apologise for having an opinion and wanting to voice it. :cool:

Lunar_Eclipse

suzybaby2001 wrote: »

one of which was on the same course as me. We realised that she (who'd been to private school from nursery) had been given a lower offer than me for the same course, it was almost as if the university didn't even want me there!

Thank you for sharing your story and I'm sorry you had those upsetting experiences at uni.

I just wanted to say that your findings re: the offers for you and your friend will be based on many factors and was not personal.

Additionally, it is not uncommon for universities now to lower the offer grades required to those in the state sector, because of the high standards in the private sector. It is much less likely for someone to get 3 or 4 A grades at A level in an average comprehensive, than at a good private school, thus this is done to reinstate some form of balance.

Your Dad sounds lovely.

borntobefree

suzybaby2001 wrote: »

I hope i don't cause offence to anyone by telling my story but I just wanted to share this.

I'm sure there are alot of people who can relate to everything you've said - it's a jungle out there to be sure:D

Lunar_Eclipse

borntobefree wrote: »

I am almost speechless. This is a horrible way to describe any children.:mad: Are you a troll as you seem to have little to the debate?

:rotfl:

It is a horrible description. But then you reply by asking if the poster is a troll and adding that they are not offering much to the debate. :rolleyes:

Dick_here

borntobefree wrote: »

I am almost speechless. This is a horrible way to describe any children.:mad: Are you a troll as you seem to have little to the debate?

I only speak the truth.

Rikki

Can we debate fox hunting again. Thats always good for an influx of abuse and nasty comments.

Is it only privately educated toffs who do it or the farmers?

posh*spice

!!!!!!_here wrote: »

I only speak the truth.

You mean blind prejudice with a large dose of ignorance.;)

meester

As the other thread on this is trashed by debates on the merits of private schools, I thought I would start another one.

Please do NOT respond if you are not commenting on either reducing school fees or saving and budgeting for them. I.e. not whether you should spend your money on fees but how, having decided to do so, you should plan it.

---
Anyway.

If you start at age 4, you are looking at about £7k a year in the South East. This is for reception, year 1, and year 2. This rises to about £9k in year 3-6. From year 7-11 it is about £11k/year.

This sounds like a lot of money, and it is.

But, there is a good deal of financial help available for poorer parents.

For instance, nearly all secondary schools (and plenty of prep/primary schools too) will have academic scholarships. This is for the most able children. Depending on the school this could be up to 100% off the fees, but it is often 50%. There are often not just academic, but musical and sporting scholarships.

Apart from this nearly all schools have bursaries for parents who are not wealthy.

For instance, City of London School state:

A Sponsored Award will usually cover the full tuition fees if parental joint income is less than £25,000 per annum. If gross parental joint income exceeds £25,000, any award will be for less than full fees and, under normal circumstances, no award will be made where gross parental joint income exceeds £50,000 per annum.

Even if your income is very low, if your child is very able the school will be likely keen to help, as they often have a fair bit of money from endowments and as part of their charitable remit. So it's worth approaching one or more schools and explaining your financial circumstances and asking how much you would have to pay. Plenty of parents from less well-off families can get through the entire 5-18 of education without paying for things.

If you fall into the 'middling income' bracket where you can afford to pay, but you will have to make sacrifices and plan, it's worth looking at the cost in advance. School fees are notorious for rising above inflation, mostly due to government action, this seems to have calmed down a bit, it's fair to say they are still going to rise higher than other prices, say RPI + 2%, or approx 5% PA.

There are various companies offering fee planning services, from what I have read they seem to be mostly hot air. Apart from regular savings and investment they do not offer anything special.

There are of course life insurance implications as well, in the sense that assuming £7k for years R,1,2, £9k for 3,4,5,6 and £11k for 7-13, then you are going to need to find about £135k (of today's money) to pay the bills. So with two children aged 3, you would need £300k to educate them to 18.

Of course if you START with a good lump sum, you can look to invest it to provide income to pay for school fees for your child to age 18.

The issue to me, is that you are generally not going to have long to save. If your child is newborn, you have 4 years to save before the fees arrive.

I would tend to adopt the approach that if you are going to be stretched financially by school fees (and I really would speak to the school first, to see about bursaries and discounts), you should start living as if you are already paying the fees. So £7k/year will go nicely into one person's ISA allowance (£3,600 in cash, and £3,600 into a share ISA (which doesn't have to be in 'shares'). This at least gives you three or four years of much-needed savings for essential expenses, and a chance for small overspend in later years without getting into debt, and not least the fact you will learn whether it is actually possible for you to live on that amount of money. And of course money saved is brilliant. Most people have a tiny amount of savings. You are highly unlikely to regret not having spent all your cash!

Dick_here

posh*spice wrote: »

You mean blind prejudice with a large dose of ignorance.;)

Not at all. First hand experience of it, sadly.

meester

posh*spice wrote: »

So you don't think that a child will do better in a classroom which isn't constantly disrupted by feral kids ? .

OMG unbelievable:o

Are you really so ignorant of the country we live in?

http://www.liverpooldailypost.co.uk/liverpool-news/regional-news/2008/01/18/liverpool-judge-demands-end-to-bail-for-feral-youths-64375-20364557/

A SENIOR Liverpool judge last night hit out at law-makers, left-wing intellectuals and well-meaning do-gooders who force judges to release “feral and lawless youths” into communities on bail.
Judge Ian Trigger launched his heart-felt tirade as he sentenced a 19-year-old youth who smashed a woman on the head with an iron bar while on bail for knifing a man in the back.
He was speaking just a day after three youths were convicted of the murder of Warrington father-of-three Garry Newlove, 47.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/merseyside/7085654.stm

Two Cheshire teenagers who terrorised a vulnerable man before beating him to death and throwing his body in a river, have had their life sentences cut.

Craig Dodd, aged 17, will now serve a minimum of three-and-a-half years in prison and Ryan Palin, 15, three years. The pair were dubbed as "feral" when they were jailed for life for the manslaughter of Raymond Atherton, 40, in Warrington.
They beat and urinated on Mr Atherton before dumping him in the River Mersey.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/manchester/4554611.stm
Gangs of feral youths are rampaging in cities around the country, a senior police officer investigating an attack by a teenage gang has warned.

Chief Superintendent David Baines said the gangs "don't give a damn about the police or the criminal justice system".
His comments follow an attack on a father-of-four by youths he confronted outside his Greater Manchester home. Phillip Carroll, 48, suffered serious head injuries after challenging the gang who had thrown a stone at his car.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/08/25/nferal25.xml
A judge described a group of teenagers who taunted a man suffering from autism as "feral" and said their conduct suggested they had missed out on "several thousand years of civilisation".

There are plenty more.

And even the ones that aren't stabbing people, are fairly described as feral.

Here's a couple of anecdotes for you:

http://tomisswithlove.blogspot.com/2008/04/are-parents-only-ones-to-blame.html
http://tomisswithlove.blogspot.com/2008/04/sitting-down.html

Feral for sure. 100% feral.

Children that won't even sit down, they behave like animals. They are of course human beings, but they are not civilized ones. Disgusting.