What would you/do you play for private school tuition?

[kamilla626]

I'll also post this in the finance/frugality forum.

I am looking into a private school in my city for dd for when she's school-age. She's only 3.5 now, but we're looking at all the options.

A school in our city which looks amazing charges $9000 for Kindergarten. Their website doesn't list any prices, I emailed the school and asked them. But I have no sense of whether that's a "good" price or not.

What do other schools charge?

[blsilva]

Most of the schools in our area, when I looked in to it, charged about $5000 for part-time kindergarten. Is the $9000 for part time/full time? I think it may be a little steep for part time kindergarten, but for a full-time school day, it seems to be right on par with the ones near me.

[kamilla626]

It's full day kindergarten. If I were paying every week of the year it would work out to be about $175 - which actually doesn't sound that bad. I just don't have anything to compare to yet.

[A&A]

$5000 for first through sixth grades. Not sure what the Kindergarten price is, though.

[BookGoddess]

That sounds about right for my area if you're talking about full-time. There's a wonderful school I've had my eye on for some time. Even thought DD is only 16 months now, I've been scoping the schools around here. The tuition to this amazing school is..*gulp*...$10,000/year! And that's the price right now. I imagine it will go up in another 5 years.

[Mirzam]

My DS's school fees are $7,400 for K/1st/2nd grades. This is cheaper than most of the other private schools in the area which can go as high as $16,000. The local Waldorf school is $10,000.

[Flor]

Ds's Montessori is 5000 year for full time. That's on the cheaper side of private schools in the county. The one I went to is now 10,000-12,000 a year.

[Kirsten]

We pay $10,800 per year - full time. Per kid.... I have three - two of whom are there (dd3 is in co-op preschool at $62 a month!) So our yearly tuition is just under $20,000 (sibling discount) for private school for two kids. (One in first grade, one in fifth.) By the time dd3 is old enough to go, we'll be paying over $30,000 per year. There is only one or two years of overlap with all three - depending on whether dd3 goes there for kindergarten or not until 1st grade.

And it is worth every penny. I feel like we should do one of those "uniforms - $300, books and materials fees - $500, an education like this - priceless" commercials. Every parent in our school feels like we have hit the educational lotto. If there are ten teachers this amazing in the entire country, I'd be very, very surprised.

[oyemicanto]

We are paying $3700 for 1/2 day kindy. Next year tuition goes to about $6K

[alisonsvw]

i pay 230.00 per month 10 months a year for full time first grade

[Evan&Anna's_Mom]

We paid $12,000 per year for a full-day K and 12,500 for 1st. It goes up each year, plus whatever cost increases they add. Well, that's what the tuition is, we actually only pay about 1/3 of it, plus some payment-in-kind. Thank God for financial aid.

[CharlieBrown]

I would have paid $15,400 per child for this year but withdrew my girls just before school started. private year round montessori with no extra fees.

[UUMom]

oops

[Katie Bugs Mama]

We pay $11,000 for full-day kindergarten. The tuition includes before and after care (if you want it) and lunch. The price is the same for all grades.

Around here, Catholic schools are about $6,000 for kinderrgarten, and the more "prestigious" private schools are $16,000 to $19,000 for kindergarten.

[teachma]

Originally Posted by cgmom

We are paying $3700 for 1/2 day kindy. Next year tuition goes to about $6K

This is what I pay for three half days/week of preschool! It's a lot.

[The Lucky One]

About $3500 per year for grades Pre-K-6 at our Catholic school.

If you don't mind me asking, how do you people afford yearly tuitions of $16000 per child?

[Katie Bugs Mama]

Originally Posted by The Lucky One

About $3500 per year for grades Pre-K-6 at our Catholic school.

If you don't mind me asking, how do you people afford yearly tuitions of $16000 per child?

We will probably wind up paying that much or more per year once dd finishes up at our "inexpensive" $11,000/year school. I don't know how exactly we will do it, but it will probably involve me going to work full time. It's one of the reasons that we will probably stop at one child. Sigh.

[dinade]

Well we couldn't afford a private school. The ones in our area are about 500/mo . My son goes to a magnet school and we're pretty happy with it. If I needed private school I would homeschool as again we don't have the money for private school. we have an adoption to pay for instead.

[jkpmomtoboys]

I've always wondered this about private school. If you send your child to a non-religious private school, do you do so because the schools in your neighborhoods are not good or the schools offer something that the neighborhood school doesn't?

[Mirzam]

Originally Posted by jkpmomtoboys

I've always wondered this about private school. If you send your child to a non-religious private school, do you do so because the schools in your neighborhoods are not good or the schools offer something that the neighborhood school doesn't?

I have one child in private school, one in public high school and homeschool the other. We chose to send DS to the private school (we decided on hsing DD at the same time) because the teachers are awesome and the level of consciousness of the school, it's board of directors, teachers and parents are way above anything at public school. The school is a labor of love for those that started it. It is based on the Buddhist Shambhala teachings and the have the lofty aim of educating children so that they will truly make a difference in this world. My 9 year old DD would love to attend too, but they are a new school and only go up to 2nd grade and she is an "old" 3rd grader. They plan to add a grade a year, so she is going to miss out unfortunately.