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It varies from family to family, like everything else. Some haves inheritances or help from grandparents. Most seem to live below the living standard their income would afford without the school expenses.
I think you are just selecting the wrong private schools. A competitive private school doesn't emphasize conformity - it is simply accustomed to some degree of uniformity of its student body based on the population it is intended to serve. A kid with LDs will absolutely thrive at a place like Winston or Shelton here in Dallas but that same kid won't be well served by a competitive private school which is not expected to serve kids with those needs. For most of the better private schools in Dallas, I have heard plenty of complaints about "fit" but few about actual quality.
I would also say that yes, public schools in DFW will be overwhelmingly better than in NC. Teachers in North Carolina start at absurd salaries like $25k (it might be slightly higher now due to inflation, but it is LOW). You cannot expect competent teachers to be saints and suffer with low incomes forever just because children there deserve a good education. Most of the talented ones move on when they can no longer endure the disrespect and the low pay.
Yes, but we can't afford that kind of tuition. And sacrificing on our house or vacation or cars (as previous poster suggested) isn't going to add up to $25,000 a year, especially times two kids.
Just pointing that for years I was scared of public schools and insisted on private, when in our case there was no need to fear them. We aren't failing our kids by choosing public schools. We don't value their education less because we choose public schools.
Interesting conversation given we live in WP and my kids *would* go to Plano West.
I was totally happy with that idea. I went to Plano. It's a great district. And I get to live in my town near my relatives. We spent 5 years trying to buy the perfect house (and finally realized perfection cost $200k more than we wanted to spend, but we went for it).
We love our home (rare half acre lot in the best of WP, Creek, greenbelt, neighbors spaced away), we love the location, and who doesn't love these schools?
Win win win.
Till I did more research. And started to see and realize stuff I didn't care for.
This isn't the PISD of 25 years ago.
When I went, there was already the smell of spoiled, bratty, entitled kids. They compared us to BH90210 in the 90s. Now the smell is a festering stench. Not only that, the academic excellence and competition has turned into a full on blown up rat race. Gaming GPA? Picking courses for padding rather than focusing on interests? Tiger this and that?
I had to sit back and reevaluate. I had little doubt about my son's ability to compete.
But what kind of environment did I want for him? A rat race conveyor belt? Something I grew to despise when I switched from private school to the best publics in California and Texas? Something that turned my love of school and learning into dread (and then apathy)?
Filling his day with 50 activities and then watching him stay up till midnight doing homework just to keep up?
We applied to Greenhill bc it felt like the school I went to as a kid. Small, caring, nurturing, diverse (I went to an international school run by the U.N.).
He LOVES it there. Literally gets upset if he can't go.
We don't make $500k a year. We're one income but thanks to some shrewd business moves and crazy saving, we have no debt. Sending him (and hopefully our daughter) will eat up most of our take home income, but it's worth it.
When my older son was a toddler we were faced with the choice of either staying where we were or moving to Dallas to be closer to my parents and a lot of our friends. We thought long and hard about it and ended up staying where we were because the cost of living was much lower than a comparative area in Dallas and doing anything seemed like much more work and much more stressful. My long-time friends who lived in Dallas talked about making sure you signed up for mommy and me classes as soon as they opened and waiting lists for the best preschools. My new friends in Arlington seemed less stressed and more laid back. None of them needed nannies and most of them could live a decent middle class lifestyle on one income until their kids started school full-time. Many of them went back to work then because they were bored or because they wanted to add to the retirement or college savings. It wasn't to survive though. I ended up staying put instead of moving to Dallas.
I'm glad we did because we discovered eventually that public school wouldn't be a good fit for our older son. He is a 2e kid who struggles mightily in larger classes, a combination that many public schools, the local ones included, don't support. We were lucky enough to find a top tier private K-8 school in Fort Worth that fits him very well. It's not a special needs school but the school structure suits him and the classes max out at 15. His class right now has 10 students so the teachers can make the accommodations he needs without an IEP. THe school isn't cheap but it costs about $11,000.00 less to send my two children there than to Greenhill. That's a lot of money for us. As for conformity, that isn't liked at my sons' school. The head of school often says that treating every child the same isn't fair because they aren't the same and he means it. It works though at a school with smaller classes though because the the head of school and the support staff are able to get to know each child and thus what their unique needs are. At middle school graduation the head of school tells an anecdote that he feels sums up that child's experience at the school no matter how long or short that time was. He does it off the cuff and it's always something very personal about that student. You don't see that at a much larger school.
Always lots of talk regarding the elite private schools (i.e. St. Marks, Hockaday, Greenhill, ESD, ect...) on this forum. These are unquestionably great schools but they're very expensive. Tuition runs around $25k-$30k per kid, and from what I've read, anyone making six figures and above does not receive much or any financial aid.
So for 2 kids, tuition runs $50-60k per year. Since tuition is not tax deductible, it would take nearly $80-90k of pre-tax income assuming a 35% tax rate, just to pay for tuition. Over 13 years, one would pay at least $325k per kid, assuming no tuition increases. With tuition increasing higher than inflation and the time value of money, it will ultimately cost well over $1M to send 2 kids to private school.
My question is how much income does it take to afford this? The only people I know who send their kids to these schools are likely grossing around 7 figures or have several times that in the bank already, but that's not really a representative sample to draw conclusions upon. Other than those students receiving financial aid, are all parents either making $400-$500k+, independently wealthy, or just flat broke? Even at an income of $500k/yr, two kids in private school is a significant percentage of income.
Just curious how people are making this work.
You'd be surprised how many people have extended family, i.e., grandparents, helping with the tuition bills. My grandma paid my high school tuition because she had the discretionary income and wanted me to have a better education than what she had in a Christian environment.
That's one of the reasons why schools such as ESD have grandparents' day. They know the grandparents are sometimes helping with the tuition bill and want them to feel engaged with the school.
You'd be surprised how many people have extended family, i.e., grandparents, helping with the tuition bills. My grandma paid my high school tuition because she had the discretionary income and wanted me to have a better education than what she had in a Christian environment.
That's one of the reasons why schools such as ESD have grandparents' day. They know the grandparents are sometimes helping with the tuition bill and want them to feel engaged with the school.
My friend's parents are footing the entire bill for their kid.
Interesting conversation given we live in WP and my kids *would* go to Plano West.
I was totally happy with that idea. I went to Plano. It's a great district. And I get to live in my town near my relatives. We spent 5 years trying to buy the perfect house (and finally realized perfection cost $200k more than we wanted to spend, but we went for it).
We love our home (rare half acre lot in the best of WP, Creek, greenbelt, neighbors spaced away), we love the location, and who doesn't love these schools?
Win win win.
Till I did more research. And started to see and realize stuff I didn't care for.
This isn't the PISD of 25 years ago.
When I went, there was already the smell of spoiled, bratty, entitled kids. They compared us to BH90210 in the 90s. Now the smell is a festering stench. Not only that, the academic excellence and competition has turned into a full on blown up rat race. Gaming GPA? Picking courses for padding rather than focusing on interests? Tiger this and that?
I had to sit back and reevaluate. I had little doubt about my son's ability to compete.
But what kind of environment did I want for him? A rat race conveyor belt? Something I grew to despise when I switched from private school to the best publics in California and Texas? Something that turned my love of school and learning into dread (and then apathy)?
Filling his day with 50 activities and then watching him stay up till midnight doing homework just to keep up?
We applied to Greenhill bc it felt like the school I went to as a kid. Small, caring, nurturing, diverse (I went to an international school run by the U.N.).
He LOVES it there. Literally gets upset if he can't go.
We don't make $500k a year. We're one income but thanks to some shrewd business moves and crazy saving, we have no debt. Sending him (and hopefully our daughter) will eat up most of our take home income, but it's worth it.
It seems you are comparing high school experience to elementary school, all Highschool students who try to get into top 20 schools or even honors programs of decent state schools, have to do crazy amount of work and compete. It also depends upon kids. My kids were top students in WP and their friends never asked each other about grades and SAT or college apps, still all ended up in their dream schools.
Interesting conversation given we live in WP and my kids *would* go to Plano West.
I was totally happy with that idea. I went to Plano. It's a great district. And I get to live in my town near my relatives. We spent 5 years trying to buy the perfect house (and finally realized perfection cost $200k more than we wanted to spend, but we went for it).
We love our home (rare half acre lot in the best of WP, Creek, greenbelt, neighbors spaced away), we love the location, and who doesn't love these schools?
Win win win.
Till I did more research. And started to see and realize stuff I didn't care for.
This isn't the PISD of 25 years ago.
When I went, there was already the smell of spoiled, bratty, entitled kids. They compared us to BH90210 in the 90s. Now the smell is a festering stench. Not only that, the academic excellence and competition has turned into a full on blown up rat race. Gaming GPA? Picking courses for padding rather than focusing on interests? Tiger this and that?
I had to sit back and reevaluate. I had little doubt about my son's ability to compete.
But what kind of environment did I want for him? A rat race conveyor belt? Something I grew to despise when I switched from private school to the best publics in California and Texas? Something that turned my love of school and learning into dread (and then apathy)?
Filling his day with 50 activities and then watching him stay up till midnight doing homework just to keep up?
We applied to Greenhill bc it felt like the school I went to as a kid. Small, caring, nurturing, diverse (I went to an international school run by the U.N.).
He LOVES it there. Literally gets upset if he can't go.
We don't make $500k a year. We're one income but thanks to some shrewd business moves and crazy saving, we have no debt. Sending him (and hopefully our daughter) will eat up most of our take home income, but it's worth it.
It seems you are comparing high school experience to elementary school, all Highschool students who try to get into top 20 schools or even honors programs of decent state schools, have to do crazy amount of work and compete. It also depends upon kids. My kids were top students in WP and their friends never asked each other about grades and SAT or college apps, still all ended up in their dream schools. My friends who have competitive kids in Hockaday/SM/GH, some tell same stories of crazy work and competition, others don't.
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