How elite private schools pocketed an extra $71m in funding

Victoria’s 40 most elite private schools raked in millions from donations and investments in 2022 on top of taxpayer-funded dollars, while state school funding is in crisis.

Victoria’s 40 most elite private schools earned an additional $71m from donations and investments in 2022 on top of generous government funding, a new analysis has found.

Such funding is not counted as income by state and federal governments, allowing the same schools to attract $360m in taxpayer-funded dollars in the same year, the Herald Sun can reveal.

It comes amid a crisis in state school funding, with only 1.3 per cent of government schools funded at their full level.

The school with the most generous benefactors is Xavier College, a Catholic boys’ school in Kew which attracted $6.9m in donations in 2022- the latest figures available.

The school with the most generous benefactors is Xavier College.

This is followed by Melbourne Grammar with $5.1m, Bialik College with $4.5m, Geelong Grammar with $4.1m and Scotch College with $3.8m.

About $65m out of the $71m total is earned by the top 20 schools, illustrating the concentration of wealth in a small number of Victorian schools.

Many such schools use donations to pay for capital works as well as scholarships.

The top schools are also attracting handsome payments from investments, with Melbourne Grammar and Geelong Grammar netting an additional $6m a year each.

Scotch College attracted $3.8m in donations. Picture: Tony Gough

Many of the biggest private schools are also able to draw an income from facilities such as pools, aquatic centres and sporting grounds funded in part by generous parent donations.

These include Presbyterian Ladies College which earned an additional $1.2m hiring out its facilities, along with Melbourne Grammar ($855,000) and Bialik College ($420,000).

Fourteen of these schools have parents with a median family income of more than $260,000 a year.

In a draft report released last November, the Productivity Commission recommended ending tax deductibility for donations to school building funds. It argued the benefits of such donations accrue to individuals connected with the school such as students, parents and alumni rather than providing a wider community benefit.

However, this has been ruled out by the federal government.

Geelong Grammar is netting an additional $6m a year from investments.

Trevor Cobbold from the state school lobby group Save Our Schools accused the government of continuing “special funding privilege for private schools but refusing to guarantee the rightful funding of public schools”.

“It is a shameful double standard that will entrench the resource gulf between rich and poor,” he said.

The Australian Education Union has called on the federal government to commit to ensuring all state schools are fully funded.

AEU federal president Correna Haythorpe said only 1.3 per cent of public schools were resourced at 100 per cent of the school resource standard, which is the minimum level governments have agreed they require to meet the needs of their students.

Minister for Education Jason Clare said the government was “working with my state and territory colleagues to get all government schools to their full and fair funding level”.

“Some non-government schools are funded above their Commonwealth share of 80 per cent, and these schools will transition down by 2029,” he said.