Boarding school fees on the rise
The Weekly Times’ annual review of school fees, published in Education, has found the cost of secondary education has gone up year on year, but there is a huge divide between city and country price hikes.
THE cost of sending a child to boarding school in Victoria has gone up by an average of 2.8 per cent in the past year, with the steepest increases in city schools while regional schools have worked to keep rates low.
The Weekly Times’ annual review of school fees, published in Education magazine today, reveals the average combined tuition and boarding fee for Year 12 students in Victoria is more than $48,000 a year.
The most affordable boarding education in the state is at Monivae College in Hamilton, where no increases have been made for the past three years and fees are $22,850 a year for Year 12s.
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Closer to Melbourne, fees top $72,000 a year at the state’s most expensive school.
Annual hikes of more than 3 per cent are common in Melbourne schools, while regional boarding schools have increased fees by less than 2 per cent on average.
Australian Boarding Schools Association chief executive Richard Stokes said the rises were “all about covering staff costs”.
“It comes down to parental expectation,” he said. “The schools that have had to put their fees up have done so because the parents are expecting them to provide a bigger service.”
He said wages in the education sector had increased dramatically in the past five years.
Monivae principal Jonathan Rowe said the Western District catholic school worked hard to keep rates as low as possible, while still expanding curriculum and facilities.
“First and foremost is that we try and make sure we are accessible to parents and families,” Mr Rowe said. “We may be able to do it again because of COVID in particular … so we’re not going to put anyone off thinking about coming to Monivae.”
In contrast to Monivae holding fees steady, prestigious Geelong Grammar School bumped up its combined tuition and boarding fee by 3 per cent, to $72,040 a year, which is an annual increase of $2100.
In addition to Geelong Grammar, Year 12 fees top $60,000 a year at seven Melbourne independent schools.
Of these, Melbourne Girls Grammar increased Year 12 rates by just 1.4 per cent this year, or $904, while Presbyterian Ladies’ College hiked its Year 12 rate to $63,976, a year-on-year climb of 6.29 per cent, or $3784.
Due to coronavirus disruption, however, many independent schools have given discounts of 15-20 per cent on term 2 fees this year. Boarding fees have also been waived for the weeks when boarding houses were shut.
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