how much do you pay for private school kindergarten/aftercare?

[AnnieW625]

Just curious. I just looked at a Montessori near us that is finally AMS certified:cheerleader1: and now am thinking hmmm maybe this can be an option for DD1 (we do Montessori type stuff at home and she does well with it), but it's $900 a month (including 2/1/2 hrs. of before or afterschool care; full day tution is $725). The Catholic schools we are looking at are about $650 to $700 for both tuition and after care, and the public school for after school care, not including holidays for a kindergartner is $175 a week, so $700 a month.

Does $900 a month seem high? I will still have a baby in daycare full time at $900 a month too.

[happymomma]

That doesn't sound bad at all. In this area that is a great price.

[WolfpackMom]

I would say that's an amazing price for where you are located!

[egoldber]

There is a full time Montessori program near us that is $1100 a month.

We pay about $1000 a month for younger DD for full time care at a Reggio Emilia based program.

Older DD is about $150 a month for before care and $265 a month for after care.

[peanut520]

omg, i'd love to pay 700/mo to send dd to the montessouri school here. when i priced it earlier this year it was 18.5k for preschool.
5 day 9:00-2:30 = 13k (14k for kindergarden)
before and after school care until 4:30pm (my mom would have to pick up) 3.5k
fees = 2k (co-op and activity)
-----------------------------
$1542/ mo

we also have to provide lunch for dd and it would another 1.3k for after school care until 6pm

[YouAreTheFocus]

I think that's a great price. I'm in the bay area and the two montessori schools near us are each ~$1700/mo if you include extended care.

[AnnieW625]

Thank you all for the input. I forgot to add yesterday that right now at daycare I am getting a discount (almost half off) to continue to send DD1 there because DD2 is there full time. I was sort of counting on saving a few hundred dollars a month next year when DD1 starts kindergarten, but if we chose Montessori we'd be paying $1800 a month every month (and just over $2K for months when there are 5 weeks per month) for care/school for both kids so that is where my main concern came from. I think it's kind of a moot point though because DH really wants to do the Catholic education thing (he went to Catholic school through 5th grade), but he did say we could check it out too.

[wimama]

It sounds like you are in a similar place that I was in last year while making a school choice for our DS.

I recently looked at both the local Montessori, Catholic School and Public for our DS. My DH is a graduate of the Catholic school we are now sending our DS to. I am a graduate of the public school system. I wanted to make sure we were making the right choice for our DS and family, and not just send him to the same school as my DH, because DH is an alum.

Our neighborhood Catholic school is quite old and very strong academically. It is easily one of the top 3 Catholic elementary/middle schools in the greater metro area here. Our schools graduates don't seem to have any difficulty getting into the Catholic high schools, which are quite selective in their admissions. And, almost all the graduates go onto college. Many of my son's classmates do have parents who went to the school. The parents all had positive experiences as students there and wanted the same for their kids.

The Montessori school, would have been considerably more expensive for us, compared to the Catholic school we have our son enrolled in. I really like the idea of the Montessori schools. But, an experience of our neighbors children had has stuck in my mind. They had their kids in Montessori and tried to switch them to the public schools (a very good public school). The kids hated it and did not transition well. After a year, they wound up putting their house on the market and moving back to their old neighborhood and going back to their Montessori school. I love the ideas of Montessori education, but I feel that we would want to commit the Montessori school at least until high school. The tuition at the Montessori school is about equal to the cost of the Catholic High Schools here.

Here is the financial break down:

Montessori School: Tuition - $787.50/month, After-school -$372.5/month

Catholic School: Tuition - $ 288.00/month, After-school - $336.00/month (That is the maximum cost of after-school care, we have never paid that much. It is a $5.60/hour fee.)

Public School: Tuition - Free, After-school - Cost of busing him to daycare and after-school care at our old daycare. I ran the numbers and the cost of after-school care and busing from school to daycare about equaled the cost of Catholic School Tuition and Catholic school after-school combined.

So financially we are able to send our DS to Catholic school for what it would cost to send him to public school. I was apprehensive to send him to Montessori because I felt like that was a bigger commitment and didn't work as well with our long term financial goals.

I am very happy with our decision. My DS is in K4 this year and I am very pleased with the school. His K4 class is play based, but they do hit age appropriate academics. The kids have a blast, but are learning in what I feel is a very age appropriate way. My son's fine motor skills has taken a gaint leap forward in the last two months. I am so excited with that, because he was a bit behind in that area. There is a great sense of community in our school and there have already been several get together for the mothers and I feel like I am becoming much more involved in our parish as a result. One of the most important aspects for me is that I feel that is the best choice for both my son's intellectual, spiritual and emotional development. I feel his schools values are in line with our families values.

Anyway, sorry about the book. This is a subject that I spent many hours worrying over and it sounds like you are in a similar place. My DH was also pushing for Catholic school and it truely was the best choice for us.
2 months into the year, I feel at ease and happy with our decision.

Good luck, making your decision!

[MelissaTC]

M goes to Catholic school and for comparison for you, it costs $800 a month for tuition and 5 day a week aftercare. It is slightly higher for non-Catholics because of the tuition difference. HTH!

[hanaum02]

We pay $1300/mth for my 3-year old in preschool and $675/mth for my 1st grader's before and after care (he's in public school). The $675 is what I think is crazy given that it is for a grand total of about 3 hours per day!

Michelle
DS 9/04
DD 10/07

[smilequeen]

We don't pay by month, but just a yearly tuition for an AMS Montessori school (with a traditional upper el). I don't use aftercare (work part time, but Grandma does the aftercare :)). We pay 15,500 per year in tuition for the full time K. That's pretty standard non religious private school tuition around here. The AMI school around the corner was around 11,500. So, 900 a month, for CA sounds very reasonable to me. I live in the midwest. Parochial Catholic schools here run about 5500/yr if I remember correctly.

[dhano923]

I know you're in So. CA like me. 2 years ago, we were paid $893 for FT Montessori for DS including after school care until 5:30. Snacks were provided, but we were responsible for lunch. That same school is now $1010 -- my friend just looked into it.

[lmwbasye]

Wow. I know it all depends on the area. I'm not loving where we live now (we don't have a choice...the Army picks)...but I'm seeing a positive here. DS1 is in a Montessori Kindergarten and we pay $472.50 a month (this is with a 10 % military discount, though).

[niccig]

I know you're in So. CA like me. 2 years ago, we were paid $893 for FT Montessori for DS including after school care until 5:30. Snacks were provided, but we were responsible for lunch. That same school is now $1010 -- my friend just looked into it.


THis is a good point, the tuition will go up - you can expect about 10% Keep that in mind when you're looking. We know a couple of people who could afford a certain school for DC#1 but a couple of years later tuition was more expensive and now they had DC#2 as well.

[daniele_ut]

I am once again counting my blessings for reasonable cost of living. We pay $338 a month for tuition for DS in private K. After care is a max of $170 a month. We also did the math, and as a PP found, it costs us nearly the same amount to send DS to private school as it would to send him to public K and then pay for 1/2 day aftercare. Next year he will attend the private school where dh works tuition free. The commute is 35 minutes and we felt that was too far to travel for 1/2 day K, so he'll start there in first grade.

DD's full time tuition for the two year old class is $590 a month.

[AnnieW625]

Thanks again for all of the responses. Just realized that with DD1's preschool tuition of $225 per month we are already paying what it would be equal to send DD1 to Montessori, and DD2 to daycare next year. I think comfort wise we are just going to look at Catholic school first, and then use public school of choice with YMCA or onsite daycare as a back up if we end up changing our mind about the Catholic school as it gets closer to enrollment time.

[HIU8]

Some perspective. Your price is amazing. DS is in 1/2 day K in a private school. We pay $17,000/yr ($1,700/month). This does include 1 hour group OT and 1 hr group speech per week though (roughly $240/week is what is estimated for the OT and speech). He also does beforecare 2x a week at $177/month.