The REAL Cost of Schooling

I often hear anti-homeschoolers trot out their favorite reasons for why they think homeschooling is bad. Unfortunately for them, most of them have been very publicly debunked by multiple studies - and the obvious results. 

Socialization? Homeschoolers are better adjusted that government schoolers. 

Academics? Homeschoolers out-perform government schoolers. 

Extra-curricular activities? Homeschoolers have just as many or more than government schoolers. 

College? Universities actively recruit homeschoolers because they are good students.

So what’s left? Well today I’m going to debunk the last, tired old argument against homeschooling: 

It costs too much.

“I wish we could afford to homeschool, but we really need both our incomes,” a dad sighs.

“I want my child to have the best educational experience possible, so I have to work to afford it,” a mother insists.

“You can’t tell families to homeschool in this economy – moms have to work just to make ends meet,” a friend lectures.

And I say… Facts are better than arguments. Let’s look at the numbers.

I did some extensive googling on the cost of institutional schooling. The numbers were very interesting. 

The Cost of Government Schooling

“Free” government school costs can include lunches, school supplies, tests, field trips, and school clothes (gym clothes, uniforms, etc.).  An average family can spend $500-$1500 a year on “free” government schooling necessities.

But we all know there are extras. Before and after school care, sports, tutoring, music lessons, it all adds up. Now we are looking at another $5000-$1500 per year.

On top of that, when both parents are working, the average family ends up eating out a lot more. Mom just doesn’t have time to cook every night. A typical family can spend $200-$500 a week on restaurant food alone. Restaurants are expensive - many studies have shown that home-cooked meals average one-half or even one-third of the price of restaurant meals.

There are other costs to consider too. When mom works every day along with dad, the gas costs go up. Not only does mom have to go to and from work, she and dad now have trips to pick up children from school, lessons, or daycare. Average gas costs for a family every year can be upwards of $2000-$3000.

Mom also needs more expensive clothes when she works. She may even need to buy a whole new wardrobe routinely. This can start around $1000 a year and go up to $3000-$4000 or more.

If mom is working full time, she probably doesn’t have time to deep clean the house. So now we can add in the costs of hiring a cleaning lady. This can be an additional $200-$300 per month, adding up to $2500-$3500 a year.

Then there are the things that are harder to add up. When there is no “general manager” at home every day, waste happens easily. Someone forgets to stock up on milk and bread, so dad grabs some at the convenience store on the way home – for a 30% higher price. With mom and dad too tired to supervise playtime, expensive toys get left outside in the weather or are neglected and broken.  It’s too much trouble to refill things like soap dispensers so new ones are bought every time. Clothes aren’t laundered or mended properly and must be thrown out due to stains or holes.

And finally, there’s the health costs associated with a family that is running all the time, stressed, eating poorly, and has improperly supervised children. A quick overview of this subject shows that when children grow up in a clean, peaceful, healthy home environment instead of being herded in a high-stress environment with a crowd of other germy children, they wind up much healthier and have less accidents. Medical costs for the average institutional schooled family can be $3000-$10,000 per year.

The lowest estimate of all these costs I came up with was about $10,000-$12,000 per year. That’s the bare-bones lowest, not the average. Average costs of a normal family can be $20,000-$30,000 a year or more. 

All so that mom can work and let the kids have “free” government schooling...or so the family can "afford" private schooling. 

DOES IT PAY? Let’s see…

Moms Making Big Bucks?

Let’s set all those costs against what mom will make in her job. An average woman in the U.S. has a salary of about $35,000 per year. Subtract out all taxes and social security and she’s left with around $25,000 per year to spend.

Did you notice those numbers? Average family costs for “free” government schooling while mom works are $20,000-$30,000. Average salaries for working moms are $25,000 after taxes. It’s entirely possible that a family using the “free” government schools could wind up losing money every year on the transaction.

And it's possible that a mom who is working so the family can "afford" private school will wind up losing money on the transaction.

Not just possible, but highly probable.

The Cost of Homeschooling

“But wait,” you say. “Homeschooling costs a lot too – the government schools at least provide some things for ‘free.’ Homeschoolers have to pay for everything themselves, plus the taxes that support the local schools.”

Let’s take a look at that claim. To begin with, curriculum for homeschooling can be completely free. Yes, I said free – without quotation marks. There are free books, free downloads, free printables, free ideas, and of course, free books at the public library. Used curriculum abounds and you can often borrow or buy second-hand for just a few dollars. And these free curricula can work well - studies for years have shown that there is no correlation at all between how much is spent on curriculum and how well the student succeeds. What studies do show is that a loving, one-on-one tutorship situation always out-performs every other teaching scenario.

But that’s just the curriculum. Field trips can also be free or very low cost. Many parks and museums offer special passes or deals at certain times of the year.

Even lessons or special tutoring can be more cost-effective through homeschooling. Homeschooling parents tend to be much more engaged with their children in helping them regularly practice and fully benefit from the lessons. A homeschooled child can make as much progress in a year as an institutionally-schooled child might make in two or three years.

A homeschooled child can be a healthier child since mom is around to prepare healthy meals three times a day. Mom also has time and energy to disinfect bathrooms, do laundry regularly, make sure the children brush their teeth, take their vitamins and go to bed on time. And a peaceful, low-stress, and bully-free environment helps a child’s health and development, not to mention his or her safety.

Every study ever done comparing government schooling to homeschooling has shown that homeschoolers out-perform public schoolers. The only excuse anti-homeschoolers have left is that it’s too expensive for mom to stay home from work. And I just kaboshed that. Yay me!

And yay you if you choose to tap into the academic, social, health – and financial – benefits of staying home to teach your children!

Written by Heather Sheen

3 Principles for Teaching Your Kids Finances

As the hot California sun streamed down, I huffed and puffed on my knees along the rock-walled flower garden. Weeding those rocks was a chore I hated. Not only was it grubby and uncomfortable, but sometimes big scary spiders were lurking in the weeds – anathema to a little 7 year old like me. (Actually, big scary spiders are still anathema to me!)

So why was I sticking with it? Because Mom and Dad promised my sister and I weekly allowances if we completed certain chores – one of them being the weeding of the rock wall.

It was so exciting when we got our allowance on Saturday (assuming the chores were satisfactorily completed). My sister and I each had a piggy bank on our dresser. Hers was a little fat pink pig and mine was a lovely green pig. The CHINK of the coins dropping in was such a satisfying sound.

Each Sunday, we felt excessively generous as we plinked our little coins into the offering plate. I can still remember the sudden grins of the deacons as they watched us importantly drop in our nickels and pennies. The story of the widow’s mite in the Bible always made me feel that God would probably do something amazing with my little ten cents – maybe save an entire continent or fund a new Bible translation or something.

And the part of our savings that we got to spend was fun too! After several weeks of savings, Mom would take us to the store to buy a toy or a candy bar with our very own money! Oh, how we agonized over those choices. After all, once our $2-$3 was gone, it would take several more weeks of chores to build up the savings again. I still have some of the little dolls and doll clothes I bought with that money. (I don’t have the candy bars any more though.)

Why do I share this story? Because learning how to manage money wisely seems to be a lost art in our culture. Parents themselves often are confused about how to properly save, spend and give. So they find it difficult to come up with a good way to teach their children these things.

While I certainly wouldn’t say that running a household’s finances is easy and simple, I am here to say that teaching good financial habits to your children can be simple. There are lots of good curricula, ideas, printables and internet blogs about how to do this. But the basic principles are free and you can easily adapt them to your own family.

Principle 1: All hard work brings a profit. 

That’s not my idea, it’s actually in the Bible. (Proverbs 14:23) Starting when they are just out of toddlerhood, all children can be taught this principle. Though contributing to the family through chores should never be completely on a mercenary basis, it is appropriate to designate certain extra chores or tasks as money-makers for your children. Since you want to teach them that shirking this work leads to no profit, it’s best to pick out some tasks that don’t absolutely have to be done every week.

Children need to learn (as do adults, and our government) that true profit only follows hard work. Get rich quick schemes rarely work long-term, as we who are older and wiser know. But the person who puts in elbow grease, who is willing to learn, who wants to improve their skills, who can take orders from a boss, who can properly complete an assigned task – that person will nearly always find a way to make money. Teach this principle with age-appropriate tasks you are willing to pay for.

Principle 2: Delayed gratification now means more satisfying gratification later on. 

Or in other words, saving money today means you can buy something really cool tomorrow. Helping your children learn to save up for things they want is an excellent way to counteract our instant "microwave" culture. Children today are so used to having everything NOW that parents often have to actively find ways to teach this principle.

Help your children choose age-appropriate goals to save for. Little kids may find it hard to save for a long time, so choose less expensive items for them. Older children and teens, however, should learn to be able to save for months (or even years) for something they really want. Mom and Dad can offer to match their savings, but Mom and Dad shouldn’t always be stepping in to make up the difference if Johnny isn’t disciplined enough to save.

Principle 3: God loves – and blesses – a cheerful giver. Help your children choose an amount to save for tithing and a place to give their tithe. Obviously the Bible instructs us to support the pastors and teachers who feed us at church each week. But you can also help your child look for other opportunities to give. Maybe they can fund their own shoebox for Operation Christmas Child, or perhaps they can purchase a toy to donate to a Toys for Tots drive. Help them learn the joy of giving, and remind them that God is blessing them by making them able to earn money.

The awesome thing about these three principles is that they don’t just apply to money. 

They apply to all of life. For instance, do you want a good relationship with another person? Put in some hard work, be willing to delay gratification, and give cheerfully – and see if that doesn’t improve any relationship out there! These are actually fundamental principles of living that bring peace, wisdom and dignity to everyone who applies them.

Make it practical: As your children learn and grow, continue to apply these principles in a practical manner. It doesn’t necessarily take a super-duper curriculum or intricate plan to teach basic finances to your kids. Simply introduce them in an age appropriate way to things like bank accounts, writing checks, making (and following!) a budget, running a small business, and generally keeping track of income and expenses. Let them see you doing these things on a regular basis as well.

 People who complain about how decadent our government or culture is often forget that “the government” and “the culture” are simply made up of people like us. We the people need to recover biblical basics like hard work, delayed gratification and cheerful giving. When we do, our culture and our government will change for the better. But it all starts with one family at a time!

Written by Heather Sheen