Comparing Costs of Homeschooling and Public Schooling

[lonelyhomeschooler]

5 hours ago, prairiewindmomma said:

So no mothers work in your community? Every child in your district has a SAHP because there is no childcare available? That seems….statistically not likely. Childcare affordability is definitely an issue everywhere…but most families ARE two income families…so childcare must exist somewhere.

Mosr people rely on grandparents or other relatives to act as babysitters. That's not an option for my family because of personal reasons. 

The other option is to pay a friend-of-a-friend to watch kids. But that's not affordable for my family. The average rate is $15 per hour. As a pharmacy tech, the average wage is $17 per hour. In other words, the math ain't mathing for my situation. 

[lonelyhomeschooler]

5 hours ago, HomeAgain said:

In a lot of places, even though afterschool care isn't available at the school, it IS available. Here, the only afterschool care for kids in our district at the school is 7th-8th grade, who actually have a designated program to help with homework and organized social time.  It's free.

That doesn't mean there isn't afterschool care for younger kids.  It means it's not at the school.  Many of the kids are bussed to the community center for care, or the Boys & Girls Club, or the Y.  There is care, it's just not on the school grounds and unless you have a kid that needs it, you probably won't find it.  School schedules are also staggered so those who don't go to care have the option of high school students to provide immediate after school care for their younger siblings/neighbors.

I'm happy that's an option for some people! But it's not. I have friends with kids in public school. Trust me when I say that many have looked far and wide for afterschool care and have not found it. 

[Wheres Toto]

5 hours ago, lonelyhomeschooler said:

Also, childcare - affordable or not - isn't available for many people. For example, we don't have any sort of daycare or afterschool care in my entire county or any of the surrounding ones (and that border goes into three states). If I tried to work with school-aged children, I'm not even sure what I would do for afterschool, half-days, snow delays, breaks, etc. 

I see you're point, and Social Security should definitely be considered. BUT you have to live until retirement too.

That's crazy that there would be absolutely no childcare options.   Are you somewhere where three (or four, I guess you don't say how many is "surrounding") counties is a really small, spread-out population?    

Pretty much every elementary school in my state offers some form of afterschool care - either at the school, another school in the district, or the local Y or a private center with the school bussing between locations if needed.  Most also offer before school care, and there are also private centers that have afterschool care that will either bus or walk the kids over after school (usually these are near private schools).   I am in a pretty large county (about 500,000 people) near even larger ones.

Sounds like you could make a ton of money offering afterschool care.  

[ScoutTN]

Possibly @lonelyhomeschooler lives in an extremely rural area? 

[lonelyhomeschooler]

5 minutes ago, Wheres Toto said:

That's crazy that there would be absolutely no childcare options.   Are you somewhere where three (or four, I guess you don't say how many is "surrounding") counties is a really small, spread-out population?    

Pretty much every elementary school in my state offers some form of afterschool care - either at the school, another school in the district, or the local Y or a private center with the school bussing between locations if needed.  Most also offer before school care, and there are also private centers that have afterschool care that will either bus or walk the kids over after school (usually these are near private schools).   I am in a pretty large county (about 500,000 people) near even larger ones.

Sounds like you could make a ton of money offering afterschool care.  

Yes. It's a very rural area. The county tried to offer a daycare a few years ago, but it was difficult for people to get their kids there and make it to work on time.

For example, if my kids were still young enough for daycare, it would take forty-five minutes for me to get there in the morning. Depending on where I could get work (pharmacy tech in a flooded market), it would take me another thirty minutes to an hour to get to work. So if my shift started at eight, I would need to be able to drop the kids off around 6:15am, and it didn't open until 7am.

Most people rely on family or friends-of-family to watch their kids. I hadn't considered offering afterschool care myself. 

[lonelyhomeschooler]

2 minutes ago, ScoutTN said:

Possibly @lonelyhomeschooler lives in an extremely rural area? 

Yes. 

[Nichola]

….

Edited April 24 by Nichola

[Heartstrings]

I’ve lived in small cities where there were very few child care centers because there was a culture of in home daycares, both licensed and unlicensed.  I’m not comfortable with an in home daycare provider for the most part so that wouldn’t have been an option for me.  It’s also incredibly difficult to find in home care providers, you basically have ask in Facebook mom groups and get referrals, which isn’t a great system.   Most families in that area are dual income so yes, they figure it out, but honestly it’s often low quality, unreliable care that still costs an arm and a leg.   It’s very different from where I am now where there are a dozen centers in a suburban area.  

Edited April 4 by Heartstrings

[sweet2ndchance]

We live in a rural area and there is really no afterschool care here either. It boggled my mind when I first moved here and had 6 kids from high school down to infant. Someone really could make a killing offering before and afterschool care but having had an in-home daycare license before, I understand why people aren't jumping at the opportunity. It's not a business model for the faint of heart.

We also have a pitiful rural library when it comes to book selection. That's why I pay $30 a year to have access to the big city library 2 counties over. I can check out up to 50 books with no late fees but what I use more than anything is Hoopla and Libby. I can get almost anything as an audiobook or an e-book that way. I gladly pay the $30 a year to have library access as a non-resident. It's definitely cheaper than buying all the books we need, even if I buy used. Anymore, I just buy spines and books that we really enjoyed and will read more than once.

 

[EKS]

On 3/28/2024 at 9:19 AM, lonelyhomeschooler said:

But what about you? Is homeschooling more or less expensive for you? Is that a factor in your choice? 

Homeschooling was way more expensive for us than public (high) school.

[Kassia]

4 hours ago, EKS said:

Homeschooling was way more expensive for us than public (high) school.

Yes, same for us.  We enrolled dd in public high school for her last two years of school because dual enrollment is covered 100% for ps students, but hardly at all for homeschool.  So we waited until she was going to be 100% dual enrolled and enrolled her in high school and she graduated from the public high school (as valedictorian!) without ever taking an actual class at the high school!  We were fortunate that our district made it very easy to enroll and they took all of our homeschool credits and grades.  Dd had high test scores and was National Merit Finalist so they did get bragging rights for all of that even though it had nothing to do with them.  

ETA - dd's last two years of high school with full dual enrollment cost us nothing but gas to/from the college, but it would have cost us thousands if she had been homeschooling.  And, honestly, it made applying for college so much easier as a ps student.  

Edited April 5 by Kassia

[SKL]

For my kids, another piece of the cost puzzle is the savings in school sports/arts instead of paying for various extracurriculars.  For us, group activities are a must, so having these essentially free at school is very helpful (once they age into school sports / band etc.).  In high school, these even help keep the kids busy in summer.

Edited April 5 by SKL

[Clarita]

I guess it's hard to answer or even perhaps discuss. Because it seems like the public school system varies a lot in what they offer (even without talking about academics).

On top of that is everyone's personal preference on what they even need, for example my parents sent me to public school. They never looked into childcare, because my school was walking distance to my house and my parents just told me to go home after school (shh.. don't tell CPS). During non-school days occasionally it was stay at home by myself or go to my parents work. 

Then furthermore there is the question of extracurriculars are you a family that would extracurricular whether you homeschool or not. Or whether public school will put pressure or present opportunities for your kids to have extracurriculars (which might cost extra even at a public school but perhaps not as much as if you had to make those activities happen outside of the public school system). 

Also technically, my kids do go to a public school. It's a homeschool charter school, so they give me monetary and curriculum support. They have a library of curriculum I can choose from to use for free, including consumables. 

[ScoutTN]

6 hours ago, SKL said:

For my kids, another piece of the cost puzzle is the savings in school sports/arts instead of paying for various extracurriculars.  For us, group activities are a must, so having these essentially free at school is very helpful (once they age into school sports / band etc.).  In high school, these even help keep the kids busy in summer.

Yes, my son is not skilled enough to play his spring sport in the club leagues around here and we could not afford the cost! 
 

Homeschoolers can play for their zoned high school here, IF they make the team and if their school has a team. But they cannot do other ECs like band, drama, or clubs. 

[seemesew]

I would drive my kids at least one way if they went to public school (actually some do and that is what I'm doing).

Breakfast and lunch are free here (though it is super unhealthy) 

At our elementary school there are fundraisers at least twice a month.

FroYo Friday to support teachers classrooms which is $5 each month (kids are looked down on and feel bad if they don't get it).

All field trips cost the normal price no discounts so anywhere from $8-$12 for each one and there are several a year

New backpacks

School supplies

Classroom snacks

Teacher gifts (so at least 5) for Christmas, Mothers/Fathers Day and Teacher appreciation day.

Random events that are usually around $5 per person

Thanksgiving meal for family at school during lunch $5 per person 

All in all I spend quite a bit of money with my kids in public school! I think it actually is a bit more expensive for me than homeschooling. If you throw in my added stress from all that schools require, driving, always having at least one kid I have to pick up for sickness or something, homeschooling wins 😉

 

ETA: I didn't even include sports fees because I figured either way we'd do them. However,  there are other fees in each class like lab fees, band fees, ect. Depending on what kids get in their schedule. 

Also I'm not including my salary IF I were working because I've always had at least 1 or two that would require daycare if I worked which would cost more than anything I would bring in. Even now I'd need half day of daycare if all my kids were in school.

 

 

Edited April 20 by seemesew

[OakParkOwlets]

In lost wages alone, with me being PT rather than FT employed it is very expensive to homeschool, even compared to private schools.  However one might make the argument that I wouldn't want to be FT anyway because my quality of life is so much better with me and my husband both working PT than one working FT.

My kids activities they would be in anyway, other than co-op which is only a few hundred a year.

Edited April 8 by OakParkOwlets

[prairiewindmomma]

By about 5th grade here most parents don’t pay for daycare. Parents might sign their kids up for a few summer daycamps, but not all do.

We’re glad to be out of TX. Schools here don’t fundraise or make you pay for fieldtrips or have a heavy gift-giving culture. Kids are bussed home even if they stay for extra curriculars.

I do acknowledge that where you live has a huge impact on how expensive public school is.

TX’s high property taxes and sales taxes were still cheaper than income + property here on the west coast.

[Alice]

On 4/4/2024 at 8:44 PM, EKS said:

Homeschooling was way more expensive for us than public (high) school.

Yes, same here.