Eating is an agricultural act - Wendell Berry

Sunday, September 30, 2007

cost of education

my general regard to the times group publications is usually in the range of disregard.
the economic times has still not plumbed the depths of the other 'esteemed' publications yet and the local editions are perhaps just notches above the bombay/delhi editions.

so this article is interesting in its premise and values thrown up:
Educating your kids is no child's play
Our estimates indicate that it could cost on an average Rs 21 lakh (at today's prices) on education of a single child from school to college. This includes expenditure on school fees, coaching classes, books, stationery and so on. If you have to include post-graduation studies as well (MBA, for instance), the cost is even more. It reaches Rs 98 lakh.

while the 98 lakhs seems out of proportion, there is certainly some validity in the 21 lakhs.
i think private education is the sciences (engineering or medicine) will cost more than 21 lakhs.

and my estimation indicates that the majority of this cost (during the K-12 period) will be spent on private coaching/tuitions and the actual cost of school fees will be less than a quarter of the total cost of education.

one of the primary tasks of parents in the USA is to save up for their children's college education and looks like indians are headed that way too.

good luck mates.

4 comments:

Vanessa said...

U have touched a sensitive issue there. We are looking for a playschool for Shreya here. Its around 550$ a month.....min 230$ if we opt for 2-day-week....

She is still at home, while we try to get our finances right.

csm said...

the costs are much worse in the US.
my thoughts on this are pretty radical to the extent of home schooling.
the only main thing that a playschool/nursery offers is peer interaction.
you could set up a nice corner in the house with safe toys and knick-knacks and train shreya for alone time.
i think it could be more educative than any formal system.

Vanessa said...

You are right...
We bought her an educational laptop. She picked up alphabets and numbers - fine, she knew them before. But it being bilingual laptop, she picked up spanish alphabet and numbers too. that was amazing. i don't know how to keep up with her high learning ability...need lots to feed her brain.

csm said...

why does the parent have to keep up.
it is not a race.

let the children 'overrtake' you.
be brave to say "sweety - i dont know, i will find out and tell you".

or you could use calvin's dad as an ideal.

give her more time with real objects.
establish rules of breaking and usage (this takes time - but worth the effort). give her things to screw on and off, stick on, shove on, roll on. jigsaws are the obvious favourites. stop buying and start making from old books and the packaging of say Cornflakes/Fruit Loops.