The Cost of Education · Question 01

What can 13 years of school cost?

Victorian government schoolGovernment-school tuition

$138k

Marymede Catholic CollegeRecurring school bills

$751k

Wesley CollegeRecurring school bills

Government-school tuition is publicly funded. Families may still pay for uniforms, learning materials they choose to own, optional activities and other extras.

Students must still be able to access the standard curriculum if their family cannot pay. Eligible families can also receive help with some essential school costs.

Marymede and Wesley figures are projected recurring charges billed by each school, from published 2026 charges. They do not estimate every family cost. Fee-charging figures are rounded from the canonical projected totals.

01 / The bills

School costs can look very different

A government-school tuition baseline, followed by six named fee-charging examples ranked by projected recurring school bills.

Victorian government school

$0 standard tuition

Other family-paid costs can still apply.

$0 refers to standard government-school tuition, not total family spending.

Six named fee-charging schools · projected school bills over 13 years

Marymede Catholic CollegeSouth Morang$138k
Waverley Christian CollegeWantirna South$238k
Bacchus Marsh GrammarWoodlea$266k
Westbourne GrammarTruganina$435k
Kilvington Grammar SchoolOrmond$570k
Wesley CollegeGlen Waverley$751k

Exact projected recurring school-billed totals
School	Selected campus	Total
Marymede Catholic College	South Morang	$137,771
Waverley Christian College	Wantirna South	$238,305
Bacchus Marsh Grammar	Woodlea	$265,659
Westbourne Grammar	Truganina	$435,110
Kilvington Grammar School	Ormond	$570,123
Wesley College	Glen Waverley	$751,394

02 / Through the years

How does the cost build?

The difference starts early and grows year by year.

Marymede Catholic College

Prep$5.5k
End Y6$46k
End Y9$87k
End Y12$138k

Westbourne Grammar

Prep$20k
End Y6$176k
End Y9$292k
End Y12$435k

Wesley College

Prep$32k
End Y6$285k
End Y9$495k
End Y12$751k

03 / The money not spent

What if the family invested the difference?

Each year, the difference in school fees is invested instead.

Government-school comparisons use the $0 standard-tuition baseline. Families may still have other school-related costs.

Illustrative invested value at 7% · Prep to Year 12

Exact cumulative modelled invested value at each year end using the illustrative 7% scenario
School year	Government school instead of Wesley	Marymede instead of Wesley	Government school instead of Marymede
Prep, 2026	$33,135.19	$27,451.12	$5,684.07
Year 1, 2027	$70,246.61	$58,196.38	$12,050.24
Year 2, 2028	$111,695.42	$92,534.98	$19,160.44
Year 3, 2029	$157,872.24	$130,527.09	$27,345.14
Year 4, 2030	$212,796.54	$176,351.59	$36,444.94
Year 5, 2031	$278,535.69	$231,904.90	$46,630.79
Year 6, 2032	$354,932.77	$297,021.42	$57,911.37
Year 7, 2033	$441,809.27	$366,549.42	$75,259.84
Year 8, 2034	$541,160.59	$446,673.15	$94,487.46
Year 9, 2035	$666,694.07	$550,246.71	$116,447.38
Year 10, 2036	$797,330.07	$656,618.26	$140,711.79
Year 11, 2037	$941,308.94	$773,089.02	$168,219.90
Year 12, 2038	$1,099,774.58	$901,238.10	$198,536.48

Illustrative 7% return, not guaranteed. Annual positive differences use mid-year investment timing. Values are nominal and modelled to the end of Year 12.

04 / Scope

What did we actually count?

Fee-charging school totals

The main values compare recurring charges billed by the school:

tuition;
compulsory recurring levies;
required recurring programs;
other recurring compulsory school charges supported by the evidence.

Government-school reference

The $0 is standard tuition only. Families may pay for:

uniforms;
owned textbooks, stationery or devices;
optional camps or activities;
transport or enrichment.

These costs do not apply in the same way to every family. Students must still be able to participate in the standard curriculum if their family cannot pay, and help is available for some eligible families.

The evidence trail

How did we reach these numbers?

The seven discoveries show how the question changed as we checked the evidence. Scan the journey, then open any discovery for its sources, method and caveats.

Discovery · Finding

“Free school” doesn’t mean “no family cost”

At first, government school looked like a simple $0 tuition starting point. The policies showed that families can still have other school costs.Evidence — 3 government policy sources · VIC · NSW · QLD

Government-school tuition is free. So could we simply use $0 as our starting point and move on to schools that charge fees?

We started with: Government-school tuition gives us a simple $0 starting point.
But the policies showed: Tuition can be free while families still pay for devices, resources, camps, excursions, uniforms and activities.
So our starting point changed: $0 tuition does not mean $0 in school-related costs for the family.

In these policies, “free” refers to instruction or tuition. Families can still have other school-related costs.

Victorian Department of Education

Curriculum instruction is free. Families may still pay for things outside that instruction, such as extracurricular activities, camps, excursions and items they supply themselves.

What we take from this

A school can charge no tuition and families can still have other school costs. This policy shows which kinds of costs can sit outside free instruction.

NSW Department of Education

School contributions are voluntary and regulated. Families can still pay for excursions, camps, activities and some resources.

What we take from this

The school contribution may be voluntary. Camps, excursions and some resources can still cost money.

Queensland Department of Education

State-school instruction, facilities and administration are free. Families may still pay for textbooks and resources, devices and equipment, camps, excursions, uniforms and activities.

What we take from this

What is free is quite specific. Many normal parts of school life can still cost families money.

$0 tuition does not mean $0 in school-related costs for the family.

These policies show what families may have to pay for. They do not tell us what a typical family actually spends. That needs different evidence.

Discovery · Friction

“School fees” don’t include the same things at every school

Put two school fee schedules side by side and the problem appears quickly: they do not include the same things.Evidence — 4 named school fee schedules · 1 incomplete

If we want to compare schools fairly, do their published fees actually include the same things?

We started with: A school’s published fee should be directly comparable with another school’s fee.
But the fee schedules showed: Different schools package costs differently.
Marymede lists tuition, levies and other charges separately;
Wesley groups some costs together under “consolidated charges”;
Melbourne Grammar includes several required costs in one annual total;
some costs are still paid directly by families, outside the school bill.
So the comparison changed: Before we compare the totals, we need to check what each total includes.

Two schools can publish a “fee” that covers different things.

How each school presents its costs — not a full line-by-line audit

What each school or schooling option includes in its published cost
Schooling option	Tuition	Buildings & levies	Resources & devices	Camps & excursions	Uniforms	Enrolment & application	Added programs	Missing amount
Victorian government-school option — government policy	Free	—	Separate	Separate	Separate	—	—	—
Marymede Catholic College — school example	Confirmed	Confirmed	Confirmed	Separate	Separate	Confirmed	Confirmed	—
Wesley College Melbourne — school example	Confirmed	Confirmed	Included in total	Included in total	Separate	Confirmed	Confirmed	—
Melbourne Grammar School — school example	Included in total	Included in total	Included in total	Included in total	Separate	Confirmed	Included in total	—
Haileybury — incomplete	Confirmed	Confirmed	Missing amount	Confirmed	Separate	Confirmed	—	Missing amount

Listed — shown as a separate line in the school’s fee schedule
Included in total — included inside another required total
Paid separately — paid by the family outside the school bill
Free — not charged under government policy
Missing amount — required, but no confirmed 2026 amount

View the detailed comparison

Detailed comparison of cost categories by school
Cost category	Victorian government-school option	Marymede Catholic College	Wesley College Melbourne	Melbourne Grammar School	Haileybury
Tuition / instruction	Free — government policy	Published tuition	Published tuition	Included in one total	Published tuition
Building / infrastructure charge	—	Building levy	Infrastructure charge	Included in one total	In published charges
Digital resources / device program	Paid by family	Required e-resource levy	Included in consolidated charges	Included in one total	Managed Device Program — amount missing
Camps & excursions	Paid by family	Paid separately	Included in consolidated charges	Mostly included in the total	In published charges
Uniforms	Paid by family	Paid by family	Paid by family	Paid by family	Paid by family
Application / enrolment fee	—	Application fee	Application / confirmation fees	One-off charge	One-off charge
Extra programs	—	Other school charges	Additional programs	Some programs included in the total	—
Required cost with missing amount	—	—	—	—	Device program, Years 5–9 — 2026 amount missing

Missing amount: the Haileybury device program is required in Years 5–9, but we do not have a confirmed 2026 amount, so we leave it out rather than guess.

Marymede Catholic College

CF-M2B1-S09 · example 2026 tuition

Prep – Year 6: AUD 4,865
Years 7 – 8: AUD 7,916
Years 9 – 10: AUD 8,345
Years 11 – 12: AUD 8,763

One school example. It does not represent every Catholic school.

Wesley College Melbourne

CF-M2B1-S13 · example 2026 tuition

Prep – Year 3: AUD 30,185
Year 7: AUD 38,171
Year 9: AUD 44,175
Years 10 – 12: AUD 45,206

One school example. It does not represent every independent school.

Melbourne Grammar School

CF-M2B1-S11 · required annual totals

Prep: ≈ AUD 36,754
Year 7: ≈ AUD 44,657
Year 10: ≈ AUD 52,255
Year 12: ≈ AUD 46,589

Each total includes several required charges, including some resources and programs.

Haileybury — incomplete

Managed Device Program · Years 5–9

Required?: yes
2026 amount available?: no

We left Haileybury incomplete rather than guess the missing amount. It is not included in the total-cost comparison.

This still does not tell us which school is cheapest overall. It only shows that published fees can include different things. Marymede, Wesley and Melbourne Grammar are examples, not averages for all Catholic or independent schools.

Discovery · What we count

So we had to decide what we would count

No source gives us one ready-made total we can compare. So we had to decide exactly what we would count.Our method — 3 cost groups · defined for this comparison

Every total that follows depends on this choice, so we make it clear here instead of hiding it in the method.

01 — What the school bills

School-billed costs

We record these in two parts so we do not mix different kinds of charge.

Recurring: tuition, required levies, required programs and other recurring compulsory school charges.

One-off: application, enrolment, acceptance and similar entry charges where we have reliable evidence.

02 — What the family pays separately

Broader family cost

Adds school-related costs the family pays separately: uniforms · devices and resources · camps and excursions · other required or near-required items.

We leave transport out by default because travel costs vary a lot from family to family.

03 — Extra activities

Extra activities the family chooses

Activities the family chooses to add: tutoring · music · sport · coaching · other enrichment.

We keep these separate because the school does not require them.

Spending money in one place means the same money cannot be used somewhere else. Economists call this opportunity cost. We keep it separate from the school-cost total, then ask in Discovery 07 what could happen if the yearly difference were invested instead.

Discovery · Model

What does choosing a different school do to the cost?

We started with broad labels like government, religious and private. The school-level numbers showed that those labels hide very different financial choices.Model — Prep to Year 12 · recurring school-billed cost · six school examples + government policy reference

We started by thinking about school choice in broad groups: government, religious and private. But do those labels actually tell us much about what a family would pay?

That turned out to be too simple. Two families can both choose a Christian school, or both choose an independent school, and still make very different financial commitments. So instead of asking what “private school” costs, we compared actual schools.

Projected Prep–Year 12 recurring school-billed costStarting Prep in 2026 · nominal AUD — future dollars · modelled pathway from published 2026 charges

Panel A

Some faith-led choices we investigated

These schools can all appear on a family’s list when faith, community or school culture matters. Financially, they are not close substitutes. Under our model, the recurring school-billed cost runs from about $138k at Marymede to about $570k at Kilvington across Prep to Year 12 — more than a four-fold difference.

Choosing a faith-led school does not tell us what the family will pay. The individual school matters.

Panel B

Some other independent choices we investigated

The same pattern appears among the other independent schools we investigated. Bacchus Marsh Grammar, Westbourne Grammar and Wesley College are all independent-school choices, but their projected recurring school-billed costs are very different — from about $266k to about $751k.

There is no single “private-school price”.

Both charts use the same scale — $0 to $800k.

This does not mean government school costs a family $0. The $0 recurring school-billed statewide policy baseline does not price individual-school contributions, devices or other school-specific family expenses. It is a policy reference point, not a family’s bill.

We started with: Comparing government, religious and private schooling would be enough to describe the choice.
But the school-level evidence showed: Those categories are useful descriptions, but they are too broad to describe the financial choice. A family does not buy the average Catholic school or the average independent school.
So the framing changed: They choose an actual school — and the actual schools can be hundreds of thousands of dollars apart.

“Private school” is a category. It isn’t a price.

Broad school categories hide very large differences in cost.

Instead of asking “How much does private school cost?”, a more useful question is: “What would the schools we could realistically choose cost our family?”

This discovery does not tell us which choice is better. Cost is only one side of the decision. We have not yet asked what the extra spending provides.

As we established in Discovery 03, we keep different kinds of cost separate. These bars show recurring school-billed costs only.

One-off entry costs, required family-paid items that we cannot yet price consistently, and broader family extras remain outside the bars.

Schools do not package their fees in exactly the same way. Some recurring charges already include camps, curriculum resources or IT support, while other costs may still be paid separately by families.

That is why this comparison uses recurring school-billed cost rather than pretending every published fee contains exactly the same things.

Child starts Prep in 2026, in metropolitan Melbourne.
Prep to Year 12 at the same school.
We start from each school’s published 2026 charges.
We apply the approved fee-growth assumption through to Year 12.
Figures are projected nominal AUD — future dollars, not adjusted for inflation.
Wesley includes the compulsory Year 9 Clunes program.

These are modelled projections built from published 2026 charges. They are not known future invoices, and not amounts a family will definitely pay.

The figures behind these charts

Projected Prep to Year 12 recurring school-billed cost, with one-off entry costs kept separate
School	Recurring — rounded	Recurring — model output	One-off entry cost (kept separate)
Faith-led examples
Victorian government-school pathway — Victorian government-school policy reference	$0*	$0*	No individual-school amount
Marymede Catholic College — South Morang	$138k	$137,771	Known amount at least $165; further acceptance / deposit treatment unresolved
Waverley Christian College — Wantirna South	$238k	$238,305	Known net entry cost $400
Kilvington Grammar School — Ormond	$570k	$570,123	Known net entry cost $1,050
Other independent examples
Victorian government-school pathway — Victorian government-school policy reference	$0*	$0*	No individual-school amount
Bacchus Marsh Grammar — Woodlea	$266k	$265,659	Published upfront amount identified; final credit / refund treatment unresolved
Westbourne Grammar — Truganina	$435k	$435,110	Known net entry cost $915
Wesley College — Glen Waverley	$751k	$751,394	Known net entry cost $1,400

$0* is a recurring school-billed statewide policy baseline, not the cost of attending a government school. Entry costs are one-off amounts, kept separate from the recurring Prep–Year 12 figures and never added to the bars. These are modelled projections from published 2026 charges, not known future invoices.

Discovery · Model

Thirteen years don’t arrive as one bill

The gap starts in Prep and grows year by year. Some school stages make it widen faster than others.Model — Prep–Year 12 · annual + cumulative recurring school-billed cost

Discovery 04 showed how far apart the thirteen-year totals can end up. But families do not pay thirteen years of school fees all at once.

When does the cost gap open up — and how quickly does it grow?

Discovery 04 gave us: One thirteen-year number for each school. That made the size of the difference clear — but it hid when families actually face those costs.
Looking year by year shows: Each school follows its own path. The cost does not rise in one smooth, standard pattern.

To answer that, we need two views: what each school year costs, and what happens when those yearly bills are added together.

Chart 1 · annual cost

What does each school year cost?

How large is the recurring school bill in each individual year? Both panels share one vertical scale — up to about $100k a year — so the two groups can be compared by height, not read in isolation.

Panel A — faith-led examples

Victorian government-school pathway $0/yr
Marymede Catholic College $17.9k/yr
Waverley Christian College $27.6k/yr
Kilvington Grammar School $68.8k/yr

Panel B — other independent examples

Victorian government-school pathway $0/yr
Bacchus Marsh Grammar $32.6k/yr
Westbourne Grammar $50.0k/yr
Wesley College $89.5k/yr

Year 9 — compulsory Clunes program included

Both panels use the same scale — $0 to $100k per year

$0* = statewide recurring school-billed policy reference. See Discovery 04 for what this does and does not mean. It is not an ordinary zero-cost family pathway.

The annual bill does not rise in one smooth, standard pattern. Each school has its own year-level fee structure: some make larger jumps around secondary school, some change at other year levels, and some include compulsory programs in particular years.

The model applies fee growth over time, but the differences between year levels come from the schools’ published 2026 fee structures — not from the growth assumption.

Chart 2 · cumulative cost

What happens when those yearly bills are added together?

Cumulative projected recurring school-billed cost — each year’s bill added to the ones before it. Both panels run to about $800k, the same range as Discovery 04’s thirteen-year totals, so the end of each line lands where its Discovery 04 bar did.

The dashed guide after Year 6 marks the move to secondary school. In these examples a substantial part of the thirteen-year cost has already built up before secondary school begins.

Panel A — faith-led examples

Victorian government-school pathway $0
Marymede Catholic College $138k
Waverley Christian College $238k
Kilvington Grammar School $570k

Prep

Marymede Catholic College$5.5k
Waverley Christian College$12k
Kilvington Grammar School$20k

End of Year 6

Marymede Catholic College$46k
Waverley Christian College$98k
Kilvington Grammar School$212k

End of Year 9

Marymede Catholic College$87k
Waverley Christian College$162k
Kilvington Grammar School$373k

End of Year 12

Marymede Catholic College$138k
Waverley Christian College$238k
Kilvington Grammar School$570k

Panel B — other independent examples

Victorian government-school pathway $0
Bacchus Marsh Grammar $266k
Westbourne Grammar $435k
Wesley College $751k

Prep

Bacchus Marsh Grammar$10k
Westbourne Grammar$20k
Wesley College$32k

End of Year 6

Bacchus Marsh Grammar$99k
Westbourne Grammar$176k
Wesley College$285k

End of Year 9

Bacchus Marsh Grammar$174k
Westbourne Grammar$292k
Wesley College$495k

End of Year 12

Bacchus Marsh Grammar$266k
Westbourne Grammar$435k
Wesley College$751k

Both panels use the same scale — $0 to $800k — matching Discovery 04

The cost gap starts early, then grows year by year.

The difference does not suddenly appear in secondary school. By the end of Year 6, these examples have already accumulated roughly one-third to two-fifths of their projected Prep–Year 12 recurring school-billed cost.

Secondary school can make the gap widen faster, but the financial difference has been building since Prep.

The thirteen-year gap isn’t one big bill at the end. It is years of smaller differences adding up.

This is a pattern across the examples we modelled, not a universal rule — the split between primary and secondary years is not the same at every school.

These charts use projected nominal recurring school-billed cost. One-off entry costs, unresolved family-paid items and broader family extras remain separate.

Discovery 06 explains how these future-dollar values differ from amounts adjusted back to 2026 buying power.

Key figures behind these charts

Cumulative projected recurring school-billed cost at four milestones, rounded
School	Prep	End of Year 6	End of Year 9	End of Year 12
Victorian government-school pathway — Victorian government-school policy reference	$0*	$0*	$0*	$0*
Marymede Catholic College — South Morang	$5.5k	$46k	$87k	$138k
Waverley Christian College — Wantirna South	$12k	$98k	$162k	$238k
Kilvington Grammar School — Ormond	$20k	$212k	$373k	$570k
Bacchus Marsh Grammar — Woodlea	$10k	$99k	$174k	$266k
Westbourne Grammar — Truganina	$20k	$176k	$292k	$435k
Wesley College — Glen Waverley	$32k	$285k	$495k	$751k

Exact Year 12 model outputs: Marymede Catholic College $137,771 · Waverley Christian College $238,305 · Kilvington Grammar School $570,123 · Bacchus Marsh Grammar $265,659 · Westbourne Grammar $435,110 · Wesley College $751,394.

Annual projected recurring school-billed cost at selected year levels, rounded
School	Prep	Year 6	Year 7	Year 9	Year 12
Marymede Catholic College	$5.5k	$7.7k	$13k	$15k	$18k
Waverley Christian College	$12k	$17k	$20k	$24k	$28k
Kilvington Grammar School	$20k	$45k	$48k	$59k	$69k
Bacchus Marsh Grammar	$10k	$19k	$23k	$28k	$33k
Westbourne Grammar	$20k	$31k	$36k	$41k	$50k
Wesley College	$32k	$55k	$60k	$85k	$89k

Wesley’s Year 9 figure includes the compulsory Clunes program. The full year-by-year canonical series feeds the charts above.

Discovery · Comparing dollars

Why can the same school cost have two different totals?

Discovery 04 showed future-dollar totals. The same spending can also be expressed in 2026 buying power — and the two numbers answer different questions.Comparison · future (nominal) dollars vs 2026 (real) dollars

Discovery 04 showed the total in future dollars, and Discovery 05 showed how those bills build year by year. But money paid in 2038 does not have the same buying power as money paid in 2026.

So how should we compare spending spread across thirteen years?

Future dollars

“How many dollars does the model project the family paying over the thirteen years?”

This adds up each year’s projected dollar amount, including the modelled fee increases. This is usually called the nominal total.

2026 dollars

“How large is that spending in 2026 buying power?”

This converts later spending back into 2026 buying power so money from different years can be compared on one scale. This is usually called a real value.

Neither number is the “correct” total. They answer different questions.

Same modelled school pathwayWesley College — Glen Waverley

Future dollars≈ $751k

adjust later spending back to 2026 buying power

2026 dollars≈ $630k

These are the same thirteen years of modelled recurring school-billed spending, expressed in two different ways — not two different school pathways or two different bills.

The 2026-dollar total is not a discount.

A family following the modelled pathway would still face the projected future-dollar bills in those future years.

The 2026-dollar figure simply gives us a common measuring stick for comparing money spent at different times.

How the two totals are built

Published 2026 fee
apply modelled fee growth
Projected future-dollar bill
adjust for general inflation
Value expressed in 2026 buying power

A — Fee growth: projects what the school may charge later.
B — Inflation: translates those later-dollar amounts back into 2026 buying power.

They are different assumptions serving different purposes.

The same spending can have two totals because we are asking two different questions.

Use future dollars when asking how many dollars the model projects being paid.

Use 2026 dollars when asking how large that spending is after putting every year on the same purchasing-power scale.

Neither number replaces the other. They answer different questions.

The same comparison across the schools

Projected Prep to Year 12 recurring school-billed cost for each school, shown in future (nominal) dollars and in 2026 (real) dollars.
School	Future dollars	2026 dollars
Victorian government-school pathway	$0	$0
Marymede Catholic College	$137,771	$114,808
Waverley Christian College	$238,305	$201,169
Kilvington Grammar School	$570,123	$476,639
Bacchus Marsh Grammar	$265,659	$222,282
Westbourne Grammar	$435,110	$366,457
Wesley College	$751,394	$629,706

Same Prep–Year 12 recurring school-billed totals as Discovery 05, with the same nominal-to-real conversion applied to every school. $0 is the same statewide recurring school-billed policy reference used in Discoveries 04 and 05 — not the cost of attending a government school. The 2026-dollar column is a common measuring stick, not an amount any family pays.

Discovery · Opportunity cost

What if the family invested the difference?

The financial choice is not only what a family spends on school. It is also what the extra spending could otherwise become.Model — D5 yearly school-bill differences · 3%, 5%, 7% + 9% examples

Choosing a cheaper school does not make education free. But if one pathway costs less than another, the family could use some of that difference somewhere else.

So we asked: what if the yearly difference was invested instead?

Money spent on school

The higher-cost pathway’s recurring school bills

These are the bills paid under the higher-cost pathway in our model.

Money invested instead

The positive yearly difference

For each year, we compare the two pathways and invest the money not spent on the higher-cost school as that difference arises.

Investment growth is not part of the school-cost total. It is a separate example of what the money not spent on the higher-cost school could grow to.

The 7% comparison · Prep to Year 12

How the invested yearly differences grow through the school journey

We did not pretend the whole 13-year difference was available at the start of Prep.

Instead, we modelled investing each year’s positive school-bill difference as it arose, from the middle of that school year to the end of Year 12.

Government reference lines are not $0 family-cost estimates. They show the future value of the modelled recurring school-bill difference only.

Exact results

At the end of Year 12

Govt reference → Wesley: $1,099,774.58
Marymede → Wesley: $901,238.10
Govt reference → Marymede: $198,536.48

See all 13 plotted values

Cumulative modelled invested capital at each year end, using the 7% example
School year	Govt reference → Wesley	Marymede → Wesley	Govt reference → Marymede
Prep 2026	$33,135.19	$27,451.12	$5,684.07
Year 1 2027	$70,246.61	$58,196.38	$12,050.24
Year 2 2028	$111,695.42	$92,534.98	$19,160.44
Year 3 2029	$157,872.24	$130,527.09	$27,345.14
Year 4 2030	$212,796.54	$176,351.59	$36,444.94
Year 5 2031	$278,535.69	$231,904.90	$46,630.79
Year 6 2032	$354,932.77	$297,021.42	$57,911.37
Year 7 2033	$441,809.27	$366,549.42	$75,259.84
Year 8 2034	$541,160.59	$446,673.15	$94,487.46
Year 9 2035	$666,694.07	$550,246.71	$116,447.38
Year 10 2036	$797,330.07	$656,618.26	$140,711.79
Year 11 2037	$941,308.94	$773,089.02	$168,219.90
Year 12 2038	$1,099,774.58	$901,238.10	$198,536.48

See what changes at 3%, 5%, 7% and 9%

Illustrative value at the end of Year 12 when each year’s positive school-bill difference is invested as it arises
Annual return	Victorian government-school policy reference instead of Wesley	Marymede instead of Wesley	Victorian government-school policy reference instead of Marymede
3%	$880,825.42	$720,413.55	$160,411.88
5%	$982,851.76	$804,651.75	$178,199.98
7% · main example	$1,099,774.58	$901,238.10	$198,536.48
9%	$1,233,910.69	$1,012,094.32	$221,816.36

The Victorian government pathway is a statewide recurring tuition-policy reference.

Government-school families can still pay for devices, uniforms, camps, activities, contributions, transport, enrichment and other costs.

So the about $1.10 million result is the modelled value of the recurring school-bill difference. It is not a complete estimate of what a real government-school family would save.

Both are named school-billed pathways in the model, so this is a cleaner comparison of the recurring school bills we have priced.

It does not include every possible cost faced by either family.

In technical terms, this uses a mid-year cash-flow convention and reports nominal future value.

The Prep contribution grows for 12.5 years.
The Year 12 contribution grows for 0.5 years.

An example, not a prediction

We used 7% a year as an illustrative long-term growth-investment scenario. It is not a guaranteed ETF return and it is not a forecast.

Vanguard’s long-run index history gives context for a growth-investment example. ASIC Moneysmart explains that investments carry risk and that ETFs are vehicles for holding investments, not rates of return.

Returns can be higher or lower.
Investments can lose value.
Personal tax is not included.
No particular ETF or investment product is selected.

The financial choice is not only what a family spends on school. It is also what the extra spending could otherwise become.

In our Marymede–Wesley example, the recurring school-bill difference is about $614,000. If the yearly difference were invested as it arose at an illustrative 7% return, the modelled investment reaches about $901,000 by the end of Year 12.

This does not mean the cheaper school is automatically the better choice.

The more expensive school may provide experiences, opportunities or other value that the family deliberately chooses to pay for.

The financial comparison tells us what is being given up. It does not tell us whether the trade-off is worthwhile.

A better question

We started by asking what thirteen years of education costs.

We’re leaving with a more precise view. The choice includes the school bills, when they are paid, and what the extra spending could otherwise become.

The financial comparison shows the trade-off. It does not decide which choice is worthwhile.

Where this led us nextWhat are parents actually buying?