Are We Ready for Our Child’s Education?

Disclaimer: this is an unsponsored post. Just wanted to share what I learned. 🙂

I was browsing through Facebook a few weeks ago when I stumbled upon a seminar posted by Mothercare Philippines:

I was interested to attend as I have been planning to have my son homeschooled, especially when I confirmed that he has Down syndrome. It is not for the reason that I don’t want him to interact to “normal” kids but rather to ensure that his studies will be based on his own learning curve. So when I saw this, the first thing I checked was the schedule. It was to be held on the same day as my goddaughter’s christening. Well, I still took the risk, though. I signed up for it and included my sister (and I totally forgot that my Mom was coming to the big metro as well and was not able to include her in the registration. Sorry, Mom!). Good thing that there was no registration fee because, seriously, I don’t have the budget for it. 😛 

The seminar lasted about two hours, tops. Two topics were discussed: first one Design Your Child’s Future which was about the cost of education and how to prepare for it presented by representatives from Insular Life. The second one was Level Up Parenting in Homeschooling presented by Ms. Abigail Yabot, a parenting advocate and homeschooling mom.

Here’s what I have learned from the seminar (this is what I retained in my head as I was not able to take down notes – forgot to bring my handy dandy notebook :P).

Financial Preparation

The reps from Insular Life presented how much it cost to send a child to school. Hearing stories from colleagues as well, I would agree with what they said that sending a child to school is expensive. Here in the big metro, depending on the school, sending a child to grade school can cost as much as Php120K. Seriously! How much more when they reach college?

They have presented the common options that parents nowadays have in terms of financially providing for their children’s education. A few of what I remembered (and how I understand it) from the presentation are as follows:

• financial assistance from grandparents and/or other relatives
• Loans / cash advance
• Bank savings
• Investments

In the Philippines, it is very common for Filipino families to get financial help from parents to send their kids to quality schools. And there is no decrease in the tuition fee as well, year by year. On the average, it was presented that there is a tuition fee increase of 7% every year. And that’s not the only fee you pay in sending a child to school. You still have the miscellaneous fees, daily allowances, school projects and the likes. So just imagine how expensive it gets every single year.

If both parents are working and still struggling to finance their child’s education, how much more for a single parent like me? Just thinking about it is making my head hurt, to be honest.

A comparison was presented as well by the Insular Life folks between the difference of the annual interest rates provided by banks and compounding interests provided by investment funds, so to speak. To sum it up, bank interest will only provide you a very minimum interest on the initial capital whereas investments with compounding interests will provide interest on both the initial capital plus the year on year interest earned. In the long run, the return of investment via compounding interest is much higher compared to simple interest earned through bank savings. (I do hope I was able to explain that well).

When we have kids, for sure we have already thought of how much it would cost to send them to school but more often than not, we only have a very vague idea on how much it would really cost in the long run. We are so used to having that “bahala na” attitude that sometimes we don’t really plan ahead of time.

Boy am I glad to have been interested in financial planning a few years back so I do understand the importance of financial investments. At the start of this year, I have already opened up a mutual fund for my Little Z. I started with a small amount but I am planning on increasing the initial capital on that fund as well. It will not only be for his education in the future but it will be a good source when the time comes.

Traditional School vs. Homeschooling

In the second part of the seminar, Ms. Abigail Yabot discussed the advantages of homeschooling. She has been homeschooling her children for 5 years now and so far, it has been working great for them.

Homeschooling is not a new concept for me. When I was young, a few of the kids my age in church before were homeschooled. They go through modules at their own pace. Others can go fast paced (and usually take the acceleration exam to level up) and some follow the normal pace.

That’s what I really like about homeschooling. Teaching becomes flexible. It also has the usual curriculum approved by DepEd but the style of teaching is non-traditional. You still have the option to have a few classroom-type sessions, depending probably on the subjects, but more often than not, the style of teaching is not the usual theoretical and conceptual approach.

Given that my son has DS, I would really prefer homeschooling because of his learning curve. This is because I myself would approve of the non-traditional teaching approach. Learning incorporated in play time, vacation, and even the simple routine stuff of everyday life.

There’s also the misconception that when homeschooled, the child will not be able to develop social skills because there is no interaction with other students. It was explained as well by Ms. Yabot that, depending on the curriculum you take, you have the option to have some classroom-type sessions for some of the subjects so they can interact with other students. And I don’t think they will not have this skill in the long run. They may not have any interaction with other students in a classroom type set up but I think they can still develop their social skills through everyday interaction with people around them. 🙂

So there. I am so glad to have attended this seminar. Although I have already a vague idea on how much it would cost to send my son to school and how expensive education is nowadays, I was still able to learn a lot of things with the two topics discussed.

Thank you, Mothercare Philippines. I never knew that you conduct seminars on a regular basis and I am happy to have stumbled upon the advert for this seminar. Hoping to attend more of your seminars in the future. 🙂

The event was sponsored by Mothercare Philippines, Philips Avent Phils, Early Learning Center and Insular Life