Tonight is the night of Maddie's end of the year music concert. She is just finishing First Grade. We have been in our Catholic schools now for over 15 years. We started Emily, our oldest child graduating this year from a Catholic H.S., when she was 3 years old. At the time the tuition was $40.00 a month and we were really stretching our budget to be able to send her. As she is leaving the Catholic system, her tuition is over $4000 each year. Of course I realize this is comparing High School to a preschool tuition, but...let's think about this...In order to send our family to Catholic schools last year it cost us over $13,000. (remember 5 of our children were in school, one of those in 3 day a week preschool and another little one at home with me. :) Please understand, I value the Catholic schools. I love the Catholic schools and I have given a number of teaching years myself to the system because that is where my heart is. I am not saying that an education at a Catholic school is not worth the tuition. Not at all. What I'm trying to decide in my head is what in the world is a "traditional" Roman Catholic family to do! We are facing a family crisis here and we really do not see a light at the end of the tunnel.
We are not the 'average' family that attends the school system--we truly embrace life and trust our family to Christ.
We are not looking for a private school as an alternative to a public education. We want the Faith taught to our children. We want them to be able to learn about God without fear of being told, "That's not welcome here!"
OK. So where does that take us...well, we apply for tuition assistance and go from year to year not knowing until the end of summer if our children will be able to continue at the school they have learned to love. I don't think families with two kids even consider this stuff.
So...we have decided that we will send our son who will be a Freshmen next year and the others will be decided as we see how our finances are doing. You may very well be reading a homeschooling blog here in a month or two. That is a very viable option. You should know that my husband isn't some exec with a huge salary...He teaches High School at our local public High School.
Will we survive? You bet! Would we let finances get in the way of more children? Absolutely not! Do we always have an adventure here? Yeah!
God watches over us.
Jesus, I trust in you!
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