Nursery is probably a year and a half away. My partner works in finance and wants a number to save towards, and the fee sheets we've seen are clearly only the start. For those who did nursery recently: apart from the term fees, what did the first year really involve? Uniform, books, van, the things that came up every month. Not asking for school names, just the categories that surprised you.
The extras came in waves with my elder one. Books and uniform, two pairs of shoes in the first term because feet grow, the van, and then every month something small: a costume, a trip, a contribution for annual day. I'd plan for the extras to be a real chunk on top of the fee, not a small top-up. Doing it all again with the baby now, so I'm reading every reply.
Teacher here, so I see the lists from the other side. The fee is predictable. What isn't is everything around it: some schools include clubs and events, some charge for them separately. Ask any school you shortlist for a full year of last year's circulars rather than the fee sheet. The circulars show what parents were really asked for. Whether the extras are worth paying for is a separate question that I still haven't settled for my own daughter.
The cost nobody warned us about was time. Nursery finished at 12.30, so we paid the caregiver for extra hours, and over the year that came to more than the van. If both of you work full days, put the afternoon cover in the same spreadsheet as the school.
Stationery lists. Every year. Twenty pencils for one child?
Our son is in college now, so my memory of this is old. The nursery year felt expensive and turned out to be the cheapest one. We never kept an account for it. I wish we had, mostly so the bigger years didn't arrive as a shock.
That's what my partner keeps pointing at, that it's the bigger years we're really saving for. Thank you. And the circulars idea from above is going straight onto our list.
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