Public or private schools: Which do we choose?

By VANAJA THOMAS

Growing up in Kuala Lumpur, my family instilled in me a strong sense of the value of education.

Being Sri Lankan, education to them was at the top of their list in importance. They both came from large families and because of this upbringing opportunities were limited.

I have a belief, which I would love to pass on to my children, which is to always strive for a better life, and that it’s OK to be more, and want more, than your parents may have had.

I’ve been able to experience so many more things than my parents did because they had this belief too. They wanted me to have the opportunity to travel, have a good education, and have a career. All things I’ve been lucky enough to have experienced – I now even own a parenting website, Little Roan.

This is a Brand Voices post brought to you by Australian Scholarships Group. All opinions expressed by the author are 100% authentic and written in their own words.

Ten years ago I married my husband – an Aussie. We now live in Melbourne and have a four-and-a-half-year-old son. He is the most caring, compassionate and brightest little boy. Like any mum, I want the best for him. I want him to have love and happiness in his life, and a great career that he truly enjoys.

Every evening he enjoys pulling up his stool to the kitchen table watching me cook and bake, something he loves to do. Mixing the ingredients, stirring the pot and even adding salt, he inquisitively looks on to see what my next step in the recipe is.

Maybe one day he’ll want to be a chef, but at the moment, I’m pretty sure his dream is to be his favourite superhero – The Incredible Hulk. Whatever he wants, all I hope is that he lives his dreams and has every opportunity to do what he wants in life.

But I think in order to make dreams a reality, education is fundamental. It develops our potential, shapes our future and provides a great opportunity for a better life.

In Australia I think there are high quality tertiary institutions, but for me and my husband, it is the standards of education in public primary and secondary schools that concerns us.

With so much discussion at the moment around school funding and teacher quality, we have concerns about whether public or private schools will meet our educational expectations.

I guess that’s one of the main reasons we started thinking that we needed to put a plan in place. With the growing costs of private schooling a concern as well, we wanted to provide all we could for our son and it became apparent that we would need to prepare early. We wanted to have a choice when it came to education for him.

A few years ago we signed up with the Australian Scholarships Group (ASG), which offers a range of products and resources to help us prepare for his education. It has given us peace-of-mind that we’re doing what we can to give our son the opportunities for a great future.

In helping prepare for his future at either a public or private school, we hope he can live his dreams and have all the opportunities that we didn’t have.

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