Pricy tuition turns expats to home schooling

    Close to home

    With a crimped economy tightening belts, a growing number of expatriates in China are seeing home schooling as a solution to the soaring cost of tuition.

    Expats living in China usually weigh two options for formal schooling, says Arkansas native Liora Pearlman, a founding member of Beijing Home Schoolers, an Internet-based support group.

    Their children can attend an international school, where tuition is afforded mainly by employees of multinational conglomerates whose pay packages include children's education, or be enrolled in Chinese schools where classes are taught solely in Mandarin, Pearlman says.

    "International school education is certainly not cheap, and in situations where companies or organizations do not cover children's education, some parents may feel that they have no choice (but to home school)," says Wayne Denmar, principal of Beijing BISS International School. For the 380 students attending BISS, annual tuition costs range between 96,000 yuan ($14,000) for kindergarteners to 172,000 yuan ($25,200) for high school seniors.

    "I think that parents have an obligation to do what they believe is best for their children," Denmar says.

    Many of those lacking access to the deep pockets of employers are adopting a do-it-yourself attitude.

    "When Beijing Home Schoolers was formed in 2007 there were only 10 members and now we have almost 60," Pearlman says. "And the numbers are still growing."

    Estherine Chan, administrator of the Shanghai Area Learners Together (SALT), says she has seen a similar rise in the number of families choosing to home school.

    "We have noticed a big increase in the home-schooling population here, and I think it's for several reasons," including reductions in the amount of expatriate education packages because of the global economic downturn, Chan says.

    For American Pat Sommers, the cost of educating her 7-year-old daughter, Ellie, one year at an international school would average 150,000 yuan ($22,000).

    When Sommers moved to Beijing two years ago from England, following her English husband whose online mapping software company, Schmap! is based in Beijing, she thought enrolling Ellie in an international kindergarten was the best option. The cost was too high, though, so Sommers decided to explore the Chinese school system.