In Delaware, with the nation’s highest percentage of private school enrollment, tuition bills of $25,000 a year are not a barrier to entry for many students. Yet as the recession reaches into all socioeconomic corners of the state, private schools are offering more financial aid—and more parents, even in upscale neighborhoods, are reaching out for it.
With aid applications up 15 percent, Wilmington Friends School earmarked more than $2 million in tuition help for the current school year. Funding for need-based scholarships will be increased from just over $1 million to nearly $1.5 million next year at St. Mark’s, the largest Catholic high school in the Diocese of Wilmington. At Delmarva Christian High School in Georgetown, officials say no students will be turned away because their parents cannot pay tuition.
“Parents who have never requested financial aid before are coming to us now because a parent has lost a job,” says Eric Peters, director of admissions at Tatnall School in Greenville. “We are stepping up and offering families financial aid.”
Tuition at Tatnall ranges from $10,500 a year for preschool to $22,500 annually in the upper school. Enrollment is steady, and visits to the school by prospective students have increased, according to Peters.
With generous endowments and generations of supportive graduates, Delaware schools are well positioned to weather the economic storm, Peters says. “Wilmington has the highest number of independent schools—and the strongest independent schools—of any place I’ve ever heard of.”
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Delaware’s private school enrollment has slipped each year from 2005 through 2009, but the percentage of students in non-public schools in the First State is still comparatively high. Nationwide, a projected 11 percent of students will attend private schools this school year (independent or church-affiliated), according to U.S. National Center for Education Statistics. In New Castle County 18.8 percent of students attend private schools, according to the Delaware Department of Education (DOE). In Kent and Sussex, 14.8 percent are enrolled in private schools.
Private schools in other states have suffered dramatically during the recession. In Michigan’s Kalamazoo County, private school enrollment has dropped 10 percent in two years, as families have moved out of state to find work. In Palmetto, Fla., a market devastated by the real estate meltdown, an independent school faced with closure converted to a charter school in order to receive government funds and offer free tuition.
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In Wisconsin, where Peters worked before joining Tatnall, private institutions routinely lose students to public schools, he says. Delaware, however, has not experienced a flight from private to public schools, according to the DOE. This year’s modest public school enrollment increase of 1.3 percent (to about 128,000 students) is consistent with the last several years.
“The numbers speak for themselves,” says DOE spokesperson Susan Haberstroh. “We haven’t seen an extraordinary event in terms of growth in enrollment.”
While the state’s jobless rate is 8 percent, that’s below the national average of 9.8 percent.
“AstraZeneca, DuPont and Bank of America have all laid off people [in Delaware]—but they haven’t closed a plant and thrown everybody out of work,” says Kelly DeShane, director of admissions at Tower Hill School in Wilmington. “If we have two working parents and one loses a job, they aren’t moving away.”
In the last two years, financial aid applications have increased 30 percent at Tower Hill, where tuition ranges from $17,000 for kindergarten to $24,000 at the upper school. But while families may be struggling, enrollment—755 students in preschool through grade 12—is the highest in the school’s 91-year history.
DeShane says Tower Hill’s commitment of $1.7 million in financial assistance reflects the school’s dedication to families.
It also makes good business sense.
“The need for financial aid is a temporary bridge for many parents,” he says. “If a parent owns a small business that is struggling, that business will bounce back some day. If a parent loses a job, there will eventually be a new job.”
When students do leave private school, many go out of the system for good, says Myra McGovern, spokeswoman for the National Association for Independent Schools (NAIS), a trade group based in Washington, D.C.
“Families tend not to jump back and forth between schools,” she says. “If a child has already made one change, parents don’t want to disrupt their lives again.”
During the last decade, nine schools have closed or consolidated in the Wilmington Diocese, which includes all of Delaware and the Eastern Shore of Maryland. But total enrollment decreased by only about 1,000 students in five years—a relatively modest loss. Attendance at the remaining 38 schools is just over 13,400, according to the Diocese.
The Diocese established its Vision for Future Education Fund in the 1990s to make Catholic education more financially accessible. Families also can apply for aid through individual schools and parishes.
At St. Mark’s, where annual tuition is $9,746, requests for financial aid are outpacing this year’s $1 million allotment. The school has set aside nearly $1.5 million for next year, says Clarice Kwasnieski, admissions director.
“Some families still need help,” she says.
Of the nearly 800 students at Wilmington Friends, 27 percent are receiving financial aid this year, up from 22 percent last year.
Most requests come from parents who have more than one child enrolled at Friends, where tuition starts at $15,050 in preschool and rises to $21,600 in the upper school. There is no discount for siblings.
“The family wants to stay—and we want them to stay,” says Kathy Hopkins, director of admissions and financial aid at Friends School, established in 1748. “We’re getting the word out to parents to let them know that help is available.”
Founded in 2003, Delmarva Christian High School (DCHS) has grown from 60 to 185 students, drawing from a mixture of students from Christian and public schools, as well as home schools. In addition to tuition of $5,825 a year, the school is funded by several committed benefactors, as well as two annual fundraising dinners, according to spokesperson Susan Gum.
A number of families are struggling due to the sharp turndown in Sussex County’s real estate market, says Gum. But enrollment has not dropped, thanks to a decision by the board in 2008 to support parents who have fallen on hard times with a sliding scale for tuition based on the parent’s income.
“We feel strongly that no one should be turned away because of ability to pay,” Gum says.
A recent NAIS survey suggests parents are willing to make sacrifices in order to keep their children in independent schools. Some 75 percent would forego a vacation in order to pay tuition, while 60 percent would give up eating out and 52 percent would stop putting money into their retirement accounts.
“We have had parents who say they ‘would do anything’ to keep their children in [a private] school,” McGovern says. “Schools realize how important that is and are working hard to help.”