Take my girls out of private school? I’d rather starve, says desperate mum

  • Dec. 3, 2010
  • Keywords:
    • out
    • private
    • school
    • sibary
    • starve
    • take
  • Rated: 3.0
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Desperate mother, Shona Sibary, refuses to take her children out of private school despite increasing debts.

 Hero

Mrs Sibary determinedly continues to send two of her three children to The Royal School in Haslemere, and argues that she would rather starve than take them out of private school.

She claims: “for the past seven years we have slaved to pay school fees and keep our heads above water - an act of madness that has seen us drowning and waving at the same time (the waving only ¬happens at school functions, as we vainly attempt to disguise the fact we are trying, ¬frantically, to stay afloat). We owned a house — once.”

“But in the eight years we lived there we were forced to remortgage three times to keep ¬paying the school fees. When we finally sold up in 2008, just before the market fell through the floor, we came out with so little equity that we now have to rent and somehow - in our 40s - save up for a deposit all over again.”

Her husband Keith scrapes on a writer’s pittance, earning a modest wage in sales; whilst Shona has sold jewellery, worked weekends and had to plead with the Bursar for more money to pay fees.

“We have no assets, are thousands of pounds in debt and our earnings do a handbrake turn out of our current account so fast we’re left staring at the cloud of dust it leaves behind” she claims.

Hero“We rarely go on holiday; I buy all our clothes in charity shops and I can’t remember the last time we went out to dinner together. But, to me, it’s all worth it.’

Everyone agrees that Mrs Sibary’s daughters are the most polite, considerate and well-spoken girls that one could hope to meet, and she hopes to keep it that way. 

“Once you’ve got a child in the private sector and you’re seeing, first hand, the benefits of small class sizes and one-to-one, tailored teaching, it’s impossible to go back.”

Mrs Sibary concludes: “the look on their faces at the end of each school day, when it is as clear as the red on my overdraft ¬statement that they are loving what they learn, justifies my choice.

I’m no different to any other ¬parent. All I want is the best for my children, because this chance to educate them properly comes by just once.”

“Even if it means wearing underwear with holes in until I’m 60.”

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