Tuition Pricing

Good thoughts, but most of us do not know how the committees work. Presumably, those who are closer to the school, either as family, by hashkafa, by teaching there, etc will get a better deal. I am all for making the system more transparent, but practically speaking we are using the approach that we saw several of older “working” friends were using:

do not submit any financial forms, simply come to school and suggest that you’ll pay X $$$ or X%. The number should be fair, depending on your circumstances, number of children in school. your dependency on the school and how much markup the price is over the true cost. Do this number yourself, do not leave it to them. Generally, it would be 50%-70% of published price. This presumably covers your own children, excluding paying for the “non-working” families. If, say, general studies are so bad that you will have to teach them separately, then maybe 40%.

How do I know this is a good number? I once started conversation with a new financier, saying “I would like 30%” (meaning I am asking for 30% off). He thought that I am asking to pay 30% and almost had a heart attack. I quickly finished the sentence and we immediately shook hands.

Bottom line is that we need to have good Jewish education affordable to normal jews who work. Without that, we will continue having social distortions. parents consider staying in chinuch to afford education for their kids, schools using the tuition powers to dictate all rules, kids seeing their parents in constant financial distress despite working hard..

I do not have the answers to the tuition crisis. But please understand, as someone who works in Yeshiva administration and does not recieve an automatic tuition reduction, I do not know of a Yeshiva/Day School who is able to remotely cover their budget with the tuitions collected. Actually, the general formula is that they hope to cover payroll with tuitions. I agree that perhaps some administrators could use a brushiup on thei interpersonal communications skills,some of this comes form the fact that they are tired of getting the runaround from parents. Parents want Caddilac service at Yugo (for those that remember what that was) pices. They aren’t willing to give up on any amenities to save money. The answer “just fundraise” is rediculous.
There is an expression, “it is easy to be amartyr, when someone else is doing the dying”.

Chiam,

1) Not every schools offers free tuition, many don’t. Often only a reduction.
2) You are making an assumption that the tuition committee works competitively, pitting one family vs another when determining tuition. That is not what is done. Certainly not with any of the Yeshivas I am familiar with. Working with one parent on tuition does not mean that another who is deserving will not get the similar consideration.
3) $60,000 for a Rebbi in lakewood is well paid, an accountant at $90,000 is being paid well below market in Lakewood. I know that accountants with several years experience get paid well more than $90k in Lakewood. Not touch, but they make a multiple of what rabbeim get. You are not comparing apples to apples.

4) Someone making $90k with several children is not paying anything near 25%. And parsonage is taxed as SECA.
5) even with your flawed example, the rebbi after tuition has $53,000 net of whatever taxes. The accountant, if you gross up the tuition even at 25% which is a very flawed assumption, is left with $81,250 (90,000- 7,000(1.25)). Obviously pretax. But that is still $28,000 or more than 50% higher than the Rebbi.
6) For some reason you think that rabbeim should be complete paupers. So you cannot fathom any benefit that might have working as a Rebbi. Who says they have to be the worst paid people? Why is that your attitude?
7) You heard the word Paraonage and you bandy it about, but it is not what you think it is and it’s not used to pay tuition. There is a separate non taxable benefit available for people who work in schools that many yeshivas and schools make available. Many non Jewish schools and colleges do so as well.

nisht, I think Chaim is presuming way more than one child in schools, Bh. Update your computation for 6 kids:
rebbe – 3 free (the gender he is teaching), 7kx3=21K pretax. Left 60-21=39K
accountant – 6x7x1.2 (tax) = 50K, left with 90-50=40k

btw, I am not 100% sure that taking low salary and tuition reduction is really kosher in terms of “savings” on taxes. I did not hear of people arrested/fined for that, so it must be mostly legal.

Tuition is extremely expensive for everyone, but let’s recognize that this is also a test from Hashem.
Mori v’Rebbe, R’ Yaakov Bender shlita, wrote that he compares it to the Jews in the US in the early 20th century who were moser nefesh for Shabbos.
R’ Moshe Feinstein zt”l notably said that most of the children of these people did not stay frum because the fathers would come home and say “es is shver tzu zein a Yid.” That had a huge impact on the children.
I was always taught that the money for our kids tuition is separate from the money that we’re allocated on Rosh Hashanah. On a personal note, I can say that there have been plenty of times where I didn’t think I’d be able to pay my tuition costs, but somehow, the money always ended up being available. Sometimes it means borrowing, sometimes I got an unexpected income, but somehow, it always showed up.
The one thing that I’m always extremely careful of is to never let my kids hear me complain about it – and I try not to complain at all, even not in front of my kids! When my daughter once asked me about it, because she heard someone else complaining about it, I told her, “My biggest priority is to make sure that my children get a good Jewish education. If that means I don’t go on vacations, and don’t have a fancy car, that’s fine. It’s my greatest pleasure to pay tuition so that you can learn how to be a good Jew!”
I hope that my children get that same view, and then one day pass it along to the families that they will IY”H build.

@Chaim87-

I haven’t come across a way to collect tuition and give out scholarships that is fair to everyone. I’ve come across many opinions that say the only fair way to do it is this or that but once you look at it from the other direction it’s no longer fair.

Tuition is just one of those things that’s in a category by itself with nothing even remotely comparable.

What other expenses does one have in life that they can’t skimp on? You want to save money- buy a smaller house, eat out less, spend less on vacations, get a few more years out of your car… But when it comes to tuition- there’s no saving money- if you have the money you need to pay it.

Additionally, where else can you find a service where people pay based on what they can afford and everyone gets the same service?

A guy I used to sit next to at work subscribed to every WhatsApp tuition rant he could get himself onto and some of the discussions really had two sides and I got to see both of them and I literally could’ve taken either one.

One posters was willing to pay full tuition (which included the full amount for his kid plus a “secret” percentage above that) but he wanted a tax-deductible receipt for everything above what it cost to educate his kid. The school refused as they were concerned that those paying full tuition would give them a hard time about paying that extra percentage.

What about the tuition board that says that a person shouldn’t put away towards their 401(K) while getting a discount? Is it fair that he should lose out on the employer’s match? The school says that self employed parents don’t get a 401(K) match. Then there’s the government employee who gets a pension without having to set aside for a 401(K). Should he have to use part of his pension to pay back the school for the scholarships he got at the expense of those who couldn’t save for retirement?

There’s also the guy demanding that his kids get preferential treatment (I.e. leading roles in a school play, first choice at yearbook jobs…) since they pay full tuition while others were saying that their kids shouldn’t lose out because they can’t afford full tuition. (Would they go to a car dealership and claim that it’s not fair for their kid to drive a Yugo (yes, I remember those) instead of a Cadillac like their friends since they can’t afford it?) Is it fair that the teacher gives these out based on whose mother is a crank and has all the faculty phone numbers in her speed dial? (As a side story- someone asked a mother at a school play how her kids always have leading roles her response was “easy, the squeaky wheel gets the most grease”.)

In short- there may be a way to do all this fairly I just haven’t seen anything remotely close yet. I also don’t anticipate anything changing in the future.

(Also- can you explain what “parsonage” is (or what context you’re using it in)? I honestly thought it’s when a school (or other non-profit) lets their clergy live in a house on their property for free. I don’t see how this can be used to pay tuition.)

As per the IRS, a parsonage i”s a home that the church provides a pastor to live in rent-free as reasonable compensation for their ministerial services.”

It can also be a synogogue or a mosque but not a school. How many rebbaim are also the rav of a shil and are getting free housing?

The way parsonage is used in yeshivas is that taxes are not withheld from a certain amount of rabbi’s paycheck to cover his housing expenses. He does not need to live on campus.

What eddiee said is correct, that for the most part the schools using FACTS and similar programs do take all income and expenses into account.

Oy,

The amount of mistaken posting here is depressing. Most seem to be based on what someone has overheard but really does not grasp the concept. Even if it is someone who may have someone who gets parsonage or tuition benefit, they do not understand the programs and are posting wrong information. Calling it Parsonage when a school pays rent and such has a lot of mistakes and is really inaccurate. Referring to something as “School Checks” make sit clear someone does not know what the actual program is nor the IRS code section that specifically allows for such a benefit.

nishtdayngesheft

If i would have caled it by its name: Qualified Tuition Reduction Program. Nobody would know what I’m talking about. But yes very worked in schools and have experience so I do know about it.

This is from agudah:
So yes it is considered parsonage.

For purposes of a parsonage allowance, housing costs may include:
ü rent,
ü mortgage payments,
ü down payments and other costs of buying a home,
ü real estate taxes,
ü homeowner’s or renter’s insurance,
ü the actual cost of home improvements,
ü maintenance expenses,
ü repair costs, including appliance repairs,
ü utilities (electricity, gas, water, sewer charges, garbage and snow removal
charges, non-business phone line),
ü furniture costs,
ü appliances (including vacuum cleaner, garage door opener, lawn mower),
ü household goods (dishes, cookware, linens, lawn care tools and supplies, cleaning
supplies, light bulbs and fixtures, etc..) and
ü home decorations (carpets, curtains, paint, wallpaper, pictures, mirrors, etc.).15

@anonymous-jew

I’m all for transparency but there are some consequences. Do you actually want someone with a gripe to go through the books with a magnifying glass and complain about every penny that they don’t agree with?

At work we call it the Perry Mason Rule (and no, I’m not old enough to remember it), if we don’t have to share or disclose something- we don’t. Trust me- there are many times that my life would be easier if I could just share my entire financial model with the auditors but the higher ups won’t let. They don’t want those auditors, who are looking for problems, to have access to the full model. I need to cut out exactly what they’re looking for and give it to them.

When my son’s school applied for a loan to renovate / expand their building the bank hired an auditor to go through their books and he spilled the beans to me. (Okay- some auditors are cool.) Trust me- there’s nothing explosive in there but someone looking for some excitement could get lots of parents all riled up.

@Chaim87- Using inflows and outflows to figure out the tuition rate is unfair and unrealistic
Schools would need to start analyzing everyone’s expenses and telling them how to live.

Oh- this person has a nice car, he should pay more. Yeah, but he travels for work and needs a good car. Happens to be he lives in a small apartment.
Oh and my outflow is less because I live in a small basement apartment (with 6 kids) so I could save up for a house, should I pay more tuition? If so, I could move to a larger apartment.
Etc, etc, etc

Inflows and outflows only works if you take it on an individual case by case basis and then we’re back to where we are up to right now.

Flyer,

Parsonage, or housing allowance, almost never involves the Yeshiva directly paying the housing expenses of those who are eligible for parsonage (Clergy), or even providing them with a house. The checklist that the Agudah put together (and this is old, I first saw it probably more than 15 years ago) was so that the amount of parsonage can be determined and supported. The amount of parsonage allowed is the lesser of eligible housing costs or the fair value of rental.

Qualified Tuition Reduction, QTR, is a completely different benefit and is specifically for educational institutions and their employees. It is a non-taxable benefit that is explicit in the IRC. The benefit can be used to pay for education expenses at the school itself or even at other schools, for the employee or the family members of the employee. Often times there is a requirement for there to be reciprocating agreements between institutions and that is why it is not feasible in every case.

What is clear is the Chiam was slightly aware of such programs, and just blathered on because it bothers him that a Rebbi also gets consideration from the tuition committee when determining the tuition the Rebbi has to pay for his children. But he clearly did not know the actual details and three days after being told that his post did not make sense, was able to google up a small amount of the details.

One wat to reduce tensions between two groups would be to clearly charge working parents tuition that corresponds to expenses without marking it up, and then use fundraising to pay for discounts to the rest. Someone mentioned before about parents requesting at least documentation of a charitable donation but was refused. This is not right.

In a convoluted way I can see the point of the parent who wanted a tax deductable receipt for the costs above educating his child. If you think about it, once the class exists, so the costs of the room, Teachers, electricity, etc. are already established. At that point, adding another child to the class does not increase those costs. If so, the costs to educate this one child are negligible, on the outside $500.00 ( this does not include food) ANNUALLY.
This parent is making the claim that any tuition above this $500.00 should be counted as a donation and be tax exempt. This can reprisent a significant amount.

I agree that this is twisted logic, but I have heared this thought process, albeit with a different demand attached to it.

I also don’t understand this whole issue. I have worked either on the tuition committee or closely with the tuition committee of a number of schools. I have NEVER seen a tuition committee say”we have X amount of funds available. Lets see how to divide it up”. It is ALWAYS lets see how much we can get from the parents, and see if it comes close to what we feel the parents can pay (do we feel the parents are taking advantage of us). I am not saying that it is right for a committee to dicide what you are able to pay, but for the most part that is communication and negotiating skills that may need brushing up.
the point is that in the right wing schools, which would be the schools that I have knowledge of- both intown (NY and Lkwood) and out of town (not NY and Lkwood)- there was never a preexisting total scholarship number that was being worked against. As such, is it just jealousy that someone else may get a bigger break than you, or is this thread about having rachmanus on the poor fundraiser who now has to raise funds for the school budget?

@always_ask_questions

You seem concerned about the intrusion of the tuition committee into peoples personal lives. I’m not trying to belittle that but point out how much worse it is when vicious Shadchanim find out that someone exists (may Hashem protect us all from them and their wicked tactics).

A family only needs to deal with a tuition committee (and again, I understand that it may be very uncomfortable) once they decide that they want to send their kids there and ask for a scholarship application. If they feel that the questions are too personal they’re welcome to not fill it out and apply elsewhere.

Once an evil shadchan gets ahold of your name there’s nothing you can do. Even after you tell them that you’re not interested in working with them and give them no permission to make calls on your behalf (the polite ones will tell you that it’s too bad because that’s not how the system works while the rude ones won’t even acknowledge your concerns) they’re going to call everyone you know and ask the most personal questions (and trust me, it’s not limited to finances) under the ruse that לשון הרע doesn’t apply to shadchanim.

@eddiee

That calculation doesn’t pass the smell test.

Take the entire school budget for the fiscal year and divide it by the number of kids in the school (possibly prorate it by grade as for example preschool is less expensive than older grades). Once an expense is determined at the individual level and a surcharge above that is added for full tuition- a family should be able to ask for a tax deduction for the surcharge(s).

Asking for more than that is just not honest. (I’m not sure what context you saw that in though.)

The school that I spoke with the auditor about would project their annual budget and add a certain percentage to the individual tuition responsibilities for full tuition. Whatever shortfalls they were left with was closed with fundraising.

I’m not under the impression that have a certain amount to give out in scholarships and they divide discretionally.

eddie, you bring an interesting point of view but it is based on your insider position. As you see, we parents are not privy to that magic. Maybe we’ll be more considerate if the school shared details and gives more decision-making power to the parents.

eddie: In a convoluted way I can see the point of the parent who wanted a tax deductable receipt for the costs above educating his child.

let me explain this logic: some people pay more, some people pay less. Regardless of how your committee squeezed those funds, those who pay more are in effect subsidizing those who pay less. So, that person requested donation receipts for the extra amount so that he can write it off. Maybe you can explain why the school refused to do that. Maybe they do not want to acknowledge what the true costs are v. published tuition?

Of course, it could be that the paying parent gets additional services, like advanced math class or personal Gemora tutor. In that case, the extra tuition would not be deductible. In any case, transparency will help everyone understand the other side.

Schools are a system with limited competition that exists, for example, in defense industry where there is often 2-3 or even one supplier. In such system,
(1) suppliers develop strategy to divide market such that each of them is a monopoly. In defense, companies focus on vertical integration in one weapon system. Schools similarly teach you “derech” instead of stam mishna and halocha so that you can’t switch to a different “derech” without losing face
(2) the customer strategy in defense (used successfully during Reagan times) is to create as much competition is possible by subdividing tasks, using two suppliers for the same item …

So, how do you develop stronger negotiating position (may vary by school and place, of course). Here are my ideas, what are yours?

– send kids to two different schools so that each of the school knows that you can move remaining kids to the other school. You can ask for a discount for moving kids there
– change schools with some frequency
– be prepared to go to a different school or move to another town if negotiations fail.
– be prepared to online/home school for a year, maybe create a group ready to do that
– be known in the community as a decent person whose opinion is valued. What would people say if you changed schools?!
– maintain a community school that is cheap and teaches minimal standards for many groups without pushing ideology and is flexible in letting parents add things according to their preferences and interests. So, then people from many schools could use this school when they have problem with their own. It may not be the best, but beats moving to another town.

@Always_Ask_Questions

My kids are gifts from Hashem and my most treasured assets, which is why I take pride in tuition being my first and highest priority. (In 2024 we probably paid more than four times the amount on tuition than we did on our mortgage.)

Switching a kid to another school can be hard as they’ll be leaving their friends and coming into a new school where the kids already have their groups of friends. They may be behind (or ahead) of the curriculum in the new school- it’s not always easy to catch up (or spending a year to learn something for the second time). Is the new school going to give your kids the attention they deserve if they know that you’re only sending them there to prove a point to another school and then you’ll switch them back or to somewhere else?

We choose schools based on where our kids are going to succeed the most- not to show the schools that we have other options. We choose schools where we trust that the faculty will do what is in the best interest of the child, regardless of whether it’s in their own best interest.