As my eldest is approaching 4 years of age, he will soon be starting at 幼稚園 (nursery school), and I decided it was time to sit down with Excel for the afternoon and work out how much this school business is going to cost me.
I researched 3 different options: public schools, private schools and international schools. I based my calculations over 19 years, from the year of starting at nursery school to the year of graduating university. (based on a 4 year degree course, anyway).
I give you my summary below:
Public School: 707,500JPY average each year, per child, for 19 years
Private School: 1,197,500JPY average each year, per child, for 19 years
International School: 1,985,000JPY each year, per child, for 19 years
Now there are a lot of possible combinations of these above three. For example, the competition for places at public high schools and universities can be quite severe, meaning that you may be forced to going with the private school route to secure an adequate level of education for your child.
The maths I used to come up with the above figures is shown below:
| Age | School | Public | Private | International |
| 4 | 幼稚園 | ￥300,000 | ￥300,000 | ￥300,000 |
| 5 | 幼稚園 | ￥300,000 | ￥300,000 | ￥300,000 |
| 6 | 幼稚園 | ￥300,000 | ￥300,000 | ￥300,000 |
| 7 | 小学校1年 | ￥350,000 | ￥1,000,000 | ￥2,000,000 |
| 8 | 小学校2年 | ￥350,000 | ￥1,000,000 | ￥2,000,000 |
| 9 | 小学校3年 | ￥350,000 | ￥1,000,000 | ￥2,000,000 |
| 10 | 小学校4年 | ￥350,000 | ￥1,000,000 | ￥2,000,000 |
| 11 | 小学校5年 | ￥350,000 | ￥1,000,000 | ￥2,000,000 |
| 12 | 小学校6年 | ￥350,000 | ￥1,000,000 | ￥2,000,000 |
| 13 | 中学校1年 | ￥500,000 | ￥1,300,000 | ￥2,000,000 |
| 14 | 中学校2年 | ￥500,000 | ￥1,300,000 | ￥2,000,000 |
| 15 | 中学校3年 | ￥500,000 | ￥1,300,000 | ￥2,000,000 |
| 16 | 高校1年 | ￥550,000 | ￥1,050,000 | ￥2,000,000 |
| 17 | 高校2年 | ￥550,000 | ￥1,050,000 | ￥2,000,000 |
| 18 | 高校3年 | ￥550,000 | ￥1,050,000 | ￥2,000,000 |
| 19 | 大学校1年 | ￥2,000,000 | ￥2,500,000 | ￥3,700,000 |
| 20 | 大学校2年 | ￥2,000,000 | ￥2,500,000 | ￥3,700,000 |
| 21 | 大学校3年 | ￥2,000,000 | ￥2,500,000 | ￥3,700,000 |
| 22 | 大学校4年 | ￥2,000,000 | ￥2,500,000 | ￥3,700,000 |
| Total | ￥14,150,000 | ￥23,950,000 | ￥39,700,000 | |
| Average Yearly | ￥707,500 | ￥1,197,500 | ￥1,985,000 |
Now the above does not take into account of Juku, 塾, or cram school. Many children at Japanese school, particularly those at public school, will attend Juku for at least the year before Juken, 受験 , or enternace examinations before high school or university. My research showed that a year of cram school is around 500,000JPY, meaning you are potentially looking at an extra 3,000,000JPY if your child attends Juku during all 6 years of junior high and high school.
For those really into numbers, (and those who don't mind kanji), I created a matrix showing combinations of public/private/international/juku.
| 小 | 中 | 高 | 大 | 塾 | 合計 | 平均年費 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 公立 | 公立 | N | ￥12,150,000 | ￥639,474 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 公立 | 公立 | J1 | ￥15,150,000 | ￥797,368 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 公立 | 公立 | J2 | ￥14,650,000 | ￥771,053 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 公立 | 公立 | J3 | ￥14,150,000 | ￥744,737 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 公立 | 私立 | N | ￥14,150,000 | ￥744,737 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 公立 | 私立 | J1 | ￥17,150,000 | ￥902,632 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 公立 | 私立 | J2 | ￥16,650,000 | ￥876,316 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 公立 | 私立 | J3 | ￥16,150,000 | ￥850,000 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 私立 | 公立 | N | ￥13,650,000 | ￥718,421 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 私立 | 公立 | J1 | ￥16,150,000 | ￥850,000 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 私立 | 公立 | J2 | ￥16,150,000 | ￥850,000 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 私立 | 公立 | J3 | ￥15,650,000 | ￥823,684 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 私立 | 私立 | N | ￥15,650,000 | ￥823,684 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 私立 | 私立 | J1 | ￥18,650,000 | ￥981,579 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 私立 | 私立 | J2 | ￥18,150,000 | ￥955,263 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 私立 | 私立 | J3 | ￥17,650,000 | ￥928,947 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 公立 | 公立 | N | ￥14,550,000 | ￥765,789 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 公立 | 公立 | J1 | ￥17,550,000 | ￥923,684 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 公立 | 公立 | J2 | ￥17,050,000 | ￥897,368 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 公立 | 公立 | J3 | ￥15,650,000 | ￥823,684 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 公立 | 私立 | N | ￥16,550,000 | ￥871,053 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 公立 | 私立 | J1 | ￥18,650,000 | ￥981,579 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 公立 | 私立 | J2 | ￥19,050,000 | ￥1,002,632 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 公立 | 私立 | J3 | ￥18,550,000 | ￥976,316 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 私立 | 公立 | N | ￥16,050,000 | ￥844,737 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 私立 | 公立 | J1 | ￥19,050,000 | ￥1,002,632 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 私立 | 公立 | J2 | ￥18,550,000 | ￥976,316 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 私立 | 公立 | J3 | ￥18,050,000 | ￥950,000 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 私立 | 私立 | N | ￥18,050,000 | ￥950,000 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 私立 | 私立 | J1 | ￥21,050,000 | ￥1,107,895 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 私立 | 私立 | J2 | ￥20,550,000 | ￥1,081,579 |
| 公立 | 私立 | 私立 | 私立 | J3 | ￥18,050,000 | ￥950,000 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 国際 | 私立 | N | ￥18,500,000 | ￥973,684 |
| 公立 | 公立 | 国際 | 国際 | N | $23,300,000.00 | ￥1,226,316 |
| 公立 | 国際 | 国際 | 国際 | N | ￥27,800,000 | ￥1,463,158 |
| 国際 | 国際 | 国際 | 国際 | N | ￥37,700,000 | ￥1,984,211 |
The above Juku codes are:
-N: No Juku
-J1: 6 years of Juku
-J2: 5 years of Juku
-J3: 4 years of Juku
Please also note that the above calculations take into account 2,000,000JPY "insurance payouts" we expect from our Educational Insurance Policy 教育保険 with the post office. I.e. the totals are reduced by 2,000,000JPY in anticipation of the windfall.
My research for the costs was based on a anfternoon searching around the Japanese Internet for terms such as 教育費用.
For those interested
http://www.nomu.com/loan/lifeplan/k_education_01.html
http://money.goo.ne.jp/lifeplan/learning/fi63ag000000ucp3.html
http://www.babytown.jp/magazine/money/02/index.html
http://allabout.co.jp/finance/gc/10690/
Please note that the above 4 links are only a small sample of those I used as a basis for calculations. One thing that made things difficult, is that while the official Government (MEXT) statistics seem to understate the total burden, the numerous insurance companies I came across seem to be overstating.
For my figures, I opted to overstate rather than understate. It is my intention to calculate the true burden of sending children to school, including: school fees, school lunch, uniform, school trips, textbooks, tests, stationary, transport, insurance etc. I hope the above is an accurate reflection of that. For me, time will tell.
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