financial crisis and saving money.

We are hit by the financial crisis at a bad time ,we wanted our kids to go good international schools but are thinking of saving some money aside instead as the recession rises further,meaning sending her to a cheaper school but not lowering our educational values standard to provide for our kids.Any one of you out there have the same changing priority now ,meaning considering switching to a 'cheaper' schools in hongkong islandI always feel guilty about it but someone's told me not to wear a hat bigger than my head if i cant afford it now.Does the recession affects you but still wouldnt mind applying for a better school?

Hi Clara34

I have one of those jobs that isn't affected by the recession.

In HK, paying top dollar for an overpriced education is not necessarily going to buy your child the best education.

(This part is written in context of your other forum post on GSIS)

Take GSIS as an example, in our meeting with the CFO, he made it clear that ALL kids will need to be covered by the exorbitant debenture and in the future, because they are looking to into rebuilding the school, we were told that there may be a building fund request too on top of the debenture. From the conversation, i gathered that this school was funded by corporations willing to pay the debenture and VERY WEALTHY local HK families. Given the exorbitant fees, I was willing to overlook had I seen a nurturing, creative and hopefully some semblance of quality work around the school during the tour. What my husband and I observed were far from it! For the amount of money that has gone into educating the kids, I was surprised that the quality of work that was shown... neither creative or of good quality. The kids at my Band 2 Chinese Medium of Instruction School would have done a MUCH BETTER job as would have the kids back home in a public school would have produced. As for nurturing... from what I observed with the teachers interactions and the kids interaction, there was nothing spectacularly warm and inviting about being in school.

I have seen much better work at other International Schools which have "a high price tag but not at high as GSIS".

So, don't judge the school by the price... sometimes we do better by our kids by exploring schools that would suit their talent best. Mine is one spirited child and we will definitely be looking into schools that are first and foremost more nurturing and creative and coincidentally definitely CHEAPER!

We have our son waitlisted at an International School that promotes ALL the values we believe in. But have also looked into ESF as an option and even local schools. Our decision has never been about the price tag but about the educational value the school can provide for our child. We don't want him to be a drone. He will be leaving school going into an even more competitive markets as graduate numbers are expected to increase by 30 per cent in the world... making a graduate a dime a dozen!

I reckon our kids are in an even greater need of a school that promotes Literacy (in at least a bilingual environment), Creativity and Sports! GSIS is definitely NOT one of them despite the price tag.

So, don't feel bad if you don't want to place your child in the most expensive school.

Clara34,


If I were you, I would let the kids to stay where they are for one whole year, and at the same time look around to see if there are any other good but afordable international schools here. After finding some suitable ones, I would then do the applications for my kids for the next school year instead of the current one. If the financial situation doesn't improve in a year, then that would be the time to do school transfer. In fact, Hong Kong has quite a few good international schools charging reasonable school fees. School fee is one important but certainly not the determing factor for us to judge and choose an international school. You really don't have to feel bad or guilty while transferring your kids to a "cheaper" international school from an "expensive" one in Hong Kong. Do your school search, I'm sure you would be glad to find out that some "cheaper" international schools here are surprisingly excellent and provide similar quality education as those provided by expensive and prestigious international schools.