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Comment by nsxwolf | Hacker News Reader

Why are they so damned expensive?

Why are all the other preschool options so cheap? Even Montessori-trained preschool teachers are barely paid enough to scrape by, and it's not like the schools are taking in enough cash to pay them more.

Tuition at the Montessori school by me is $15,000 per child, per year. That's crazy. Most families around here could never dream of affording that.

Where does all that money go...

Say it's $15k per child per year, and we're talking about a preschool. That means state mandated teacher ratios, depending on the state. Let's say it's 1:10, and that's on the low side. Suppose you have two classrooms of 20 children each. That means you take in 300k in tuition and you have to pay four teachers plus at least one administrator. Knock off 100k for rent, overhead, insurance, certifications, capital expenses. That leaves you with 40k for each teacher's total compensation. How far does that go where you live? Realistically, most preschools charge even less and pay their teachers accordingly.

$15k * 40 is 600k which with your math means $100k per teacher

You are correct about the multiplication, I forgot to multiply by two classrooms, but let's keep my other assumptions. Start with $600k. Subtract $100k for insurance, rent, and overhead. (And I think $100k is a low estimate here.) Now you have $500k and 5 employees. That's still $100k in total compensation per employee. It's not dire poverty like my $40k estimate before, but keep in mind that that's still a good deal more than their gross pay, which will come in more like $60-80k once benefits are accounted for. In the kind of area that can support a $15k/student/year Montessori school, that kind of pay is basically decent, but it's not like they're laughing all the way to the bank.

$15,000 per child per year * 2 classrooms * 2 children per class room = $600,000 per year, not $300k.

Knocking off 100k for <foo> leaves 500k between the 5 staff, which is 100k each.

So, more likely, 40k for the 5 teachers, and the remaining 300k going to manager(s).

Good point -- mental math failure on my part.

That's relatively high, but local conditions vary.

Note that many Montessori schools offer access to financial help. The key benefits are said to be derived between the ages of 3 and 6. My daughters both started at age 2, still going, I wish I had had that kind of education.

Note that $15k isn't tremendously more than public school costs:

> Total expenditures for public elementary and secondary schools in the United States in 2013–14 amounted to $634 billion, or $12,509 per public school student enrolled in the fall (in constant 2015–16 dollars).

https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=66

Supply and demand? also, cost of materials. Montessori-trained guides devote years to training, want to make a decent living, and the excellent ones are in short supply.

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