Forgo Your Child Tuition; Invest the $ Instead

Few days ago, I felt so lazy to get out of bed, with my sleepy eyes, I lazed in bed reading a blog post - My talk on Funding your child's University Education at the Lifelong Learning Library.

And this paragraph caught my attention - "Along the way, I was able to blend in some ideas from economists along with some statistics to get parents to start thinking about the opportunity costs of paying such a large amount of money to tuition teachers and enrichment seminars and think about how large this money stash can get if it was invested in the stock market instead. This forms the heart of my dangerous idea : Money paid to tutors and enrichment schools could have been used to pay off dividends starting from the day your child graduates from a polytechnic."

What really got my attention - Dangerous Idea?

Not that I have any kids. But I decided to download the presentation deck to find out more details. The dangerous idea was presented in the following 2 slides (Source: Funding your Child's Education):



I did not attend the talk. My assumption and interpretation will be a tuition-free education environment for the child, relying sorely on the school, the child and the parent (i guess).




Would Singaporean parents actually consider it?

I believe nearly eight in 10 parents with children pay for private tuition in Singapore. The paper chase begins really early and tuition is considered a means to improve their children's grades and to help them keep up with others. I came from a non-tuition background and I did not have really good grades (average student). However, in this current era and context, I am not sure how receptive parents are to not providing any tuition to their kids. In fact, some parents might put in the extra hours at work just to provide tuition for their kids.