Up to $150k for guaranteed place at Canadian school

May 2, 2008

Up to $150k for guaranteed place at Canadian school

By Jane Ng

ANOTHER international school has announced that it will guarantee places for students in return for up to $150,000, making it the third school to embrace hefty placement fees.

The Canadian International School is hoping to tap into the growing number of companies looking to secure places in good schools for the children of expatriate employees.

Eight per cent of the places at the school will be available under this scheme. It currently has about 1,700 students and will increase the numbers to more than 2,000 by August.

Principal Glenn Odland said the plan was a 'response to market conditions'.

'This programme is designed to allow corporations or individuals, who need to be able to guarantee places for students, to purchase such a guarantee,' said Dr Odland.

This would make it easier for firms to hire senior-level executives who have children of school-going ages.

For corporations, the price of a guaranteed place is $150,000 for the first child and $130,000 for the second.The scheme is open to individuals as well, at $100,000 a child.

The school joins the United World College (UWC) of South-east Asia and Tanglin Trust School, which earlier announced similar plans.

The rising expatriate population is causing a squeeze on places in international schools. The number of foreigners here went up from 798,000 in 2005 to 875,500 in 2006.

Many international schools report long waiting lists.

The Canadian International School has received 30 per cent more applications than there are spaces available for its August intake.

The UWC has 1,000 on the application list for its interim Ang Mo Kio campus, which can take in 440 students, and the average waiting time for its Dover campus is four years.

A Tanglin Trust School spokesman said about 80 of 2,250 places at the school will be taken up by the guarantee scheme, which was launched in January.

The places have been bought by both individuals and companies, and the school has no immediate plans to increase the number of spots.

The UWC, whose guaranteed places are sold only to companies, declined to reveal the exact number of places taken up and would say only that it was 'very pleased with the general level of interest and uptake of the scheme. Demand has exceeded our expectations'.

Not all parents are going for such a scheme though; some are just joining the waiting list early.

Mr Niraj Parekh, 31, an investment banker, registered his then two-month-old daughter Isha at the UWC in November last year. He said it was a matter of being practical.

'The school said it's a first-come-first-served situation, so we take comfort in the fact that we're doing the best that we can for our daughter,' said Mr Parekh, whose spouse Rashmi is a housewife.

Isha will enter the school in 2012 when she turns five.



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