Preparing for the start of the school year can be daunting for parents, as well as students. This week the Herald tracks the growing education bill for families and gets some expert advice on how to cope. Today, Imogene Bedford and Lochlan Lineham start by looking at the overall costs. Auckland mother Cara Roberts reckons she spends about $600 to $1000 a year on education for her 11-year-old son Aaron – depending on what extracurricular activities he pursues. She hopes to send Aaron to Dilworth when he starts high school in 2028. If he does not get a place there, Roberts said she will enrol him at the local secondary school, Glendowie College, for a donation of $595. But state school donations, which ranged from zero to Auckland Grammar’s $1825, according to a Herald survey last month, are the tip of the iceberg for Roberts and other parents at this time of year. Interviews and information from schools show parents of a student starting Year 9 in Auckland can expect to pay thousands to get them set up for high school. The list starts with basic costs such as uniforms, devices and stationery, before families consider extras such as after-school activities, camps and trips. And at the other end of the spectrum, parents sending their children to private schools can expect to spend $150,000 on tuition costs across five years. Woodlands Park School principal Ngaria Stephenson said the cumulative impact of several smaller expenses is the greatest challenge for a number of Kiwi families. Many need extra help. Struggling parents borrowed $9,016,436 in 30,735 hardship assistance grants from the Ministry of Social Development in the March 2025 quarter – money that helped them through the start of the school year but still had to be paid back. KidsCan chief executive Julie Chapman said the charity has helped more than 1400 Aotearoa schools and early childhood centres with key costs such as food, jackets, shoes and health items in the past year. “Cost-of-living pressures mean more families are having to make impossible choices, and it’s showing up in classrooms right across New Zealand. KidsCan founder and CEO Julie Chapman says the charity helped more than 1400 Aotearoa schools and early childhood centres with key costs last year. Photo / Supplied “When we talk to schools, the costs hitting families hardest are often the most basic ones – food for lunch, appropriate shoes and warm clothing. These are things many people assume are already covered, but increasingly, they’re not.” The Herald will cover many of these costs in detail this week – but for now, here’s a snapshot of the main ones. Devices Most primary and secondary schools now ask parents to purchase a personal device for their children’s digital learning. Roberts spent about $600 on a school-issued Chromebook, which is expected to last about three years. The cheapest Chromebook listed on PriceSpy costs $416, while an Apple MacBook is priced as high as $2800. Mother of two boys, Jodie Peters, told the Herald she spent about $1000 on two Microsoft Surface laptops for each of her sons while they were in secondary school. Boys can be rough on their devices, so Peters recommended buying the extended warranty and investing in a good case to get the most out of their lifespan. “You don’t want to be forking out $1000 each time or claiming on your contents insurance.” Stationery Parents can sometimes avoid having to cough up for textbooks and stationery, which often do not get used because of the reliance on devices, Peters said. “Right through the years, they’ve had to buy these packs – spend $100 on the stationery [when] they don’t use anything that’s in the box.” She purchased the full packs in their first year of college, after which she would only purchase essentials and reuse stationery from previous years. “[We] kind of recycled the last year’s one, ripped out pages where they didn’t need it, and tried to keep it quite simple.” Unfortunately, the advice doesn’t...