Our DD has attended private girls' schools since she was in 4yo preschool. I was also a staff member at her first school for 5 years and received a 25% discount. Fees have gone up significantly since then. I think they are around $5,000 for the first year of school and increase about a thousand each year. Her new school is similar and this year we will pay about $9000 for grade 6. This includes everything except uniforms (about $1000 in the first year; hats, dresses and blazers often last for 2 years and a school backback is part of this ammount which lasts up to 4 years). Stationery is about $200 (includes annual school diary). I'm glad that these schools didn't require the students to have their own lap-tops which is fairly common in private schools. We make significant sacrifices to send our daughter to private school but it's already proving it's worth. Our DD loves school, has learnt a little of most of the world's religons and much about Christianity, has a sports teacher that contacts us personally when she thinks there's an outside-of-school athletics event that she would do well in, she's also on her way to speaking fluent French and has learnt several instruments eg violin at no extra cost to us. Perhaps some of these programs are available in public schools though. My DH and I attended public schools and didn't enjoy school at all and we believe we could have maximised our potential if we had the opportunties we are giving our chidren... anyhow, I often feel defensive when I discuss our DD's education as few of our friends or relatives seem to support our decision. Good luck in your search for a good school. I think the most importnat aspect of a school is it's "culture" ie small and caring is the best in my experience