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A lot. We share a 90s style cell phone, share one car and live very minimally, and on a busy street but it was what we could afford in the best part of town. I value giving her the opportunity to attend quality schools because I suffered at a very poor country school and it limited me greatly.

I am not sure. It depends on what kind of educational needs and sacrifices we were talking about.

Of course I want the best possible situation for my son, but that doesn't mean I would be willing to live in poverty to achieve it.

@looch: agreed. I won't put myself in the poorhouse for tuition for a good school.

My sacrifices for my son is to help him with his homework, keep him organized and make sure he understands everything he's learning in school. I watch his school and teacher to make sure they're making the right decisions in teaching him, and when they fail, I'm more prepared to home school him than I am to pay too much for tuition.

That said, he does great in school and right now I feel like his needs are met. We're going to a new school next year, so I'll be diligent there to make sure my presence is known and that his teacher knows I'm paying attention.

That's sort of a broad question. I mean we're going to pay a lot for a really good daycare. And we specifically bought a house in a good school district (although not THE BEST so I guess we weren't willing to sacrifice having a nice house for having the best school district).

But in terms of future education (like college?)? Some but not a ton. We don't feel a responsibility to pay for 100% of our kids' college education. We will certainly save SOME and help SOME when the time comes, but we're not going to drastically cut our standard of living to start socking away hundreds of thousands of dollars to pay for college.

I feel like it will depend on where end up living. Right now we are sacrificing all the little luxuries to afford preschool but I feel like it is totally worth it because it makes all of us happier. If we end up in DH's hometown we would have to go the private school route and I think we would have to make much bigger sacrifices. I guess that means a lot?

@Weagle: I am glad you added that, because that was along the lines of what I was thinking. The public school system is obligated to provide an education to children and if they can not do so, they must find a reasonable alternative and pay for it. I know first hand because my brother attended a private high school at no cost to my parents because the public school just didn't have the facilities.

In any event, if my son were to be diagnosed and his needs couldn't be met with the public school, we'd explore options.

We were dreaming up a scenario of 'what if' LO was accepted into the dream private school xyz and then got a full ride scholarship. Would we drive hours to get her back and forth from where we live? We agreed to sacrifice where we lived so she could go to school. But that is just our dream scenario. In reality she will just go to the school where I teach. We don't want to pay for elem. Maybe high school and definitely part of college.

I think I'll take it one day at a time with this myself. I want to send LO to a private preschool but then to a public elementary, middle, etc. If he thrived at the preschool I may try to do more years there, because it goes to grade six (it is a Montessori school). But it would have to work with the rest of the family. I don't think we would ever consider private HS; we don't want to have to earn that kind of money (golden handcuffs) and my husband is very pro public school at that point (he grew up close to a ritzy private school and felt like the community always looked down on the students at his schools when they would face them in competitions, sports, etc.).

I would be willing to move to a different district (actually we are in the process of doing this hopefully soon). I'd also be willing to hold my children back from preschool longer to afford a better one. For example, DH and I have decided not to do PS for our son at 2 so that we can save up for PS at possibly 3, definitely 4.

As far as college goes.... I went to college in GA when we had a fully funded education lottery. My parents helped me out with board and meals the first year, and I got a full ride for my tuition. I was an RA to afford room and board the other years of college. My parents did pay for my cell and my insurance and bought me a car and gave me sums of money occasionally. I don't know what the future will hold for my son, but I suspect there will be reform in this area. But I am planning to enjoy my life (within reason of course), and fund my retirement, and help him outside of that.

@snowjewelz: some school districts will let you pay your way in. The absolute best district in our state will let us pay in for $10k a year, per student. You have to arrange transportation too; but if you live in a town with cheap taxes and crappy schools, that's another solution! $10k is cheaper than private school!

Well, I guess I feel that no child's education is worth straining our spiritual lives, my marriage, and the quality of family time for. I think overall we'd be willing to make a lot of sacrifices for our children's educations, but if it got to a point where it started detrimentally impacting those things, it would be a no-go, period. So all our decisions would be filtered through that lens.

Within those constraints, I think for K-12, I believe I have an obligation to do what works for each individual child's needs and learning style. Thus we're equally open to private, public, or homeschool, or a combination of all of the above. And DH and I are prepared to sacrifice our careers and income for that because we feel its our duty to care for and educate our kids to the best of our ability until they are adults. And we've built our careers around that assumption from the beginning of our marriage.

However, I believe this kind of investment and sacrifice makes college something that's out of our control. Our kids will be raised to believe going to college is something that's necessary (unless they have some special vocational skill they are passionate about). And if we have the funds to help our kids, we will do so. But they will not be raised to assume that college is paid for. DH and I worked really hard for our educations, our parents did not or could not afford to help, and so we believe college is a privilege and a blessing. We want our kids to believe the same thing and work hard for their own schooling. I think it will teach them not to waste their opportunities.

It really depends on the situation, we are willing to sacrifice a lot, but we are also willing to put a lot of our own time into working with our kids on their education. It depends most of where we are and what opportunities are available. If we stay in our current location, we are going to have to look outside of public schools, but if we move it just depends where we end up. We have several more years before we have to bite that bullet though.