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Public school raises fees to meet public benefit test

Finance | Gareth Jones | 6 May 2008

Winchester College has denied that its new bursaries policy, devised in response to the new public benefit requirements, is putting pressure on other independent schools to follow suit and raise their fees.

The college last week wrote to parents outlining the results of a review “in the light of current changes in charity law and assessment of public benefit”.

As part of the plans, parents of pupils are to be means-tested, so that scholars - those who enter via examination - will receive remission on fees as required, while other pupils may receive a bursary of up to 50 per cent of the fee.

The College’s eventual aim is to admit scholars on a “needs-blind” basis, whereby the applicant's financial situation is not considered in deciding admission, ensuring that 67 of its 685 pupils receive full bursaries and 134 partial bursaries.

In order to fund the changes, boarding fees will rise by £1,389 this year, an increase of 5 per cent, while the percentage of fees put towards bursaries and maintaining historic buildings will rise from the current 2 per cent to 5 per cent by 2010, resulting in further increases.

Winchester has ‘raised the bar’

Others within the independent schools sector are said to be concerned that Winchester has ‘raised the bar’, particularly as the Charity Commission has stated that it will be taking note of what the leading schools do when assessing public benefit.

However, headmaster Dr Ralph Townsend told Charity News Alert the College was merely adhering to its ancient charitable origins.

“Schools must make their own judgement as to how and to what extent they want to respond to the signs of the times, only one of which is the change in charity law.

“Neither Winchester nor the Charity Commissioners see this as a competitive exercise. Our understanding is that schools will be assessed on public benefit according to what is reasonable in terms of their capacity.”

‘Sons of teachers will not benefit’ 

Townsend also refuted the suggestion by the educational philanthropist Sir Peter Lampl that bursaries might end up going to existing pupils whose parents have fallen on hard times or to teachers’ children.

“Assisting current parents who ‘fall on hard times’ is not the prime motivation in our review of bursary policy.

“As an independent charity, however, we reserve the right to decide how we will disperse our funds as need may arise.

“Sons of Winchester teachers will not benefit from the new policy.”

Fee rise below average

Figures from the Independent Schools Council’s Annual Census 2008, released this week, indicate that Winchester’s fee rises are in fact below the national average.

The census shows that fees have increased by 6.2 per cent in the past year.

However, the number of pupils receiving assistance from schools towards paying their fees rose by just 0.6 per cent, to 124,298.

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