In Reply to: Kristal posted by marni on Wednesday, 20. June 2007 at 15:26 Bali Time:
is somewhat of a sore point for me and it has been discussed before.
You are the only person who knows your friend and can judge whether he/she is trustworthy or not. Of course you do not wish to offend your friend by questioning the cost but it is my opinion that it is just as offensive to question it on this forum. If you don't trust your friend, don't pay the extra money. Their daughter can just as easily go to a government school. It is actually harder to get into a government school than a private school. The entry is based on their score in the national exam taken at the end of grade 6 and government schools usually have a much higher cut off than private schools so the best students usually go to the more popular government schools (some government schools are better than others)
For what it's worth I think the amount quoted sounds about right for that school but I don't know for sure. Private schools are obviously more expensive than government schools. It is certainly a lot less than a national plus private school which can vary from Rp.1,500,000 to 4,000,000/month. (National plus is a type of Indonesian school which teaches both the Indonesian and a foreign curriculum usually bilingually)