When Ana Mulipola and her husband, Walter, settled in Caroline Springs, a burgeoning outer western suburb of Melbourne, 22 years ago, the area was a far cry from its current bustling state. “It was literally just us,” Ana recalls. “We had no neighbours. It was a blank canvas.” At the time, educational considerations for their future children weren’t at the forefront of their minds as they built their home in the developing greenfields. However, as the suburb expanded, so did their family, and with it, the need to choose a school for their three sons. They ultimately opted for a Catholic primary school.
“It started off being a family request,” Ana explains, highlighting the deeply religious backgrounds shared by her and her husband. “We both agreed that the kids would go to a Catholic primary school at the very least… [but] the one thing that has always made me back the decision to put them into a Catholic school is just that there is a common denominator. There’s common values.”
The Mulipola family’s choice reflects a growing trend across Australia: an increasing number of families are opting for private education over public schooling, a phenomenon particularly pronounced in the outer reaches of our major cities.
Shifting Enrolment Landscape
Recent data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics paints a clear picture of this shift. In early March, figures revealed that the proportion of students enrolled in public schools has fallen to a new record low. Between 2016 and 2025, government school enrolments saw a modest growth of just 5%. In contrast, Catholic school enrolments increased by 8%, and independent school enrolments experienced a significant surge of 31% over the same decade.
Emma Rowe, an associate professor of education at Deakin University, attributes this trend largely to a prolonged period of governments failing to meet funding targets for public schools, while simultaneously channelling substantial financial resources into private institutions.
“The one big thing that gets parents in the door, absolutely without a doubt, is the buildings,” Professor Rowe observes. “They say it time and time again. They walked into that school and they were blown away by the gym facilities, or the football pitch, or the fact that it has a concert hall.”
She argues that framing schooling as a matter of parental choice can be problematic, as it transforms a fundamental right into a commodity. “Education shouldn’t be seen as a consumerist good because it’s too closely linked to social mobility, life outcomes, a healthy democracy.”
Growth Corridors and Educational Choices
The rise in private school enrolments is most dramatic in urban growth areas. The city of Melton, which includes Caroline Springs, recorded the second-highest growth in independent school enrolments over the past year, with an additional 558 students, according to analysis from Independent Schools Victoria. This figure was surpassed only by the adjacent city of Wyndham, which welcomed 1,175 new students to its independent schools. The Catholic education system has also seen substantial growth, with Caroline Springs alone experiencing a 12% increase, or 247 enrolments, in the past five years, as reported by the Victorian Catholic Education Authority.
Since its development began in 1999, Caroline Springs has grown to a population exceeding 24,000. The most rapid expansion occurred between 2006 and 2011, when the resident population nearly doubled from 10,880 to 20,366. During this period, the suburb also saw a higher proportion of children under 15 compared to the state average.
This demographic shift paved the way for the establishment of schools like Southern Cross Grammar, which educates students from preparatory year through to Year 12. Southern Cross emerged in 2011 from the remnants of ICA Melton College, which had ceased operations in 2010. Following the collapse of its parent company, Independent Colleges Australia, the school community found support from the late Zig Inge, a retirement home developer. A grant from the Inge family enabled the school to be re-established as an independent, not-for-profit institution.
Since its relaunch, Southern Cross Grammar has experienced remarkable growth, expanding from just 46 students in 2011 to 930 this year. Principal Brayden Stone anticipates the school will reach its capacity of 980 students within two years. “We’re only two years away from maximum numbers, which, as you can imagine, is a great problem to have,” Stone states. “But also, it is a problem for those in the local area that want access to independent schools.”
The physical proximity of educational institutions is striking. Southern Cross Grammar is situated alongside St George Preca primary, a Catholic school with approximately 730 students, including one of Ana Mulipola’s sons. Sharing the same block is Springside Primary, a local public school that had 976 students enrolled last year.
A key distinction between public and private schools lies in their enrolment policies. Public schools are mandated to accept students residing within their designated catchment areas, whereas private schools have no such obligation.
“The majority of students at Southern Cross live in Caroline Springs and the immediately adjacent suburbs,” says Stone. However, the school also draws students from further afield, including urban growth areas like Aintree and Cobblebank, and more established western suburbs such as Deer Park, St Albans, and Keilor Downs.
The Appeal of Private Education
For Tania Tkatchyk, a resident of nearby Taylors Hill, Southern Cross Grammar was particularly appealing due to its smaller size compared to other grammar schools and its offering of combined primary and secondary education. “Walking into Southern Cross we were like, wow, that’s a great sense of community for a grammar school,” Tkatchyk shares. “The teachers know a lot of the children by first name… the people are personable, and that there’s that strive for excellence.”
The financial commitment for Tkatchyk and her husband is substantial, with annual fees for their four children amounting to approximately $55,000. She readily acknowledges this is “huge,” but emphasises the importance of providing the best possible education for her children. “We knew that we were able to provide that financially and it was a no-brainer for us really. We were like, you know, we want to give them the best opportunity, academically, that we can afford to give them… It is a really big decision. Do I ever regret it? Absolutely not.”
Ana Mulipola also gave her sons the choice to continue with Catholic schooling or transition to a public school when they reached high school. They chose to remain in the Catholic system, partly driven by the desire to stay with their friends. This decision came with an understanding that the boys would need to commit to their studies, as Catholic schooling incurs costs of around $5,000 per child annually for the Mulipolas. “I said, ‘we’re not paying all this money for you to just muck around’,” Ana asserts.
Research from Independent Schools Australia indicates that word of mouth is the most influential factor for over 53% of parents across all school sectors when making school choices. A 2021 online survey of 1,968 parents also revealed that when parents recommended independent schools, 54% cited educational excellence as the reason. Conversely, when parents did not recommend independent schools, cost was the primary deterrent, with school fees being the biggest concern (68%), followed by the expense of additional activities or items (49%).
Socioeconomic Divides and Funding Realities
For certain families, however, the cost of private education renders public schooling the only viable option. Students from low socioeconomic backgrounds are disproportionately represented in public schools, a disparity evident even within the same block of schools in Caroline Springs. At Springside Primary, 27% of students come from the most disadvantaged quartile according to the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority’s index of community socio-educational advantage. At St George Preca, the Catholic primary school, this figure is 19%. At Southern Cross Grammar, however, only 3% of students fall into the lowest quartile.
Trevor Cobbold, the national convener of Save Our Schools, highlights that the consequences of funding stagnation are plainly visible to parents. “All the research around the world shows that money matters,” Cobbold states. “That makes a huge difference in terms of who you can employ and the material resources you can bring to bear in the classroom. People are not silly. They can see it, and they talk to other parents.”
