Ria is already up for her big school challenge. And it is also a challenge for us. We are carefully studying the pros and cons of the schools that we have chosen and still looking for schools that offer discounts to honor students. It’s already April, and yet we still do not have a final decision on where to enroll our first born.
Many times have we conditioned Ria’s mind on where she will study and she responds well every time. Haha. Name it. From time to wake up to clubs to science curriculum. We have convinced her that this school is better than this school because…
And now, after we have convinced her to St. Joseph, WE have changed our minds. But we do not decide without data (we are researcher and IT persons, right).
Here is the summary of the data that we have with our perception of advantages and disadvantages.
| St. Joseph College of Quezon City (2016 fee) | Immaculate Conception Cathedral School (2017 fee) |
Stella Maris College (2016 fee) |
St. Paul University of Quezon City (2016 fee) |
Holy Spirit School of Quezon City (2016 fee) |
|
| Tuition Fee (Semestral Plan) | 38,530.47 | 32,009.00 | 34,723.00 | 58,567.00 | 47,550.00 |
| MISC, books and uniform description | uniform: 570/set (daily; largest size); PE shirt: 190 (largest); jogging pants: 250 (largest) | uniform: 600/set (daily); PE shirt: 240 (size 4); PE pants: 270 (size 8); books: 4,000 | uniform: 600/set; books: 2,800 | books: 4,450 | no data |
| Books | 3,440.00 | 4,000.00 | 2,800.00 | 4,450.00 | no data |
| uniform | 2,720.00 | 2,910.00 | 2,900.00 | no data | |
| School Service to Cubao (annual) | 25,000.00 | 15,000.00 | 0.00 | no data | |
| Commute to Cubao (annual) | 9,600.00 | 9,600.00 | |||
| TOTAL Annual | 54,290.47 | 53,919.00 | 40,423.00 | 72,617.00 | incomplete data |
| PAASCU Acc. | BED – Level III | None | None | BED – Level I | BED – Level II |
| Academic scholarship | Incoming Grade 1 and thereafter if the student is top 1 of batch | Scholarship starts at Grade 7 | Scholarship starts at Grade 7 and can be maintained depending on grades | Valedictorians who are incoming Grade 1 can have scholarship but for one year only | |
| Payment Plans | Cash, Semestral, Quarterly, Monthly | Cash, Semestral, Quarterly, Monthly | Cash, Semestral, Quarterly, Monthly | no data | Cash, Semestral, Quarterly, Monthly |
| Payment Plan fees | No increase between plan | up to 2.5% increase for quarterly payment | 1.5% to 2.5% increase (quarterly and monthly) | no data | With increase in tuition starting Semi-Annual |
| Teaching Method | Traditional | Traditional | Traditional (Gr. 1 to 4), DLP (Gr. 5 up) | Traditional | Traditional |
| Percent increase per Grade Level (not per School Year) | 3.38% | 6.77% | 4.94% | no data | no data |
| Advantages | – Free tuition for the first year due to academic scholarship; -can take jeepney as transpo
-can take jeepney as transpo |
Science and IT curriculum (technokids) -joins IT Cup every year -curriculum seems ok with all the description and all (well, we just don’t know when it comes to implementation)
-joins IT Cup every year -curriculum seems ok with all the description and all (well, we just don’t know when it comes to implementation) -curriculum seems ok with all the description and all (well, we just don’t know when it comes to implementation) |
-Near house thus no school service -DLP starting Grade 5
-DLP starting Grade 5 |
– known school -accessible thru jeep or train
-accessible thru jeep or train |
– Free tuition for the first year due to academic scholarship |
| Disadvantages | Far from house (6:45am start of classes until 2:10pm) -marketing dept was not effective with no brochures available and no selling points
-marketing dept was not effective with no brochures available and no selling points |
-no PAASCU accreditation yet (preliminary visit passed) -not accessible when commuting -difficulty in contacting the school thru the given numbers
-not accessible when commuting -difficulty in contacting the school thru the given numbers -difficulty in contacting the school thru the given numbers |
– no PAASCU accreditation
– bad feedback due to no homework |
– high tuition compared to others | – high tuition compared to others -not accessible when commuting
-not accessible when commuting |
Here are the fees that we have as of the moment:
Immaculate Conception Cathedral School 2017 fees
Immaculate uniform fees
Immaculate Conception Cathedral School 2016 fees
Holy Spirit Cubao 2016 fees
St. Joseph’s College of QC Kinder to Grade 6 2016 fees
St. Joseph’s College of QC Grade 7 to 10 2016 fees
Our Decision (how we are taking this seriously)
Well, we are still torn. We wanted to have the best education for Ria according to our budget (of course). We do not want her enthusiasm in learning to stop. This is the reason why homeworks are important to us. Since there are times that we are busy, we cannot focus that much on giving her worksheets. We provide books for her to read when she is bored but we do not know if she reads them while we are at work. That is why we removed Stella Maris on our list. Although Ria’s teachers in Learn and Play said that she is suitable to Stella’s program (no homework policy starting Grade 1). But I am still thinking if their curriculum can further stimulate Ria’s mind so she can explore more and learn more. Teacher Au, though, said that parents can try to ask the teacher to give assignments to our kid since one parent did that already.
With Learn and Play’s training, we do not want everything to be wasted. And we actually cannot find a curriculum that is similar to theirs (according to our budget. haha). But thank you to this school. All the teachers trained our daughter well.
Stella Maris College Seal
Stella Maris College. This school is just in front of our building so jeepney fare and school service fees are eliminated every month. Their Dynamic Learning Program is a real plus for us. This is a new approach to teaching and learning that is so far proven to increase the passing rate to national tests. DLP starts in Grade 5 and according to the Guidance Counselor that we have talked to, Grades 1 to 4 have the traditional method. But just what I said, they have no homework starting Grade 1 according to the parents that we have interviewed, contrary to what the school says. But in terms of the environment inside the campus, it’s like you are not in Cubao because of the peacefulness and greenery.
Stella Maris College is a Co-Ed Grade School and High School run by Franciscan Missionaries of Mary.
Stella Maris College Campus
Holy Spirit School Seal
Holy Spirit School Cubao. My mom was a scholar of Holy Spirit (in Mindoro and Manila) so we considered getting information from this school. Unfortunately, their tuition fee is way beyond our budget for Ria’s school. We asked if they offer scholarships to valedictorians and their answer was yes. But the scholarship is just for one year even if the kid became the overall top in her batch starting in Grade 2. So we scrapped this on our list because we cannot afford P48k per year.
School campus is a bit small and old in my perception. But it does not affect our decision. 🙂
Holy Spirit School is not the one in BF Homes but they are sister school. It is run by the Missionary Sisters Servants of the Holy Spirit. They offer Preschool (Co-Ed), Grade School (Co-Ed; Level II Re-accredited by PAASCU) and High School.
Holy Spirit School Campus
(Photo credits: HSS FB page)
St. Joseph’s Seal
St. Joseph’s College of Quezon City. This school was recommended by the owner of Learn and Play since this school offers a scholarship to Valedictorians (100% tuition fee discount; misc. fees and incidental fees will still be paid the parents).
Since we were introduced to TechnoKids curriculum, we learned that SJCQC sent participants to the 2017 IT Cup (TechnoKids in collab with DLSU). We were relieved when we learned that SJC adapts the curriculum since they cannot enter the contest without being a partner school. But unfortunately, no one from the school (that we have talked to) knows about this, even the marketing and admissions department.
Also, when we asked about their curriculum, they all said “the basic,” a bit vague and a bit disappointing because they do not have selling points. We were waiting for some spiel to convince us to enroll our child there because they know that we are considering three schools already.
Another thing, no brochure was available where we could learn more about the school. Their website is also not that informative.
St. Joseph’s College of Quezon City is a Catholic and private school administered by the Franciscan Sisters of the Immaculate Conception founded in 1932.
St. Joseph Campus
(Photo credits: Wikipedia and Personal Encounters)
Immaculate Conception Cathedral School Seal
Immaculate Conception Cathedral School. Imma, as what they call it, is a diocesan school in Cubao (Diocese of Cubao).
The school brags about its robotics winning in IT Cup. Imma follows the curriculum of TechnoKids according to their course description (Grade School: TechnoArt, TechnoIllustrator, TechnoEntrepreneur, TechnoImages; High School: TechnoHTML, TechnoFlash, TechnoPhotoshop, TechnoStore). The website is also a very helpful tool to know about the school. It explains the grading system (academic and extracurricular). The school also have speech class once a week from primary to high school and a separate reading program (all levels). Did I mention that they have smart classrooms as well?
Although the school does not grant scholarships to honor students (except those from public school), we still want to try this. With the given information, they are really into IT and Science, which we really like. To know more about their curriculum, you can visit this page: http://iccs.edu.ph/course-description/
According to the ICCS Students website, the school will adopt the DLP. Well, another plus points! The school is also undergoing PAASCU accreditation as of the moment. We hope that their business process will improve because we were not guided accordingly after Ria passed the exam. Plus, it is so hard to reach their office through phone.
Immaculate Conception Cathedral School campus
(Photo credits: ICCS website)
Well, we are gearing towards Immaculate but still researching.
Contact details of the schools:
Holy Spirit School:
Phone Number: + 62 3 723 0221
Email Address: stjosephcollegeqc@gmail.com
Mommyhood Journey 
Thank you so much. This helped a lot in confirming our decision – we chose Imma! We also made comparisons .. but not as much as you did. Wow! I salute you. Great job!! Again.. this ks very helpful.
Trying to search you in FB :)i wanted to share your blog to parents like me who struggles with school hunting 🙂 im sure they will also find this very helpful
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Hello mommy! Thank you so much. You can share this if you want. I really want to help other parents. If your kid is incoming Grade 1, our kids might be classmates! 🙂 We also chose Imma. 🙂
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Pleaseu include Starland Internatinal School in Cubao .
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Hello. I can ask around about Starland since this is just near our house. I did not include this school in our options because of the feedback that we read from the parents who enrolled their kids in that school. 🙂
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Hi, where did you end up sending your kid? And how is it so far? Wanted to get feedback since am looking for school for my daughters now. Thanks!
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Hello mommy. Sorry I did not notice that you sent a comment. I enrolled my kid at Immaculate Conception Cathedral School. 🙂
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By the way, am an alumni of Imma. It is a great school but I was not sure if it was still the same. One concern I have was student-teacher ratio, I heard some classes now have 50+ students.
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Hello Mommy Ann! We enrolled our daughter at Imma. So far we are happy with our decision. The class size is 31 (as for the class of my daughter). The school also offers ballet class for only P850/month and we are really happy with this because our daughter wants to take ballet classes again. Imma also implements the DLP (Dynamic Learning Program – the plus factor of Stella for us), so parang lahat ng hinahanap namin nasa Imma na. 🙂
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Hi, there. I know this blog is over a year now but this is currently my struggle. Me and my husband are looking into Stella until they said that’s it’s on DLP. I have an incoming HS and Grade 1. Looking into Imma now but are they strictly on DLP or just partial?
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Hi, This is off topic, but may I know yiur feedback to Learn and Play Preschool? My little girl will go to preschool school next year and we are also currently hunting for good school. Thank you.
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Hello mommy! I am super happy with Learn and Play. My second child is currently studying there (Jr. Nursery/Toddler). They have advanced curriculum but amazingly, the kids can pick up the topics. This shows that their teaching strategy is working. I highly recommend Learn and Play. The owner and teachers know every child and their parents. Plus, during assessments/exams, their basis of grades does not include academics alone but also the psychomotor development of the kids. 🙂 The school also implements mini field trips like community visit (but the kids are just inside the van while the teachers show them the community), supermarket, fire station, police station, zoo, orchidarium, etc. Their approach is eclectic gearing towards progressive teaching but the tuition is way below the progressive schools. 🙂 The school also promotes good study habits that the kids can bring when they brave the big school. Since the curriculum is advanced, my daughter finds her subjects easy in Grade 1. My officemate said that her son can still use the lessons up to Grade 3. 🙂 I hope to see you next year during family activities! 🙂 You can ask Teacher Janette (the owner) about me. She knows me well. Hehe.
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Thank you for your reply.😀 This really helps. We went there yesteday to inquire. My husband and I will discuss about it but I think it is a good school plus their tuition is quite reasonable compared with the other preschool. Mahihimatay na ako sa presyo! Haha. Thanks again and good luck to your baby girl.😀 I hope you can also post a review about IMMA, looks like it will be her school when she reaches her grade school.😀 Thanks!
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Thank you very much for your insights. I really appreciate it. My husband is an alumnus and he said that the school was great. Your insights validated our decision. Thank you again and more power.
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You are welcome, Mommy! 🙂
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Hi mommy! If you don’t mind, may I ask how much is the tuition fee at Learn and Play? I’m hunting for my daugjhter’s preschool next year. 😀
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Hi mommy. This year, the TF plus misc fee cost P54k, a lot cheaper than other progressive schools (for me). MF includes school supplies and mini field trips. Books for Nursery cost P700. 🙂 Hope to see you next year during school activities and get together! 🙂
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Hi Mommy,
My daughter is an incoming high school and I am looking at ICCS as an option. May I ask if you are happy with Imma still? And is the DLP being applied across all grade levels.
Thanks in advance!
Mommy Imee
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Hi. Your post abt your school hunting is very helpful especially to a mom like me who still undecided where to enroll my 3yrs 5 mos old daughter. Actually im super glad coz im choosing exactly among those schools that you post. Very much appreciated.
But when i read your comment abt learn and play preschool, having a second thought now. Others said na for nursery/pre school dnt enroll on big school agad while for others naman it is good na sa big school na agad para hindi na daw palipat lipat. Can i have your opinion on this? Thank you
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Hello. I’m glad this post helped you. Regarding Learn and Play, I can attest that the kids do not have difficulty when it comes to transferring to big schools. My daughter was really prepared sa big school in terms of study habits and lessons. My colleague (who referred Learn and Play) said her son can still use his lessons until Grade 3. 🙂 And kids can easily adjust naman sa environment. The main concern should be the development kasi crucial yung preschool sa development ng kids kaya need mo talaga piliin yung school na continuously magti-trigger ng curiosity ng kid mo 🙂
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Hello mom, thanks for sharing a great review of the schools. I am a solo parent and my daughter, who is turning 4 this year, is also a current student of Learn and Play (moved up from Sr Nursery and now incoming Jr Kinder at Learn and Play). What I learned from our dear teachers in Learn and Play especially from Ms. Janette is that the early you place your child in school, the better. Learn and Play I must say is a really great school and we’re very very lucky to live near it. Appreciate their love and concern for our kids. The school even has one on one sessions with each parent every quarter to have a deeper understanding on how the child is developing based on parent’s assessments, how they are at home and what the kids love to do. Surprisingly, they also know each student’s behavioural patterns. They are not only concern about our children’s progress in academics but also their personal development — being a good and responsible individual with confidence, respect and love to all living things and especially strive on the things that they love to do. I love their child interaction classes because it is where my daughter started. I also highly recommend this school to all parents who are searching for a great school and it would be a great miss if you don’t enroll your babies here.
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Thanks for posting this! 3 of our other options are Starland International School, JCSGO Christian Academy and Living Epistle Christian Academy.
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Hello po. I hope you can help me. My daughter will be grade 8 in this coming school year and if you have idea how much would be the tuition fee?
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