Competition for the best school zones changes suburb demographics

Only around a third of schools in Sydney reflect the population that lives around them, new research has found.

And that’s not only a result of parents in socially disadvantaged areas sending their children to private schools, but also parents moving house, renting or lying about where they live to put their kids into popular public schools.

“A lot of people are telling fibs to get their children in,” says retired public school principal and education researcher Chris Bonner. “No one knows the extent of this, but we know it’s happening. People might be using an aunt’s address as their own, and I know I could rent out my garage in Cherrybrook for $400 a week!

“In addition, I would have to say that not all school principals follow the zoning rules religiously. There is a capacity there to manipulate enrolments, I suspect, for sport or academic achievers. But there’s no data on that, either.”

Bonner’s new three-year study, analysing the data behind the My School website, Uneven playing field: the state of Australia’s schools, has found that as many as two-thirds of schools, including public schools, no longer really represent the areas in which they’re located. “That has a whole realm of implications for the building of social capital in the community,” he says.

Urban planner Sarah Tasic is one mum who’s actively looking for a new home to either buy or rent within the catchment area of Newtown North Public School. Although she lives just 200 metres away, her address doesn’t qualify her to send her eldest son, nearly six, there, or her younger son, nearly two, in the future.

“The public schools in this area are very high quality and very popular,” says Tasic, 42. “It’s a shame that it’s physically our nearest school, while other people who live 1.5km away do qualify.

“So we’re prepared to rent out our own house and move to something in the catchment area to address that problem.”

Many real estate agents have first-hand experience of people like Tasic buying or renting homes inside the catchment zones of popular public schools, too, helping raise property prices in those areas as a consequence.

Catherine Li of Ray White Epping says that’s particularly true of parents of primary school-age children – in her areas they all want to be near the well-performing Carlingford West Public and Murray Farm Public. “They do well in the rankings, so many parents try to move to their catchment areas,” she says.

Close to the popular Pymble Public School, Josh Luschwitz of Luschwitz Real Estate says that’s a huge drawcard, but when parents can’t buy or rent in the zone, they often resort to more desperate measures.

“I’ve heard stories of people investing, particularly close to Killara High, just so they can use the address, even when they don’t live there,” he says.

Other parents are known to use relatives’ or friends’ addresses, rent a small unit and leave it empty and even, according to one report, paying strangers for the use of their home details to get around schools’ strict catchment policies.

In the eastern suburbs, one of the first questions many house-hunters ask is whether a property is within a certain school’s catchment area, says Ric Serrao, principal of Raine & Horne Double Bay, but there are always ways of blurring the lines.

“There are some clients who’ve moved out of the area, but they still use their old address to qualify,” he says. “We have that a lot. They don’t change the voting roll and they have their mail forwarded on, especially if they buy an investor property in the area.”

There’s been a massive rise in the popularity of public schools in many areas of Sydney, with enrolments increasing by 6.4 per cent from 2012, with 494,100 children enrolled in public schools in Sydney, up from 464,340 four years ago.

In addition, the NSW Department of Education has just announced an investment of more than $60 million into new schools which is likely to further drive demand.

Some of the increase in popularity is from a rise in the number of school-age children, changing parental choices – often helped by the increase in the availability of information about schools – higher retention rates, and probably also, reports the NSW Parents’ Council, because of rises in private school fees of up to 6.7 per cent.

The former council chief executive, Noel Hadjimichael, says he even bought a new property and moved house, so his step-daughter could attend a good public school in another area.

The current executive officer, Samantha Vieira, says parents can now struggle to pay such fees, especially with the cost of housing so high, and NAPLAN scores are high in good public schools.

“Also, private tutors seem to be up to their eyeballs in work, so why wouldn’t parents send their children to free public schools and then pay for a little extra tuition if it’s needed?” she asks.