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A divorce will often have an impact on almost every aspect of your life.  If you have children often the primary concern is custody or parenting time and how the children will handle the divorce.  One topic that sometimes comes up is how to handle the situation where the children are attending a private school or one of the parents wants the child to attend a private school but the other does not and who pays for the costs associated with the private school.  These cases are all determined by the facts and each set of facts is different, this blog is intended to broadly address how the issue of private education for the children might be handled in a divorce case in Michigan.  If you have questions about your specific case, please do not hesitate to contact us to schedule a consultation by clicking on this link or by calling us at (248) 608-4123.

What Happens if I Want My Child to Attend Private School After a Divorce in Michigan?

There is a difference between the situation where the child is already attending private school before one of the parents files for divorce and where the child is attending private school when one party files for divorce.  Where the child is already attending a private school, then you have a better argument that the child should continue to finish out their education in the private school.  That of course begs the question of who will pay for the education?  In many cases, depending on the situation, the parents may agree to equally share the costs of the education, one parent may be willing to pay for the entire amount because that parent earns enough income to do so and the issue is important enough to that parent to do so, or the parents may agree to split the costs along the lines of their incomes.  For instance if parent one earns $75,000 annually and parent two earns $225,000 annually, then parent one earns approximately 25% of the total of the two incomes ($300,000), so parent one would pay for 25% of the education and parent two would pay 75%.  In the situation where one parent earns a very high income but does not want to continue to pay for the education after the divorce, then the court may still order that parent to continue to pay the education depending on the facts of the situation.

In the case where the child has been attending public school and both parents agree the child should switch to the private school, then there really is no issue other than figuring out how to pay for it.  In the case where one parent wants to switch the child to a private school, it is a much more difficult situation.  First you will have to prove that there is some reason that the child should change schools and then prove that attending the private school is in the child's best interests.  Even after proving that in most cases, the parent that wants the child to attend the private school will be responsible for 100% of the costs associated with attending the private school.

Divorce cases can be complicated and even more so when there are issue regarding where the children will attend school.  If you have questions about divorce or separation, please do not hesitate to contact us to schedule a consultation by clicking on this link or calling (248) 6-8-4123.