Somerset College (Stellenbosch)

Somerset College has the audacity to describe itself as sitting on "a beautiful estate in the Winelands" — which is the private school equivalent of saying "we charge R165,205 a year and we'd like you to feel grateful about the view." Founded in 1997, meaning it's younger than the ANC government it's definitely not voting for, yet it carries itself with the gravitas of an institution that's been mispronouncing Latin since the Anglo-Boer War. Twenty-seven years in and they still can't tell you their matric pass rate. Not unavailable — *not applicable*. Mate, what are the Grade 12s doing up there among the vineyards? Completing Cambridge A-Levels or just completing the cheese board? Speaking of Cambridge — offering both IEB *and* Cambridge A-Levels is very on-brand for a school that can't commit to one curriculum but will absolutely commit to two sets of fees. Grade R starts at R63,555, which is R63,555 more than a child who is four years old should cost per year before they've learned to tie their shoes. By Grade 12 you're at R165,205, at which point your child had better be getting into Oxford or at least winning something on a horse. The learner-to-educator ratio is 8.9:1, which is extraordinary — nearly one adult per child, all of them on a "beautiful estate," all operating under a "Christian Ethos" that apparently includes the parable of the R107,825 Grade 7. Boarding is available for Senior School students, which is just a premium way of saying Stellenbosch parents pay extra to not see their teenagers on weeknights. Overall verdict: Somerset College is what happens when a wine estate looks at its land and thinks, "we could grow grapes, or we could grow fees" — and chose both.