When parents first hear that a specialized virtual school costs $20,000 a year, many have the same reaction: that’s too expensive. We understand. It sounds like a lot of money because it is a lot of money.
But here’s what we’ve learned from hundreds of conversations with families: by the time they reach us, most are already spending that much—or more—just pieced together differently.
The Patchwork Approach
Let’s look at what families typically spend trying to support a child with dyslexia, ADHD, or other learning differences in a traditional school setting.
Orton-Gillingham tutoring runs $75-150 per hour. Most students need two to three sessions per week to make meaningful progress. That’s $600-1,800 per month, or $7,200-21,600 per year—just for reading intervention.
Executive function coaching helps students with ADHD learn to plan, organize, and manage their time. Sessions typically cost $100-200 per hour, with most students benefiting from weekly support. That’s another $5,200-10,400 annually.
Many neurodiverse students also need occupational therapy for sensory processing or fine motor skills, speech therapy for language processing, educational therapy for math or writing support, or counseling to address the anxiety and self-esteem issues that often accompany learning differences. Each service adds $150-400 per month.
Then there’s the private school option. Many families pull their child from public school and enroll in a private school for learning differences. Tuition at these schools ranges from $30,000 to $60,000 per year—and that often doesn’t include the specialized tutoring their child still needs.
The Hidden Costs Nobody Talks About
Beyond direct educational expenses, there are costs that don’t show up on any invoice.
Parent career impact is significant. When your child struggles in school, someone has to manage it. Coordinating with teachers, attending IEP meetings, supervising homework that takes four times longer than it should, driving to appointments—this falls disproportionately on one parent, usually reducing their work hours or forcing them out of the workforce entirely.
Family stress takes its toll. The nightly homework battles. The Sunday-night dread. The sibling resentment when one child requires so much more attention. These aren’t line items in a budget, but they’re real costs that affect everyone in the household.
Lost time is perhaps the most painful cost. Every year a child spends in an environment that doesn’t work for them is a year of potential progress lost. The gap between them and their peers widens. The damage to their self-concept deepens. This isn’t something money can easily fix later.
What Comprehensive Actually Means
When we say Conduit Academy is comprehensive, we mean that specialized instruction is embedded in every class, not outsourced to after-school tutoring. Executive function support happens throughout the day, not in a separate weekly session. Small group sizes (five to six students) mean teachers actually know your child and can respond to what they need in the moment. The schedule is designed around how neurodiverse brains work, with movement breaks and varied activities built in. And parent involvement is appropriate—you’re informed and included, but you’re not expected to be your child’s teacher or task manager.
Running the Numbers
Here’s a realistic comparison for a student with dyslexia and ADHD:
The patchwork approach at a traditional school might include public school (free), plus Orton-Gillingham tutoring twice weekly at $12,000 per year, plus executive function coaching weekly at $7,800 per year, plus educational therapy for math at $6,000 per year, plus parent reduced work hours at $15,000 or more in lost income. That totals over $40,000 annually—and the child is still spending most of their day in an environment not designed for how they learn.
A comprehensive approach at Conduit runs $20,000 per year with no additional tutoring needed and parents able to work normal hours.
The Question Isn’t Whether You Can Afford It
For many families, the question isn’t really about money. It’s about what you’re getting for what you spend. Are you paying for services that coordinate with each other, or are you managing a collection of disconnected interventions? Is your child actually making progress, or are you spending money to feel like you’re doing something? Is your family thriving, or just surviving?
We talk to families every week who have spent $30,000, $50,000, even $80,000 over several years—and their child is still struggling, still behind, still unhappy. The issue was never the amount spent. It was how it was spent.
Education for a neurodiverse learner is an investment either way. The only question is whether that investment is working.