Small class sizes and increased focused on language and the arts. These are some of the reasons that Stacey Piché enrolled her son Cole into a private school in junior kindergarten after her family moved to the Okanagan Valley in British Columbia where she was raised.

"Cole had French every day in JK and he'll start taking Spanish in Grade 1 or Grade 2," says Stacey, describing what appealed to her about sending him for kindergarten to Glenfir School in Summerland, B.C. "Music is also a big component at the school and I think they do it every day."

"It's gearing children to be well rounded right from the beginning," Stacey says.

Her younger daughter Kate will be joining Cole at the school as she enters JK.

"We have friends that take a huge family holiday every year, but I would rather invest the money in my children's education every day."

Still, Stacey says she doesn't see private education as the "be all and the end all. You can't just put your children in a private school and think they are going to take care of everything. You need to be very involved wherever they go to school."

"It's just that we all want to give our children the best start we can and I think we're doing that at a private school," she says.