This compares with $326.9 million for Victorian state schools, which educate 63 per cent of all students, and $343.7 million for Catholic schools. In the non-government sector, the bulk of funding for building projects comes from parents and fundraising. An artist's impression of Caulfield Grammar School's new aquatic and wellbeing centre. Caulfield Grammar forked out $47.3 million on building works in 2016. The school recently released plans for an aquatic and wellbeing centre with dance, pilates and yoga spaces and an Olympic-size swimming pool. The pool has a moveable floor that can be raised and lowered to adjust the water depth for competition swimming, water polo and diving.

Camberwell Grammar spent $31.7 million on capital works in 2016. It has unveiled a new sports centre and chapel with a 50-metre swimming pool, teaching pool, gymnasium, fencing piste, underwater tanks, an ergonomics room, and underground parking for 256 cars. Presbyterian Ladies' College, which spent $31 million on capital works in 2016, recently unveiled a performing arts centre with a 550-seat auditorium, music studio and orchestra lift. In Victoria, the capital expenditure per student is $4056 in independent schools, $1656 in Catholic schools and $554 in state schools. The data also showed that between 2009 and 2016 total government recurrent funding for Catholic and independent schools increased at almost twice the rate it did for state schools.

The average Australian state school student received $13,023 in state and federal government funding in 2016 compared with $10,956 for Catholic students and $9036 for independent school students. Australian Education Union federal president Correna Haythorpe said the funding system was broken and would worsen unless the federal government restored $1.9 billion in public school funding. “While public schools wait for new classrooms to cope with growing enrolments, elite private schools are gold-plating pools and gyms and engaging in the educational equivalent of an arms race,” Ms Haythorpe said. Independent Schools Victoria chief executive Michelle Green said capital works in independent schools were overwhelmingly funded by parents and fundraising initiatives. "Independent schools receive a small amount of capital funding from governments – on average, about $135 per student in 2016," she said.

"Most of this goes to low [socio-economic status] schools who spend it on essential educational facilities like classrooms." According to research from the organisation, parents prioritise a school's values and ethos over facilities when considering where to send their children. Federal Education Minister Simon Birmingham said the government would ensure every school sector was funded according to its needs. He said the Commonwealth would increase its investment in each government school student by 6.8 per cent every year, compared with 4.2 per cent for non-government-school students. Helen Proctor, an associate professor at the University of Sydney, said private schools were spending the money to compete with other schools.