Court Opinion

ID: 9586841
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:15:48.834682+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:32:53.915789
License: Public Domain

ORDER ON PETITION FOR REHEARING
Goolsby, Judge:
The appellant Anne Nelson petitions this court for a rehearing. She maintains that we overlooked the following exception:
8. The trial judge erred in ordering a reduction in the amount of tuition [the respondent] Merritt was required to pay under his divorce decree, where changed circumstances were not shown.
We agree with the appellant. The exception was not addressed.
As we mentioned, the divorce decree incorporated an agreement entered into by the parties. It resolved several issues which divided them. One provision of the agreement read:
[Merritt]... also agrees to pay any and all tuition for the education of the minor children of the parties at an appropriate private institution of learning; the parties acknowledge and stipulate that “an appropriate private institution” would be Porter-Gaud School or Ashley Hall or an institution of similar standards. Provided, however, that [Merritt]... shall be relieved of this obligation in the *132event that his income is substantially diminished in such a fashion so as to cause him to be materially unable to meet this obligation.
The force and effect of the divorce decree’s education provision is to be determined by its language alone since the language which the provision employs is perfectly clear and unambiguous. See Perkins v. Parkins, 309 S. E. (2d) 784, 786 (S. C. App. 1983). Merritt is plainly directed “to pay any and all tuition for the education of [his] minor children ... at an appropriate private institution.” Both parties agreed that “an appropriate private institution” would be an institution whose “standards” were similar to either “Porter-Gaud School or Ashley Hall.” The only circumstance which will permit Merritt to avoid his responsibility to make tuition payments where his children have enrolled at a private institution whose standards are similar to either PorterGaud or Ashley Hall is when his income has “substantially diminished” and he is “materially unable” to make the payments.
Here the preponderance of the evidence establishes, in our view, that the Collegiate School where the parties’ two children are currently enrolled is a private institution with standards similar to those of Porter-Gaud. Like Porter-Gaud, Collegiate is a co-educational institution, is a traditional school, and is housed in new facilities. Its admission standards, class sizes, teacher educational levels, and extra curricular activities are similar to Porter-Gaud’s. In fact, Merritt does not seriously dispute that Collegiate and Porter-Gaud possess similar standards.
His sole complaint is about the higher tuition costs. The combined tuitions for both children are only Five Hundred Twenty Dollars ($520.00) more per year than they would have been had the children been attending Porter-Gaud. As we noted in the original opinion, Merritt’s salary has increased Seven Thousand Five Hundred Dollars ($7,500.00) in less than four years. Instead of his income being “substantially diminished,” the very opposite has occurred. We cannot say, then, that Merritt has made a sufficient showing that he is entitled to avoid paying “any and all tuition” for each of his two children. For us to allow him, under present circumstances, to *133pay only what Porter-Gaud would charge each child as tuition would, as Nelson contends, effect a reduction in his obligation to make tuition payments. The family court’s order, therefore, is modified to require Merritt to pay sums for the children’s tuitions in the amounts charged by Collegiate.
Moreover, because the added tuition costs are not enough to constitute a changed circumstance sufficient to warrant a reduction in child support payments, we also affirm our earlier holding that there has been no substantial change in Merritt’s ability to pay child support.
Accordingly, the mandate is amended to read
Affirmed in part as modified and reversed in part.
Shaw and Cureton, JJ., concur.