check out business computer auctions....one of my friends managed to buy Microsoft Visual Studio 6 (Professional Edition - 5/6 discs) 2nd hand with manuals, posters etc for <$30
for HSC purposes you dont really need the latest and greatest...
dude just use vb from microsoft word i think the shortcut is alt + f11
tats what we use at school to do it and u can also make a command button in the word doc for ur program to start up