Wealthy moms and dads no longer doubt that their offspring must have a fifth quarter with a language focus. And, of course, not at home, but abroad, where they can plunge headfirst into an authentic language environment.
But summer schools abroad are not only an opportunity to become more proficient in speaking English, French, or German. Many parents use the summer for reconnaissance: will their child be able to study abroad permanently in the future, will they adapt to a foreign culture and language, will they withstand academic workloads? If the child returns in complete delight, then it’s time to gather money, certificates, and documents for admission to European schools, colleges, and universities. But let’s take it in order.
Pleasure with benefit
In fact, the fifth quarter can turn out to be quite pleasant. If, of course, parents choose a gentle holiday program. Europe understood long ago: so that a child doesn’t howl and ask to go home on the second day, lessons must be generously seasoned with exciting recreation. That is why literally all foreign summer schools have such a list of entertainment that the standard 20 hours of language per week pass unnoticed. However, this does not mean that the child will not learn the language: communication in the language continues even when children go to the mountains, play football, put on plays, or learn the basics of horseback riding. You just need to make sure that the chosen school does not have too many Russian-speaking classmates.
Of course, for an older child, especially one who is not going to a European summer school for the first time, it is better to take a more intensive course - say, 32 lessons per week, and for a student even a full language course - the effect will be much more noticeable.
In any country, be it Great Britain, Switzerland, Malta, France, or Germany, you can find a summer school with a schedule that will satisfy a particular parent and their child. Of course, each of these countries has its own highlight. British schools are known, besides for the purest English and centuries-old reputation, for offering instruction in purely British aristocratic activities such as horseback riding, cricket, and golf. There are also excellent swimming pools, tennis courts, and well-equipped music and art studios. True, boarding education in foggy Albion is not so cheap - on average €1.100 per week.
Malta has other advantages, and the main one is the sea combined with a mild climate. It’s not like Britain, where you can expect anything from the weather. Considering that in quality and program content, local schools are no different from British ones, and cost half as much (on average ?550 per week), Maltese schools enjoy well-deserved popularity. However, there are so many Russians that it is difficult to achieve true immersion in the language environment, but this drawback pales in comparison with the opportunity to lie on the beach and learn the basics of diving. By the way, parents often go to Malta with their children: living nearby in a hotel, they can both visit their child and have a great rest.
Swiss schools have several trump cards at once. First, you can enroll not only in a Swiss school proper, but also in a British, American, and so on - the country is small, multilingual, and uses different educational models. Here you can learn several foreign languages at once: combinations of English, German, and French are offered, and in some places also Italian. Secondly, God gave Switzerland such nature that in an hour you can move from fragrant alpine meadows to snowy mountains and even go skiing in summer. And its location is such that excursions to neighboring countries are not tiring and are practiced in almost all summer schools. Add to this the opportunity to master the basics of mountaineering, complete safety, and comfort that is hardly comparable to anything else. But education in Switzerland is noticeably more expensive - from 1.600 Swiss francs per week.
There are somewhat fewer people who want to improve their French and German in the summer; nevertheless, schools on the Côte d’Azur, near Paris, and even in the charming French countryside do not suffer from a lack of students. By the way, many French people study in summer schools in France - there they brush up on other languages, such as English. So having a chat in French in your spare time is no problem. German schools, as a rule, use a very intensive language course and a rich excursion program. However, no summer course is enough to visit all the beautifully preserved German castles.
Why do children get sent to summer schools at all? To improve English (German, etc.), break the language barrier, immerse in the environment, make acquaintances, get new impressions, see the country, and ensure an active holiday. And if the goal is really only this, then the choice of school depends entirely on the child’s extracurricular interests, prices, and living conditions. Most schools located outside large cities usually have a large own territory - there children live, study, and have fun. "Here," the director of one of the largest schools in Switzerland, College du Leman, Henri Bear, said with a broad gesture around the 10-hectare territory, "children can do whatever they want: swim, put on concerts, paint pictures, play basketball. But beyond the boundaries without escort - no, no. Violation of discipline is immediately punished."
By the way, discipline deserves a separate mention: having sent a child to a European school, you can be sure - he will not return from there spoiled, for the daily routine is quite strict, and for every five, maximum ten, children there is at least one tutor (caregiver). In the English Concord college, the campus is even divided into female and male sections - being caught on the other half in a living room is almost tantamount to being sent home early. Without any refund. The same for smoking and beer. Security is watched and watched again. Some children even complain that discipline in European schools is too strict.
For the fifth quarter to be successful, you need to spare no time on marketing, surveys of acquaintances, and careful study of the price list of each proposed school. And most importantly, choose the sending company correctly, focusing only on those tour operators that have long and extensively been involved in educational tourism. Then you can be sure that everything will be in order with transfer, accommodation, flights, visa, insurance, and other related travel details.
Squeeze it all
Note that summer language schools offer far more opportunities than just learning the language and active recreation. In addition to language programs, they almost always also offer academic ones, including lessons in mathematics, literature, biology, and chemistry. Everything here is like in a regular school: tests, laboratory work, essays - of course, in the corresponding language.
The academic course is taken by those who are preparing to enter British, Swiss, and other schools. This is usually done with a single goal - to enter a university. After all, as is known, domestic school certificates are not recognized in Europe, so savvy parents prefer to send their child to a European school two to three years before admission. This gives good chances: firstly, a person gains the skill of studying in the corresponding language, and secondly, he passes all the necessary certification tests. The summer academic program is nothing more than a first step and a trial balloon: whether the child can study abroad right now or whether the level of preparation needs to be raised.
It is clear that in this situation choosing a school is a more difficult task, because usually a child is sent to the place where they would like to send him or her during the academic year. This is not mandatory, but such practice exists. How to avoid making a mistake in this case? It is best to find a travel company that has special consultants and provides curator services (accompanies the child throughout the entire period of study and solves his or her problems). This is not the cheapest pleasure, but you can lose much more if it turns out that the child was unable to enter a school or ended up in one whose graduates are accepted only by the most modest universities (while you will still pay about $50,000 per year).
"Usually tour operators who professionally deal with educational tourism know almost everything about the schools, colleges, and universities they send people to," says Inessa Gaplevskaya, general director of an educational company. "We travel around countries, look at living and learning conditions, compare programs, talk to students, ask for lists of graduates with test scores and the universities they entered. It happens that the preliminary information provided to us by the school greatly diverges from what we see in reality. Then we no longer recommend it to our clients."
In fact, before my eyes, a very pretty school in Lausanne was struck off the company’s list - the achievements of its graduates in the field of admission turned out to be too modest.
Of course, you can avoid torturing a child with some British, German, or Swiss school. Instead, simply offer the child preparing for a European or American university a course of preparation for passing internationally recognized exams: IELTS, TOEFL (English), Cambridge certificates: FCE, CAE, CPE. DELF, DALF (French), DELE (Spanish), ZDaF, ZMP, DSH (German). And summer is a good time to start preparing for admission. By the way, according to one study, 39% of our compatriots traveling abroad for educational purposes are specifically focused on entering universities.
Everything for sale
In general, the ability of Europeans to sell their educational services beyond their own countries is worthy of admiration and emulation. In just one summer language school in Cambridge, about 30,000 foreigners study simultaneously every year. Each of them leaves in the country at least €5,000 over three weeks in the form of payment for tuition and accommodation. But this is only one type of educational "product," and therefore it is not surprising that Britain earns more than $5 billion a year from exporting education.
Switzerland also earns billions from education (more than 1.1 million schoolchildren and students), and moreover, the majority of foreigners are students and pupils of private educational institutions. Public education in this country is difficult to sell - each canton has its own admission rules and curricula, and graduation exams (for grades 11-12) are considered the most difficult in Europe, and many university faculties accept only with them.
However, Switzerland has a developed network of private expensive boarding schools - about 250 - and a large number of relatively inexpensive ones, accessible even to the middle class. But the main thing is that only Switzerland offers American and immediately all possible European programs with the issuance of corresponding diplomas recognized everywhere. It is on the basis of private international schools that summer language and academic programs are implemented, and teaching foreigners according to the regular one-year program is conducted only in private educational institutions.
Moreover, when choosing a foreign school, Russian parents are worried about anything but its status. Being rather skeptical of domestic non-state education, people sacredly believe in the quality of similar foreign education. There is, of course, an explanation for this: the authority of European schools is very high. Nevertheless, not everything is so ideal. The fact is that non-state education in the same Switzerland is absolutely private business. The state not only does not help it with any money or tax benefits, but does not even control it. Moreover, the country has no official ratings of schools or even universities, unlike, say, England, where ranking is done according to many fully official criteria. How, in this atmosphere of complete democracy, can one achieve quality education?
First, we have very strong competition. Therefore, schools, depending on the programs - British, American, and so on - prepare children for a certain type of final testing. And they are accredited completely voluntarily in the most diverse educational organizations, - says Henri Bear. - Then strict requirements for programs apply to them. But the main criterion for quality is the success of graduates. Every year the government publishes testing and admission results - they replace the rating.
At the Swiss school LAS, located in the beautiful high-mountain town of Leysin (the school operates on the American system and prepares only high school students for university admission), parents coming for an interview are first shown numerous accreditations - from ISO 9001 to the prestigious and very rare in the Old World MSA. And the owner and director Steven Ott says: “We are an old and reputable school, for which the quality of education is the main value. When parents come to me for an interview, I first of all ask whether the schools where the child studied before were accredited.”
In short, the quality of education is regulated by simple market laws: a school teaches well if children from it go on to the best universities and it is recognized by world educational associations. Such a school can afford to charge $50 thousand per academic year. True, it reports to parents on them in full.
For example, LAS has an electronic program with detailed information about attended lessons, received grades, health status, and even pocket money of each student. The information is available to parents, administration, and teachers. The slightest failure or lack of success triggers a support system and electives. And if a child is simply slacking off, after one or two warnings they are expelled from school. In principle, respectable schools do not look at how much money is paid: places are worth their weight in gold, and there is a queue for each. This is exactly how schools and colleges maintain their positions in a very tough competitive environment.
On the other hand, we should not forget that there are many very mediocre, or even dubious, unaccredited schools where teachers do not always even have higher education. And no one can forbid them from working. Therefore, when choosing a European future for your child, one must remember - ideal education systems do not exist: a school set in a beautiful European landscape is not always a ticket to the world educational system.