Preliminary acquaintance
The family's long-term strategic aim is a decisive factor in choosing a school. What should the child become, in the parents' view? An oilman? A banker? A film director? A lawyer? Or should he continue the family dynasty as an international journalist?
The second factor is the parents' desire for the child to grow into an independent person. The ease and facility with which a child growing up in a well-off family obtains the fruits of parental labor and success sometimes alarms the older generation. For willpower, determination, and responsibility appear and strengthen only when circumstances demand them. Therefore, for many parents, the decision to send a daughter or son to a British boarding school is not a tribute to fashion but a conscious choice of an educational and upbringing strategy: alone, without parents, far from home, in a country of a foreign language, the child will have to rely only on his own strength, relying only on the knowledge he accumulates himself. Independence from school days, fluent English, European culture, access to English-speaking higher education — this is an incomplete list of what can be gained by studying abroad.
Having assessed the difference between dream and reality — preferably enlisting the help of a psychologist's consultation — parents set off in search of a suitable school. Any reputable private educational institution has its own website, by visiting which you can find out how many children study there, whether there is special support for foreigners (for example, an additional English as a Foreign Language course), how many people are in a class, the number of tennis courts, etc., as well as examine the list of teachers with their qualifications.
For more details
More detailed information about a chosen school can be obtained from an educational agency: it is quite likely that someone is already studying there, and the agency supervises the child, maintaining constant contact with him, his parents, and the educational institution. This means that the agency can tell you about the pupils, the teachers, and the educators. You also have the opportunity to meet representatives of foreign schools in person at educational exhibitions, which are currently held several times a year not only in the capital. However, as a rule, no more than two dozen foreign educational institutions take part in an exhibition, while there are about two thousand private schools in Britain alone where foreigners study.
There are facts that undoubtedly influence parents' judgments about a school's attractiveness: for example, the media wrote that Boris Yeltsin's grandson studied at the British school Millfield, and that name is now on everyone's lips. Recently, Mander Portman Woodward College, where Alsou studied, has attracted attention. And there are also the world-famous Eton, Harrow... But these are not the factors that will help you make the optimal decision and find an option suitable for a particular child, taking into account his psychological characteristics and level of development. Such a choice requires serious professional consulting — a specialist should talk with the student, analyze his range of interests, assess his level of general development and proficiency in English, and then compare these data with the requirements imposed on applicants by one or another educational institution. Parents want to choose the very best and most prestigious school. But famous institutions have high requirements, and entrance tests may prove too tough for an average student. Or, on the contrary, the questions at your chosen school may be too easy. So pay special attention to the entrance test — it will tell you much more than the number of lawns and football fields. To get an idea of entrance requirements, there is no need to go abroad: at educational exhibitions and presentations, time is usually allotted for individual interviews and testing of potential students. After a conversation with the child and his parents, the question of enrollment in the school may be decided right on the spot.
If, however, many options have been considered and no choice has been made, there remains one last resort — a familiarization trip to the school. It is better if the child goes with his parents, otherwise later they will not avoid explanations as to why he was not asked. After such a trip, it seems there is nothing more to add to the scales of "for" and "against".
We'll decide in a year
However, the decision will not be completely final, because after a year, a student who is more confident in himself and his English can try to move to another educational institution that matches the family's aspirations. British schools Warminster, Taunton, Sherborne and many others offer foreign students and their parents such an acclimatization year as an independent educational program. Children with weak English are accepted into a specialized International Centre.
They study there according to their own preparatory program, and all school grounds — libraries, computer classes, park, dining hall, sports facilities, and creative studios — are shared by "internationals" and natives alike. The daily routine at the educational institution and the rules of behavior in the boarding house are like in a real British school, only at first the teachers do not demand too much from the little foreigners. They understand: the child misses home, old friends are far away, and with new ones you have to communicate in English... But after three or four months, most children adapt, and after a year they can either continue studying at the same school now under the British national program, or transfer to another educational institution recommended by the staff of the international center after reviewing the year's results.
It would seem that a child sent to a prestigious school should feel grateful and try hard to become a straight-A student. Unfortunately, the percentage of children who absorb knowledge joyfully and eagerly is not very high. Some accept the blessing that has befallen them without any enthusiasm, since it seems to them that their parents do not love them if they have sent them away from home. Sometimes the child is too young to understand the advantage in life his parents want to secure for him, or he thinks he has a completely different vocation and resolutely refuses to continue the family’s professional dynasty.
If you give in to a child who hardly knows what he wants, parental dreams will crumble. However, if adults do not want to indulge him and still force him to go abroad, this mismatch between the parental line and his own will later affect his studies... School psychologists are well aware of this sluggishness, inactivity, and laziness, and of the cure for them.
School will help if it’s the right school
"To all parents who send a young or even not very young but poorly adapted child to a boarding school," says Nina Koltashova, director of the educational agency ITEK, "I would advise paying attention to psychological comfort as the determining factor in choosing a school. After all, knowledge is well absorbed only against a background of positive emotions, and if a student is depressed, you can simply kill his appetite for learning."
Self-sufficient children feel good anywhere. They don’t need special care. Others, on the contrary, need to feel they are objects of love and sympathy. To reveal the abilities of such children, they need external support. It is better to find them a small boarding school with a family atmosphere, where an individual approach is paramount, classes have five to seven pupils, and each has a personal tutor. If the children themselves are not eager to study, they are gently and inventively prodded. The main thing is to find an activity that captivates them, and then the awakened energy can be channeled in the right direction.
In the British education system, there is no concept of a "special school," but each school offers a choice of core and elective subjects, as well as an extensive list of extracurricular activities and hobby clubs. If parents want their child to get involved in some kind of activity as early as possible, it makes sense to look through this list and find out where graduates go afterward.
For example, Cambridge Arts & Sciences College (CATS) accepts 16-18-year-olds for the A-levels program, a two-year preparation for university. CATS graduates enter Oxford and Cambridge to study economics, biochemistry, electronics, but more often they choose design, architecture, art history, journalism, etc. as their specialty. This does not mean that CATS is an analogue of our specialized art school or humanities gymnasium. But the opportunities for developing artistic talents here are exceptional: superbly equipped studios and workshops where you can sculpt, draw, do computer graphics, design book covers, postcards, dresses... At the end of the academic year, student exhibitions are held - representatives of leading design schools come to them and invite talented young people to their institutions.
CATS College is just one example. There are many schools in Britain, each with its own character, so parents who take the matter seriously have every chance of finding the very one where their heir will be healthy and cheerful, get along with teachers, make friends, take up a favorite activity, and find study not a burden but a joy.