Lion in Winter

I'm not sure when we will be able to go - i.e it couldn't really be qualified as a plan yet, as we have to get in a better financial situation first. Of all the things that may be said about going back to the U.K., nobody ever claims that it's cheap. We have a three-year-old, which complicates things. It is his education which is one of the major things giving us a push back. I really don't want to sound arrogant and patronising, and God knows it's not that all schools in the UK are great, it's just that, allowing for generalisations, the curriculum here seems terribly narrow, they don't teach children how to write (witness "remedial writing" classes in some of the top U.S. universities), the level expected of them seems very low all the way through school, few people read for pleasure because somehow all the pleasure gets taken out of it by awful textbooks, and some of the gaps boggle the imagination. I met a Political Science PhD student at Northwestern University, supposedly one of the best. She had never heard of Che Guevara. I don't means we should all be experts on the man, but a PhD in Political Science without a clue as to who he was? Ouch. Sorry, enough ranting.

Anyway, I'm trying to lay the foundations of a plan. Now, if I could just get an idea like J.K. Rowling...

bromleygirl

Actually after being here for 4 years in 2000 I took American citizenship. I've gone to university here, worked and had 2 children here and yes I've been to church a few times just to see what it is like so I would think that I have tried to fit in.

Just because I live here does'nt mean that I should just sit back and accpet everything about the states. It's like I've explained to my eldest step son it's not that I hate it here - it's the fact that I have something to compare it to I have had some happy times here however I feel that the UK is where I would like to be not only for myself but for my children.

Lion brings up another good reason in regards to education - what is taught in American schools is very much from the American perspective and is very limited in terms of what is taught about other countries.

Pulaski - you didn't answer my question - do you have personal experience of the American school system? I don't think that it is possible to make a definitve judgement on the differences in the education systems of the US versus UK unless you do.

flashman

So I also know a number of people who go to church on Sundays but it's just a weekend facade. Their basic Christian values need clarification such as in the US:

- Do they accept the high US murder rate resulting from firearms?

- Is the death penalty acceptable as criminal punishment as supported by the President?

- Is declaring unilateral war acceptable on any country which does not conform to the expectations of the US government?

There are more but the point is that in this "So Called" free society anyone asking these questions will immediately be labelled as "Unpatriotic". So even the rhetoric of being the "Land of the free and the Brave" is also a lie.

Pulaski

Any decision on the education of our children will be made jointly between me and my wife. She is American and I trust her judgement.

I also know plenty about the British education system and it is going down the tubes. At this point in time I don't think that it will be worth uprooting our life and moving 3,500 miles for. I also anticipate further a further decline in the performance of Brtish schools.

muppetking

Dear me.....I work in that sector and your comments are rubbish. League tables and SAT results have put paid to that. Children are painfully aware of how they are performing in relation to their peers not less. International studies have English children up with the best in the world in many categories....not so the US.

Pulaski

I see that you are about as far removed from the UK as it is possible to be. Therefore I assume that must have swallowed the Bitish government's propaganda, .... like the perpetually downward sliding standards that ensure that the exam grades are always rising!

muppetking

I see that you are in denial AND ignorant of the facts! Never mind. Here you will find that the USA lags behind the UK in every facet of Literacy but feel free to browse the rest of the results too! www.pisa.oecd.org/knowledge/summary/a.htm ENJOY.

bromleygirl

I can tell you Pulaski from my own personal experience I have had my 3 step-sons in the American system in 2 different states over the last 7 years and standards and expectations are a lot lower than those in the UK school system.

Anyway Pulaski if you have no intentions of moving back to the UK, why do you frequent this area of the board?

I do think you have a valid point Flashman. I do think that in America if you fail to conform to the norms and values of what is expected then yes you must be unpatriotic. Freedom of speech - give me a break. The society/culture is so judgemental and conservative at least where I am that they are not open to other points of view and different opinions. I do not want my children growing up feeling that they have to conform - this is another huge reason why I want to take my children back to the UK.

dunroving

Yes, assimilation does not have to mean conforming. Just 'cos some of us may bitch about certain aspects of life in the US, or are different from most of the (USc) people around us does not mean we "have not tried" (hope this isn't confusing; referring to an earlier post critical of you, bromleygirl). And it does not mean we don't or can't or haven't fit in.

Those of us who have intentions or desires to go back have not failed, or failed to try, or come across with incorrect expectations. I think this implication derives from the "if yer not with us, yer agin us" mentality.

I am definitely NOT putting a gun rack in my truck just so I'll fit in. And I think I look silly in cowboy boots, so I'm not wearing them. But I DO eat NC barbecue because I think it tastes great.

If I complain about gun ownership and say cowboy boots look silly, does this make me a square peg in a round hole?

bromleygirl

Thank you Dunroving - I could not have said it better

daisymoll

I've realised that I don't want to fit in anyway, I love being English and its in England that I want to be and yes we are well aware of all the bad things in England but for us the positives will far outweight the negatives which exist here as well.

Pulaski

Yes, but, rightly or wrongly, you end up looking like somebody who came to the US (, Oz, NZ, or wherever) to grab as much as they can and then return home rather than somebody who came here to settle and contribute to their new home. ...... And that is then a brush that those of us who emigrated, period, get tarred with!

dunroving

What a load of codswallop! "End up looking like..." - to whom? Just you, I'm guessing, because in my 20 years, all on temporary work or student visas, I have never, ever, been accused of not contributing just because I am not on a GC and I have not tried to become a "New Yank". I have bought a home, and do my fair share of bolstering the economy and contributing to the community. And even though I talk different, don't go to church every Sunday, and am not crazy about baseball, that still puts me well within the realms of "a normal contributing citizen", even in this Southern town.

And as for "grab as much as they can", even more codswallop. Are you saying that temporary visitors are takers, not givers? Tell that to the hundreds of USc students who have graduated from the various degree programs I have taught in or directed. I don't think you'll find a single one who would say I came here to take, rather than give. My office door is open more hours than any USc who works in my department.

These days, people move all over the place, regularly. So your argument could equally apply to USc's who move from Houston to Boston, to LA, wherever (or Greensboro to Raleigh, to Charlotte). I suppose you intend to stay in Charlotte the rest of your natural borne, and that gives you the right to pass judgment on the rest of us "temporaries"?

Have you never moved anywhere not knowing if you were going to stay? Or thinking you were going to stay, and then when you grew up a little realized you were wrong? If not, then you are one of the (few) extremely lucky ones.

"...that is then a brush that those of us who emigrated, period, get tarred with! :rolleyes ,,,"

Give me a break! So why exactly do you have to "settle" in order to be able to "contribute"?? And don't you think the average Joe is more concerned about the homeless, or the shiftless, or the lazy, or the corporate corrupt, or the politically corrupt (among their own citizens), to worry about you and whether you are "one of them temporary visa-wantin', takin' and not givin', stealin' ferriners"?

bromleygirl

I think Pulaski, that you are generalising everyone who comes here to the U.S. as out for anything and everything that they can get which is not true. Case in point, I came here with my USc as he was transferred back stateside. I could have stayed quite happily in the UK. I had a good job, family, friends etc and did nto need to come to the U.S. However I left in England to see what the U.S. was like and even became an "American" citizen 3 years ago. But I feel I have done my time here and for my own reasons want to spend my time living in the UK.

If you are happy living here Pulaski, then more power to you but please don't lecture those of us who wish to return to the UK.

Pulaski

Sorry DunR, and others, my comment was supposed to be tongue-in-cheek, but I guess didn't really come out that way.

It just kinda aggravates me to hear people say how much better things are in the UK, which always makes me wonder why did you leave? why did you stay away so long? and why do things seem so bad to you (in the US), when most things seem, IMHO, to be no worse, and often a lot better, than in the UK?

I'll slip away from here, back to the expats boards. [Slips away, tail between legs, ..... ]