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hi i live in turkey at the moment with my family we have lived there for the last 4 years and want a change i would realy like your advise on where i should be looking myself and my partner have an independent income although we would like to work if we can and we have a 13 year old that will need to go to an english or international school so would like to be fairly near would appreciate lots of advise and experiences and look forward to joining in this forum:)

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Hello, welcome; why Spain? Fair enough why not, but presumably there's a reason? what work would you be looking for if you decided to look? what kind of international? spanish/English or another mix? Have you a preference for coastal, city, N, S etc?
Out of interest, why the thoughts of change from Turkey?

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I think you will need to be a bit more specific on your needs and desires.
Spain is a big and varied country and everyone will say that their part is best.
I suppose inland or coastal would have to be your first choice. In a city or rural. In the cooler north or hotter south. Near expat communities or more Spanish.
I have to agree with fiona, what are your reasons for moving? not being nosey but often they are a big influence in a big decision.

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hi i would like coastal area with big british population and need to be near an english school just want to try another country turkeys lovely but want a new experience now any suggestions at areas to look at

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Again, it would help if you can be slightly more specific - you say you want a coastal area with a big British population - why? commercial/business reasons or because you'd feel more comfortable socially? or you are thinking of your child? Or because you speak no Spanish? Med coast presumably you mean? Because of weather? Does location not matter at all ref your likelihood of getting work?
(sorry, probably sounds like a questionnaire but there are loads of folk in the Spanish forum who might be able to help.....if they have enough info to work from!)

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With your son still being at school, would you not be wiser staying there for him to finish his education, if he has been there since 9 he has grown into the international schooling in Turkey so you may screw his education up with moving him to Spanish International, they may not be at the same level, so are you being fair to his needs? :confused:

Have you asked him if he wants to move as he will have made friends, he will have picked up Turkish and established himself, it may be hard to accept but he may want to stay although he will go where you take him but he is the one that will suffer, you may well be better sending him to family in the UK so he can do his education there just in case you fancy a change in a few years and take him to somewhere else before his finishes his schooling.

Spain is what you make it but it takes no prisoners especially where kids are involved, there are loads of British kids who have next to no education as they could not assimilate into school here, have little chance of getting work as unemployment is sky high and they have the protectionism attitude of Spanish first and that opens them to the dark side of Spain with drugs, gangs and trafficking.

Just consider all the options before you make the move, look at schools at to what they can offer that is on a par to what he is getting in Turkey, not just where you want to be it is where he needs to be.

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In that case you are looking at the east coast Valencia, Alicante or south coast Malaga etc

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i knew this would happen please i just need advise i dont need opinions on what is best for my daughter we would never do anything that would not suit her you have no idea about our family and what works for us

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All I was simply trying to do is advise you that educationally you will be putting your child at a disadvantage but then you must be aware if that and when they come into the employment market in Spain in fact anywhere really they will be interviewed accordingly.

Spain takes no prisoners but as you say, you are the parent and as such you make your choices.

I do not judge you but when you ask for advice I have given you my advice, you can choose what you do with it.

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not that i realy need to explain myself but my daughter is now fluent in turkish and is looking forward to learning a new language she has private tutoring in english as well so will never be at a disantvantage and will not need employment in spain i am sure there are plenty of parents all over the world that put there childrens education at risk following their dreams but she will have and has more life skills and education than most kids i know,it was not advise you gave me but an opini on ..please can anyone with children give me some of there experiences :)

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Everyones experiences will be different, in my experience if your child is happy then there will be no problem, only problem children have problems adjusting.

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I found your comments over the top also.

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quote: "I just need advise (sic) I don't need opinions...." :confused:

As the one who asked most of, possibly all the questions, I did so for what I (as a somewhat mature parent) consider the right reasons. If I had simply answered your initial questions - which it would appear you simply want : where to look, independent income, non-specific but not vital work, 13 yo seeking international/british education, - my answer would be thus: "I can't possibly advise but there are quite a few british/international schools on Southern mediterranean coastal spain whose strengths/weaknesses will be relevant/irrelevant to each and every child/parent according to their needs; and few jobs in Andalucia for anyone not fluent/bilingual in Spanish."
Apologies but you kind of cornered an answer:unsure:

ps by all means check me out. I hope I'm not a bolshy ******* as aren't (:huh:) most of the spain forum regulars....I just feel it helps to know what the person you're helping is actually looking for.....

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Dailoukatt .

I for one would love to give you helpful advice but I have no children and live in a wonderful place in Spain but alas it doesn't have an international school.

I really hope you and your daughter can find something in Spain but alas these clowns on here so far, are giving a pretty typical response to a very sensible question. it amazes me that although Spain needs expats to move here - it is the expats that are putting people off ( and they wonder why they can't sell their houses )

They are a very small minority and believe me, get away from the we know it all forum brigade and you will be made to feel very welcome by the Brits but even more so by the Spanish who actually understand the importance of being helpful.

Best wishes to you both

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I wish I weren't gullible enough to be drawn in but (a) I don't know how anyone on a forum for a month or so can know enough to call posters clowns (b) the question may be reasonable but the information provided for those responding is hardly fulsome (c) I don't know it all therefore can't express it all, particularly with limited information about the requirements of those asking. Sorry.
(oh, and (d) we're not trying to sell our house so don't know if we'd find a buyer or not!)
I could, of course, provide advice for those with private income and specific requirements of the education of their (x language speaking) (x second language speaking) children whose parents will be spending (x amount of time) in (x region of) Spain and who both (parent(s) and child(ren) ) know (x amount) of the local language - be it Castellano, Valenciano, or whatever. Point being I know what I know for my family but whether advice pertaining to that knowledge is relevant to the OP... well I'll never know>>>>
Sorry, but quite honestly the questions asked at the outset were intended for any poster to be able to provide the best, most relevant possible, information to the OP......:rolleyes:
............. ps some Andaluz are very welcoming, I don't know all of them so can't make major judgements about them or the Spanish as a whole.
btw, why does Spain need expats (of whatever nationality?) to move here?

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btw, why does Spain need expats (of whatever nationality?) to move here?[/QUOTE]

I am sorry if you don't know the answer to this you obviously have spent the last 3 years living in a taped up box.

Unless you have children and know of good international schools I don't see how even by asking the myriad of questions you can be of any help or encouragement - so why are you bothering ?

Get out your box, find a life - oh and read the economic pages of the newspapers. Educate yourself before even thinking of continuing to put down others.

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I am sorry if you don't know the answer to this you obviously have spent the last 3 years living in a taped up box.

Unless you have children and know of good international schools I don't see how even by asking the myriad of questions you can be of any help or encouragement - so why are you bothering ?

Get out your box, find a life - oh and read the economic pages of the newspapers. Educate yourself before even thinking of continuing to put down others.[/QUOTE]

I don't live in a box, I have a life and I both have children and have a child in an international school. Whether it is a good international school remains to be seen. For all those reasons and more I was asking pertinent questions to be able to give pertinent answers. I hope - someone other than I would be better placed to judge - I have never put down anyone on BE or anyone else. (should I go there ref economic pages? Let's not.....)
I don't think the OP was seeking encouragement, they were seeking advice. There is a difference. One can not give worthwhile advice on the basis of very limited information.
With that limited information, all I can do is advise the OP that there are quite a lot of British/International schools on the mediterranean coast. Our son is the only non-Spanish in his year in his school. He is marginally below the others in his year on end-of-year results in the Spanish subjects. He is above the others in English subjects. I'm not sure that's what was wanted, and can't see that helps because at his age we're not talking exam results or university placements or employability but there it is......:unsure:

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Fionamw, I think the response regarding answering the questions was more aimed at my response than your own, yes my opinion was made but as you were asking about international schools surly the questions should be where are the best schools as opposed to you wanting coastal etc.

Like the UK not all schools are equal, not all schools are going to be at the same standard of your child or maybe more advanced than your child so where they go is as important as where YOU wish to live. Sorry but you are stating that your child will never need to work, but you do although you have an income substantial enough to provide for all needs. Best bit of ADVICE I can offer is get on a plane and take time to come and have a look for your self obviously those of us that live here will all have different opinions and sounds like you just want to save yourself the airfair by getting us to do your leg work for you.

I spent 3 years researching what I wanted, needed and did not consider of importance, I have also asked for the opinion of others and made 6 research trips and I have been here just over a year now and I am now re-evaluating what my requirements are as my situation may change due to elderly parents wanting to move over, so just asking for sunnyside answers and not accepting that pitfalls will be pointed out to you is underestimating where you are moving to.

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naladogs,
I think you have made a mistake picking on fiona she has said nothing wrong, it was jay01 who upset the OP and I can see why.
I think you owe fiona an apology as you are doing what you say "others" here are doing, being disrespectful and in this case without justification.

Where's a concierge when you need one;)

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Jay - thank you for putting a little bit of sensibility into this. Last night I wrote a very intemperate posting and very nearly posted it 3 times but changed my mind (ProcrastinationRUs opens at 10.00 tomorrow morning)

Surely no one can expect a response to such a short brief without being asked all sorts of searching questions - which professional co's charge €2k just to open a file.
Even making a response about "is Aldi better than Al Campo?" could involve questions before an answer can be made.

The only way to find out if a country is viable as a new place to live is to visit (not just look at a map and ask a question on the internet). Surely its like a house - do you get that "WOW!!" factor or "well ....".
There is enough on the internet about jobs, or lack of more likely, postings about language skills or lack of without asking questions that cannot be answered without being asked a further 16 questions.

We all have different experiences from moving to a new country, some good some bad (especially one poster who moved from Portugal) . But there is no need for us to start snapping at each other in open forum, it shows up the forum and all of us in bad light
although there are only 18 posts there are 434 views - so you never know who is reading these postings.......

sorry guys & gals - rant over

:wub:

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Schools really aren't the problem, nor is the area the OP wants to move to, the problem is moving a 13-year-old child to a foreign country.

The onset of puberty is hard enough, but it's easier in a familiar background, among familiar surroundings and in the company of friends.

I know.

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Thanks:o

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well they & the mods can't be online 24/7 & read every post

that's why there's a report button;) it looks like this ! and it's at the bottom left next to the karma button

if you use it - all the mods from every country forum will see a report & troublesome/rude/insulting/touting/advertising posts can be dealt with quickly

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I am sorry but Fiona has confirmed what I expected, she asks this myriad of questions and yet she doesn't even know if her own sons school is a good school . If she didn't do the research how can she advise on any international school ? I can totally understand that ,maybe, in her case, her son had no choice on where he was educated, she had to go with that area for work purposes or maybe the parents personal life style choice. This poster is in the enviable position that neither of those factors are her priority. She is ( contrary to another poster )considering her daughter needs first. Putting all this importance on needing to know the required area is surely something poster can look into if she has a choice of a few good schools, she can then fly over and see if that area will then fit in with the rest of the families needs.

As for her daughter getting employment after education, this is a worldwide problem, although I do think if her daughter has 3 fluent languages and maybe knowledge of a few more, there will be International companies all to willing to employ her, so living in Spain and conversing with British expats will go along way to help her in the future. Having spent sometime in Turkey I know which country I would have preferred my daughter (whilst going through puberty ) to be going to school in.

Maybe someone who has done some research on Spanish International schools for their own children,could give some advise on the resources they used, are they happy with the school they eventually choose ? are there any pitfalls to be considered ? are their children getting any extra help in integrating within the community etc etc etc . All this type of information will be helpful even if the area maybe not the final choice.

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Every time I think 'no more' I find myself judged; being judgemental, though not uncommon, is not constructive on a forum. Some people know each other in 'real life', the rest of us can only go by posts in the ether. If someone is seeking advice, I'm certainly not going to say 'well this school is brilliant, that is cr*p, you're better off here or there or wherever'. I (we) did research, as you would hope any parent would. However, MOTs, SATs tests or any other educational statistic only apply to certain aspects of whatever's being tested, and relate to a limited timespan. Schools vary with staff dynamics, management pressures, the body of pupils, a myriad (good word!) of factors. Yes sure I (we) thought our son's school was the right one for him/us for OUR reasons. Education being one of them. He's there, he's enjoying it (at 9 that's half the battle), his English has come back to par and his Spanish remains good. Will that remain the same? Would it have been different/better at a different school? Give us a clue.
I remain convinced that with limited information available about those requesting the help, any thinking person will struggle to give advice on where to move to. Please I'm floundering here. How could they? Generalities yes. If that's what the OP is looking for we can all wade in. Most BE Spain posters willing to truly help like to offer poster-specific help, rather than platitudes or generalities. Those that talk in generalities quite often say so in their posts (I've been known to do that myself in certain circumstances.) and posters asked to give more info to help with the advice that could be forthcoming, generally do so quite willingly.

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PLEASE STOP THE PERSONAL ATTACKS OR I WILL START BANGING HEADS TOGETHER

REMEMBER THAT THERE ARE FAR MORE PEOPLE OUT THERE READING THIS THREAD THAN ARE CONTRIBUTING AND THIS DISCOURTEOUS ATTITUDE TO A FELLOW FORUM MEMBER SHOWS THE FORUM IN A BAD LIGHT AS WELL AS YOURSELF

THANK YOU

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fiona

Not to worry , I have searched out a brilliant site that has 6 pages on ALL the International schools in Spain , costs , Sats, times , curriculums, percentages of pupils nationalities, student / teacher ratios , etc etc it also has a forum. I think maybe this was the sort of advice the poster was looking for.

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In reply naladogs I am sure Fiona would know whether the school her children are educated at is good enough for her, as to whether the school would be good enough for someone else's child is for that parent to decide not Fiona. Had she of changed schools several times and disturbed the children's education to find out whether the school is a good one or not it would not have been of any use anyway as the harm to their needs has been done.

Why does the poster not do the leg work themselves as it appears that people opinions are not of value they are simply fishing. You can have 2 children in the same school, same class and have 2 totally different educational experiences because their particular needs are different, they are at different educational levels and their out of school experiences are very different.

Her child may well have 3 languages and the knowledge of more but does that compensate for not having friends or friends that you can call on when needed because you travelled a lot. Many children of military personal find friendships hard as they moved about, I changed schools within the same city at that age and found that having to make new friends was very hard at 13 you are changing, so moving to a different country, culture, language may be just a tad more difficult.

You only need to look through past posts to see how many adults feel isolated, unhappy, homesick because of the move to a different country, why then can we not expect that a child of 13 would not suffer a similar loss, parents are all well and good but friends offer far more.

Naladogs it is not for someone to do the research on behalf of the poster, it is for the poster to do herself as any research done by any other person will only be valid to their childs educational needs so of little value to her or her child. As for extra help, integration that again is for the poster to find out as only she will know how much help will be required.

Forums are fine for general information, general questions, like can any one tell me what medical facilities are available in XYZ, or how best do I go about renting, but to ask for specific like educational values of international schools opens them up for more questions.

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It was tongue in cheek, not personal, the introduction of a concierge on the forum was to stop newbies getting beaten over and as good as the idea is, it still happens, as this thread shows.

Many,many children move from school to school, country to country because of their parents career, many of these because the parent/s are in the armed forces. To say that these parents are disadvantaging their children from selfish inconsiderate reasons is deeply insulting, surely.
I felt , as did the OP, that jay01 went way over the top in judging the OP's parenting ability.
The result is that the OP has probably left and fiona is clearly upset that she has been depicted as the culprit.
It's all so:( .......isn't it?

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it is :( isn't it?

& my comment wasn't especially aimed at you - you just gave me the opportunity to make it

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Hang on I was not questioning her parenting ability, I was simply questioning why she would wish to move a child of 13 and why it should be such a big deal for it be done now and not something that can be left till they leave education. At no point have I been rude, offensive or otherwise, how the poster chooses to take it is for them alone and not yourself to judge

Many people myself included have thought about moving with a child of such an age, many people have done just that and you can look at previous posts as to how successful or unsuccessful that is. Moving with a child of 9 and moving a child of 13 is totally different, sometimes people think it will be easy that children just pick up where they left off, but that is not the case. Just because it is an international school, you should not assume that they can pick up and carry on as usual, we all do things thinking we are doing it in the best interests of OUR children, to broaden their horizons, give them a taste of something different but it is also a parents right to do what is actually best for that child, should someone else not agree with that they are free to disregard that information, but it was still a valued point by the replies standards.

I did point out that many children move due to being in the military and they DO have the same issues of not making friends easily which DOES effect them in adult life, which is why many children of military backgrounds now go to boarding school which is funded in part by the military. How badly children/adults are effected is dependant on that persons ability to integrate, some children have no issues others find it very hard and very distressing that issue does have to be brought up what they do with it is up to them.

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Glad I'm not in trouble....again:D
I think if a stranger has a go at someones parenting ability it's going to go down like a lead balloon, well meant or not.
This thread has got very silly and I feel sorry for poor fiona.
Maybe the thread should be deleted as it's adding nothing of benefit to any one anymore.

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Why is insulting or wrong to say that parents who move their kids from country to country disadvantage their children.

For every kid that has an advantage of the move there will be another who is put at a disadvantage.

it isFact of life.

surely it would be easier to decide on the general location or town and then look for schols, instead of finding the school and then moving lock, stock and barrel to where the school is.

As children dont go to school forever and in the OPs case not for much longer it seems the wrong way round to go about things.:confused: wierd

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I don't want to get drawn into these member arguements.
I simply thought that jay01 was to heavy handed, as did the OP.
Yes there MAY be SOME cases that SOME children MAY experience SOME difficulties, it's not a fact of life for ALL and it is the parents decision to decide what they feel is best for their child given their personal circumstances of which we have no knowledge and therein right to judge.

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and there endeth the sermon for today:rofl::rofl:

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Amen and God bless us ALL:thumbsup:

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Hallellujah brother........

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thank you for all the genuine replys with good info . i am familiar with forums i am on a good one in turkey but its just the same you get good and ill informed judgemental on all . the comment that why dont i jump on a plane and find out for myself just about sais it all!! of course im going to come over im not stupid or that naive! this was a first attempt to touch base as the family only decided to look at spain this week, some people just need to stick to subjects they actualy can help on and let other more well meaning people who generaly want to help reply. I think i will give it a miss now once again thanks to all that gave good practical advise

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My advice would be Benalmadena, expats and a few International Schools nearby.
I was going to advise send her to a Spanish school as I have experience of them, but as you have a bit of an attitude about unsolicited advice I won`t bother. ;);)

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What is it with karma these days? I need to spread it around - and that's two of you I've tried for.......:lol: