HI,
WE ARE SERIOUSLY THINKING OF MOVING TO SPAIN, MAYBE THE VALENCIA REGION.  WE HAVE TWO CHILDREN AGED 10 AND 8 AND THIS IS OUR ONLY SERIOUS WORRY IS THE SCHOOLS.  THEY HAVE MINIMAL USE OF THE SPANISH LANGUAGE SO WE THOUGHT IT WOULD BE VERY UNFAIR TO PUT THEM INTO A SPANISH SCHOOL, ALSO CONSIDERING OUR 10 YEAR OLD WILL PROBABLY BE GOING INTO SECONDARY SCHOOL ONCE ALL THE RED TAPE HAS BEEN SORTED.  ARE THE PRIVATE SCHOOL VERY EXPENSIVE ??

THE SECOND WORRY, NOT AS BAD, IS THAT MY HUSBAND IS A GAS ENGINEER AND WOULD LIKE ADVICE ON WHETHER IT WOULD ONLY BE THE EX-PATS USING HIS SERVICES OR WHETHER THE SPAINISH WOULD USE HIM AS WELL.  WE ARE CURRENTLY LOOKING INTO MAYBE A BOILER MANUFACTURER OVER THERE EMPLOYING HIM, WHICH WOULD BE EASIER.  ANY ADVICE ON THESE SUBJECTS WOULD BE MUCH APPRECIATED.

Hi
My partner I and two teenage children moved to The costa Blanca this time last year. My boys go to an international school called The Lady Elizabeth In the Jalon Valley. (About an hour from Velencia) It costs about ?5.500 per child per year. There are lots of hidden costs, Like expensive school trips and you also have to pay for books and if you want to use the school bus its quite expencive, but it is still much cheaper than private school in England. The standard of teaching is fairly good and the class sizes much smaller than in England, about 18-20 a class. My children are very happy in the school and have made a large amount of friends from around the world. The classes follow the nation Curriculum .

As for your Husbands work, Gas is different here, you don’t have main line gas.(well not were we live anyway) Its all bottled and you have a gas house and the gas is pumped from there. When it runs out you ring them and they bring you five more bottles. As for getting work with Spanish people our experience has shown that its unlikle as the Spanish tend to employ each other. I can only speak for our town, Moraira, but it seems that its quite hard to find work, as there are a lot of English people with the same skills trying to get jobs. Having said that, there are a lot of English people in the area so You never know. My In laws are trying to get a business going doing Gardening, painting, pool cleaning, change overs, that sort of thing. They have an advert running every week in the local paper and it seems that very slowly they are starting to get some work. They go and quote for lots of jobs and are quite cheap but they don’t get that many of them, the competition is high. Anyway, good lucka nd if I can help in any way let me know.

Many thanks for taking time out to respond, I guess that my husband may need to broaden his skills if he is to find work. I am a little disappointed as Moraira is one area where we felt we might have a good opportunity to find work as there are plenty of ex pats there. Still its better to know before we come and know what to expect. Thanks again.

Hi there

We moved out to a small village Cuevas de San Marcos in May 2007 (an hour inland from Malaga).  We have four daughters 15, 13, 11 and 10.  We made a decision to send our eldest to an international school in Malaga as she was going into her last year and would be taking her GCSE?s in UK.  However they put her back a year to enable her to learn more Spanish. ( I think to get more school fees personally) We had to pay a one off registration fee and an annual fee plus the fees.  However after attending the school for only 6 weeks our daughter asked if she could go to the local Spanish school (costly 6 weeks - 2,000 euros and the school wouldn?t refund anything).  It was a long day as it took 1 hour 15 mins to get her to school then we would travel back to the village and make the round trip again.  It meant that she had a 10 hour day then had homework to do.  She also felt isolated from the others kids in the village.

Our other three daughters started the local Spanish school at the end of Sept and they haven?t looked back.  The two younger ones have been getting help with their Spanish from day 1.  They also get 2 hours of extra tuition on both a Tues and Wed.  Madison is 11 and would have started senior school back in the Uk but here they don?t attend seniors until they are12.  Both her and our youngest are almost fluent and have really put us to shame.  They have been doing seperate work from the spanish kids but are now starting to do some subjects along with their class.  Brooklyn is 13 and has struggled somedays.  You can imagine doing French in Spanish when Spanish is a new language!!!!!!!!!  We went into to see the headmaster and asked for extra help (which isn?t always forthcoming in the senior schools).  She now has extra Spanish lessons and is doing really well.  We are led to believe that the children take 11 subjects and at the end of each term they sit exams, their main one being end of May/June.  They have to pass 9 out of the 11 or they will be held back a year.  The grades are 1-10, a 5 and over being a pass.  Brooklyn passed 7 out of 11 and of those she didn?t pass two were level 4?s…....... Not bad going really for 3 months worth of schooling.. Our eldest started in the middle of Oct and passed 4 but two she didn? sit and those she didn?t pass again they were lelel 4?s? She started in the year below to enable her to get the Spanish language.  She has struggled more than the others as she is in constant contact via msn with her friends who will be sitting their exams this year and leaving school, however she is now finding that she is understanding more and more and is so pleased she decided to go to the local school.  I am very proud of them all as I am struggling with the langauge.  They have made so many friends and to be honest my eldest said the you do feel isolated when you are not attending the same school as all the local kids.  Both her and Brooklyn both know that they have to work extra hard and know that the hard work now will pay off in the future.  They do get a lot of homework here.  The two in senior get around 3/4 hours a night !!!!! The two younger ones probably 1/2 hours per night…..

To be honest I have had many sleepness nights worrying incase we have messed the girls education up but now I feel it has been the best thing we have ever done.  All four can have full spanish converstation, sit and read their text books and do their homework in Spanish.  We really cannot ask for more.  We have had a taster of both the local and International schools and ther is no doubt the local school wins hands down.  Also remeber the spanish kids don’t move upto seniors until they are 12 so your youngest will still be in juniors probably.  It is worrying as you think of them having no friends etc but our house is full of all the spanish kids calling for our girls…. 

If you need any more info I will be glad to help in any way?  Good luck
Kind regards
Sherryl

We have 4 kids. We sent the younger 2 to Spanish school (then 5 & 10) and they learnt Spanish (withy the correct Spanish accent etc). We looked at it as a way of them learning the language. They are now (5 years later) both at English school, one being LES. BTW the true cost of LES including the bus etc is closer to E 9 K (May 2010).

We sent the older 2 to various UK schools and at one point we tried to save money with a so called school in Javea. It turned out that the teachers had no qualifications and were closed down by the authorities (many people are now suing them). Anyway, just be careful of “UK” schools out here

Hope it helps