Secondary Education in Calis/Fethiye Etc

[WordBird]

Hi everyone

I feel I should apologise in advance in case everyone gets hacked off as I think I'm going to have a lot of questions over the next few months. Even though it will be a while before we're ready to start things in earnest, I want to know NOW! (T'other half will tell anyone who asks that I'm the world's most impatient, got-to-get-it-all-sorted-immediately person...oh, and the most stubborn too....  )

Anyway... when we move, we'll have our daughter with us, who will be 14 years old by then. Can anyone offer any advice/insights/info about schools/education for secondary-aged children? I had heard there was an international school in Fethiye but that it no longer exists (and would probably be expensive).

Are there local schools that she can attend and is education free or paid-for? That might determine exactly where we move to as well I suppose... I guess our other options would be home-schooling (not sure I'm up to that) or seeing if we can find anyone who does private tuition (though again we'd have to look at the cost).

At this stage we have plenty of time to think about it and anything is helpful and appreciated.   

[Scunner]

I will not lie to you, 14 will be a very difficult age to start school in Turkey. There is an "international" school (more than one actually) but as you suspect, they are not cheap. Most children of that sort of age who's parents I know/knew found it heart rending as their kids did not speak Turkish and there is no "fast track" learning - they generally stare at the walls all through lessons for a few months until they start to learn Turkish. On the positive side, kids do pick it up quicker than us old fools. School tends to be more academic than the UK - lots of Maths, Turkish, English etc and not too much in the way of arty stuff like drama and art.

Sorry but you did ask.

In regard to what qualifications might be achieved, and how they compare/cross reference to UK ones, there is some debate here:

http://www.calis-beach.co.uk/forum/calis_beach_questions_and_information/ladiesliving_turkey_young_kids_45703.msg264879.html#msg264879

[Scunner]

"arty stuff like drama and art"

Art being about as arty as subjects get.

[Dutchie]

There is no international school in Fethiye but there are three private schools. Tuition is about 12.000 TL per year.

The private schools give more attention to foreign languages but the main language is Turkish.

Like Scunner said, 14 years is a difficult age to start in a new country. The younger children are, the easier and quicker it will be for them to learn a new language. Young children can become as fluent as native speakers but 14 might be (generally spoken) too old for that.

The state system is almost free of charge. Currently there is a system called 4+4+4.
Four years of primary school, four years of middle school and four years of "lise".

Most children go to lise when they are about 14 years old. The lise schools have different levels and for the student to enter a lise, they have to do an exam. This exam is nationwide held at the same day. The level of lise depends on the results of the exam.
Turkish children basically spend the first eight years of their education preparing for the exam. Besides that, a lot of children also go to so called "dershanes" to get extra lessons, only to prep for the exam.

It would be hard for your daughter to enter a good lise through the state system since she never had any education about Turkish history, Ottoman empire, Ataturk, etc.

[WordBird]

Thank you, both - that's really useful and helpful information.   

What you say is kind of what I expected. I know it's not a great age for us to do this and originally we thought we'd be moving after she had finished her education in the UK (to age 18 anyway).
However, events are overtaking us and aren't completely within our own control.

Her education is important and I do have concerns. On the plus side she's good at languages and we'd all start learning Turkish before we came so hopefully she wouldn't be completely clueless...of course, she would learn more quickly if she was younger.

There are members within our extended family who have moved to other countries and done well against the odds, and others who did terribly during their formal education in the UK but as adults have gone back to college, gained qualifications and got decent jobs. This makes me hope that, whatever happens in Turkey, it won't necessarily set the scene for her future. In years to come there will be money available for her to return to the UK and study further should she wish.

I do think there's more to life than exam results - I know graduates who are stacking supermarket shelves because there are no jobs, while my own son - almost 20 - abandoned the career he trained for and is now doing quite nicely in club event promotion, in spite of having no formal qualifications in the sphere.

Sorry - this is long and waffly and I guess I'm just trying to reassure myself.....hoping the life experience she will gain will prove equally valuable.

Shame about the subject focus, though - she loves her art and drama and is definitely more of a creative.... Maths isn't her strong suit, though she is excellent at English. It's a family trait.

[littlereddevil]

I think a British teenager would be very bored living in Fethiye.

[scareylady]

Hello Wordbird

I don't often have much input on the forum anymore .... We left Calis over 6 years ago so lots of things have changed and apart from a couple of holidays we don't come over at all since we sold our villa. . . . . . .  But this I know something about and something's won't change.

14 year old girl + Calis + No friends + Not fluent in Turkish = BIG TROUBLE!

We thought as you seem to, that the life experience would out way the loss of formal education, that a home tutor will teach her Turkish and then she can go to lise, it will be a wonderful adventure for us all.

I won't go into to much detail as my daughter is now 22 and doing really well BUT please think very hard before making this step at this time of her life.

When we arrived we employed a home tutor for her and she learned Turkish quiet quickly ...... but the boredom soon set in!  The only thing for 14 - 18 year old ex-pat children to do is hang out with other bored expat children and play pool, sit on the beach or hang out in the bars with the 15 - 20yr old bar men.  This is not because they are troubled kids but because there is nothing else for them to do. 

My daughter when to the public middle school in Gunlukbasi and her Turkish was just good enough to get by but the Turkish children aren't really allowed to hang out with the UK kids because they are seen to be outsiders by the locals. 

She was desperately unhappy, isolated and confused.  14- 18 is such a tough time to be a young woman and living in a tourist centre just adds immeasurable pressure on them.  I speak from a personal point of view but she wasn't the only one, she use to hang out with a group of 6 - 10 other UK expat children and they all fell foul of the temptations available at one time or another.

Don't convince yourself  that it will be different for you because your child is a "good girl" or a "sensible" girl ...... So was mine and the others ...... It's amazing how tempting the bars are when you have nowhere else to go and the only other people of her age are all hanging out there.

All of the children that spent those years there are back in the UK now and most had to spend extra time in further education to recoup the "lost years" spent in Turkey because most exam results are not recognised in the UK.

I know 4 years seems like a long time to wait to go and live your dream but seriously think about the price please X

Sorry to sound so negative but it really was a very difficult time for us all as a family.

Thanks for listening

Scareylady (Mrs Sausage) Lesley

[Bluwise]

You've got some great information and points of view here to consider.

I would think long and hard (which I'm sure you already have) about moving over with a teenager following what I have read above. It really does have its challenges as well as benefits.

[kayakebab]

I was desperate to move over since first visiting in 1994. At that time my children were young enough to have adapted to life in Turkey, but I didnt have the finances.
At 14 there's no way they would have wanted to leave their friends and we had friends who went back to the UK once their children were 13 and 17 to give them the best opportunity in UK schools as it was what the children wanted to do.They don't regret their decision and said it was the best thing they did.
This and other people saying dont do it meant I waited til they were settled in jobs and Uni.
It was horrible being in the UK for all those years when I wanted to be here, but it would have been selfish of me to have done the move when they really didnt want to.
Also, what happens after school? They wouldn't have been citizens, so finding a job would have been nigh on impossible.
Your choice of course, but felt I had to put my 2 life's worth in!
Leaving them in their 20's was incredibly hard, but I think bringing them up here as teenagers would have been harder.

[WordBird]

I absolutely understand and appreciate the points you've raised, in particular you, Lesley, and I'm genuinely grateful for your insights. Hearing others views and experiences is extremely valuable, even if they're not reassuring. After all, that's why you ask the questions, isn't it - to get honest replies?

Originally we saw this move as something for when our daughter - she's our youngest - was older; it would just be me and hubs, enjoying our place in the sun, and until we could make it happen we'd keep plugging away and dreaming. But circumstances are such that it may be the most realistic option for us rather sooner than anticipated. (I don't really want to go into details on a public forum, although happy to do so privately.)

Obviously the fact that we want to be over there means there's a certain amount of cheer and optimism around that....but the education side of things is one of my main concerns and this does worry me. We have one other possibility, also overseas, but somewhere where we know there's a good international school. We'd be there for at least two years, so she could do her IGCSEs, and maybe longer.

This would be my preferred outcome but we won't know for a while yet whether it can happen...keep your fingers crossed for me! I desperately want to be in Fethiye but think it would be better if the dream was on hold for a few more years if possible.