Schools For A Us Rising 6Th Grader Next August.

[nikosdj]

Hi guys,

We are a family from Atlanta that wants to spend a year in BUE. We ve been before and loved it and we want to give my 11 year old boy the experience of living overseas and learning spanish. My son currently attends 5th grade and will move on to middle school next year, he doesnt speak spanish but want him to learn while in BUE. We are looking for a bilingual school inside the city that follows the american calendar school year. We are open to alternatives as well, i.e small study groups, online courses or whatever. Any reccomendations?

thanks

nikos

 

[wongjoh]

It will likely require some trade-offs if you want to do BA. AFAIK only 2 BA schools follow the American calendar: Lincoln and BAICA. However, neither are inside the city (although I know that many parents live in the city and send off their kids with school buses for a 30-40 min ride each way every day). Lincoln is all english curriculum, while BAICA is bilingual.

There are plenty other bilingual schools but then you'll have to decide how to adjust the school years as they follow the Argentine calendar. Some will let you leap forward while others will ask you to redo the last grade, but at that age level I think it may require a significant downgrade to satisfy the Argentine curriculum requirements as he does not speak spanish at all.

Call ahead of time. There are long waitlists and also plenty of paperwork requirements with apostilles to be prepared.

Not gonna be easy

 

[sgibson123]

Lincoln is where we go and follows the us school colander. We are 2 months in and very satisfied. And I have a 5 th grader

 

[nikosdj]

We looked at Lincoln, a very good Arg friend and all his siblings went there. It seems very exclusive and super expensive, more expensive than the best private schools here in Atlanta. crazy . . and its in La Lucila. we don't want to live in the burbs or have to commute. you are right @wongjoh, this will be tough.
Argentine calendar is out of the question since my son speaks zero spanish. Home schooling sounds very lonely, to move all the way to BUE to be alone most of the day, yikes. Thanks, for the feedback @ livelovehappy, Lincoln looks like a great school, just not what would work for us.

 

[nikosdj]

btw, any advice on what to do with health insurance?
thank you

 

[Matiasba]

Health insurance must not be a problem, here we have pre paid medicine, very good and affordable quality private medicine.

About the school, Im afraid that if following the american calendar is a must, you only have the options wongjoh mentioned above. There are tons of billingual schools but do not follow american calendar. But lots of them allow foreign students, and lots of them go, probably they lose a part of the year, and have little trouble when they get back to the US, but all in all I think it works.
Hope this helps

 

[nikosdj]

thank you guys, very helpful comments, i am coming down to Bue end of october and will visit BAICA which is closer to our budget. This seems really our only choice, if they don't have a crazy long waiting list. @Matiasba How does the prepaid insurance thing work?

thanks again,

 

[ghost]

thank you guys, very helpful comments, i am coming down to Bue end of october and will visit BAICA which is closer to our budget. This seems really our only choice, if they don't have a crazy long waiting list. @Matiasba How does the prepaid insurance thing work?

thanks again,

Why not call BAICA ahead of time? Also, they have little unmarked BAICA buses that run to Cap Fed to pick up and deliver their students.

 

[citygirl]

Call BAICA and get an appt now, normally you have to schedule in advance. And as mentioned, those are the only options if you must follow US calendar. Can I ask why you are set on Buenos Aires? If you need to follow the US calendar, you might want to consider other spanish speaking countries that follow the US schedule - i.e., Central American countries.

 

[Noruega]

Citygirl, most of Central America follows the same schedule as in Argentina - their summer is their dry season (Dec/Jan to March). Mexico does follow a northern schedule, though, I think.