What Would You Bring From Usa For Move?

[Jaredberryman]

As far as schooling goes, it's going to be really difficult at this point in time to get your child into a school. Usually, for private schools it's hard to even get a spot when the kid is 3 and you are enrolling them for pre-school, much less at this point. There are all sorts of good private schools in Belgrano you can try, but it's going to be tough to make happen. Enrolling your kid in a public school will be just as tough. Not all the public schools are all bad, but, like I say, it's tough to get in even those schools.

Have you thought about home school? My wife and I have basically settled on this for our 4 year old for now. For the social part, it's pretty easy in BA to find things your child can do with other children, like taking them to classes at clubs with other kids, involving them in extracurricular classes, etc. When you're child is young, you can do home school in a couple hours, from what I understand. So you might want to look into home school. You can register your children as home schoolers in the US, and then they can take open exams in a public school as well for the Argentine part. Friends of ours home schooled their teenagers in the US, and they finished at 17, then went and studied for a year and took the language, history, and other extra exams that validate your US. diploma. Home school is not for everyone I think, but it's an option you might want to consider.

 

[Jaredberryman]

Also, I don't think the Catholic thing will be an issue, but it very well might. My wife was not Catholic, but they let her go all the way through a Catholic private school (but her family are serious evangelical Christians and had to have a serious talk with several nuns). Each school might have their own policy. More info: in Argentina, pre-school is what we call Kindergarten, and Kindergarten in the U.S. is called pre-school in Argentina. Just so you know.

 

[fifs2]

As far as schooling goes, it's going to be really difficult at this point in time to get your child into a school. Usually, for private schools it's hard to even get a spot when the kid is 3 and you are enrolling them for pre-school, much less at this point. There are all sorts of good private schools in Belgrano you can try, but it's going to be tough to make happen. Enrolling your kid in a public school will be just as tough. Not all the public schools are all bad, but, like I say, it's tough to get in even those schools.

Have you thought about home school? My wife and I have basically settled on this for our 4 year old for now. For the social part, it's pretty easy in BA to find things your child can do with other children, like taking them to classes at clubs with other kids, involving them in extracurricular classes, etc. When you're child is young, you can do home school in a couple hours, from what I understand. So you might want to look into home school. You can register your children as home schoolers in the US, and then they can take open exams in a public school as well for the Argentine part. Friends of ours home schooled their teenagers in the US, and they finished at 17, then went and studied for a year and took the language, history, and other extra exams that validate your US. diploma. Home school is not for everyone I think, but it's an option you might want to consider.

Jared from my own and my friend's current reality it's so very different from what you describe. It's only exclusive schools like Lincoln, St Hildas or Northlands that have waiting lists..the rest are very happy and available for students, especially mid year joiners like the OP. My own son's school started the year with 28 kids..it's now 21, they had 38 the next year for the same grade (which btw is way too many for me) but the reality of the crazy Bsas economy is that many parents pay the matricula and don't actually start the year OR drop out for relocation/cheaper schools during the year. Home schooling is always a great option but it's so dependent on the kids personality. After 1 year at nursery my son's teacher advised us to go for the schooling option as he is such a social animal who loves sports. I think at 6 yrs old the OP and her son will have a broader Bsas experience if he is in school as long as he is the easy adapter type but horses for courses...its a rare expat who complains about schooling or childcare in Bsas..unlike the pizza threads!

 

[WindyCityJames]

I am OK with the towels here but the the selection of good sheets is terrible. Extra power cords for your electronics. Roll on and spray deodorant/anti-persperant is common so if you like the stick kind...bring it.

LASTLY: Nasal spray like Afrin...I have never found it here in Buenos Aires so I stock up back in the US. Also bring Pepto-Bismal. A pseudo-equivalent here is crema de bismuto. It doesn't work as well, tastes odd, and a tiny bottle cost about 10 USD.

 

[Rich One]

I love this thread....!!! I guess most postings come from Ladies/ housewives. Since I'm now a" houseband" I also deal with all the issues related to housekeeping, One has to adjust to the local ways and products "live of the fat of the land".

Wonder how extensive would be the wish list if these forum members lived in Indonesia or Pakistan

Like Francis the Saint of Assisi I live in austerity...!!

PD: if someone could bring down some Neosporin and Peptobismol appreciated!!

 

[syngirl]

Jared from my own and my friend's current reality it's so very different from what you describe. It's only exclusive schools like Lincoln, St Hildas or Northlands that have waiting lists..the rest are very happy and available for students, especially mid year joiners like the OP. My own son's school started the year with 28 kids..it's now 21, they had 38 the next year for the same grade (which btw is way too many for me) but the reality of the crazy Bsas economy is that many parents pay the matricula and don't actually start the year OR drop out for relocation/cheaper schools during the year. Home schooling is always a great option but it's so dependent on the kids personality. After 1 year at nursery my son's teacher advised us to go for the schooling option as he is such a social animal who loves sports. I think at 6 yrs old the OP and her son will have a broader Bsas experience if he is in school as long as he is the easy adapter type but horses for courses...its a rare expat who complains about schooling or childcare in Bsas..unlike the pizza threads!

I absolutely agree with this. I believe there is a maximum of 30 students in a classroom by law, if they accept more they must divide the class into 2, so I'm surprised they had 38 -- they are meant to split that division, a complaint can be filed, though when it's private schools of course they have ways of ignoring these things.... Very exclusive schools have wait lists, as do some of the more middle-class schools, especially if you're trying to find a laico (non-religious), bilingual, doble escolaridad (though at 6 all are), with decent sports programme in the Belgrano or Urquiza districts. However the biggest demand year is the salita de 5 (frankly, if I were you I would have started my 4 year old this year, or be desperately on the phone now to book entrevistas for next year if you're thinking of any in demand schools). Salita de 5 is when they first go to full day, and it is when you get a big dump of students from daycares.

However there tends to be a lot of shifting about as fifs2 says -- this is because often when entering at very young years parents reserved the spot for them 8-12 months previously and when they go into the school they find that it isn't actually the right fit for the child -- so people move their kids for this reason. Then of course there is the economic factor, when signing your child up they will have taken a deposit and quoted you one rate, and then a month after the school year, as happened this year, the negotiations with the docentes will finally be settled and poof! your tuition rate increases anywhere between 20- and 35%.

In Belgrano area for bilingual schools you have a huge selection -- NEA, Islands, Sworn, Belgrano Day School, Hans Christian Andersen (not sure if that ones bilingual or not), Washington etc. A great resource is the forum on planetamama.com -- enter the foros section and do a search for escuelas belgrano or escuelas colegiales (one L) or bilingues belgrano / bilingues colegiales, and you will see that there are a lot of parents on there discussing all of the schools. What is handy is that since the schools usually refuse to tell you the price until after you have done the entrevista, on the forum mothers will list their impressions of the schools with the monthly tuition. Check the dates on the posts and add inflation accordingly, expect minimum 20% more per year from what you see on the forum. It will at least give you a list to start with. Some of the schools I find rather snooty -- I'm looking for placement for my child for next year -- often you have to APPLY just to do the interview. They will ask you all sorts of personal information, your tax ID number (they can see if you are in good standing), your job, position, title, how many years have you been there, what schools did you go to etc. I filled one in the other day that had all of the questions translated in english so decided to fill the thing out in english just to be difficult.

Which actually reminds me -- you mention your husband's family is here -- so did he go to school here? If so schools are usually very happy to accept children of alumni at any time of year.

And since we are on the subject of schools, does anyone have a reference for Islands? Its the one that I filled in the form in english. The school sounds wonderful but wondering if also a bit pretentious. We want our child to have a solid education but we are not the type of family that's hanging out at the polo field nor are we looking to get into that society. Anyone have any idea about it?

 

[Borracho Britanico]

After having a nasty cold over the weekend I would bring some cough syrup and throat spray, its really bloody expensive here.

Other than that I would bring a lot of patience.

 

[arielm]

Wow, i'm so thankful that you guys have put all this info re the schools! i had no idea that it would be hard to get in mid-year. hopefully the point about movement post start of the year will work in our favor. My older son doesn't have a good temperament for home schooling - he's a social animal and learns best when watching others learn along side him. My 2 year old hasn't been to any schools yet. I had this fantasy that we'd find some sweet little school that they could both go to


Meanwhile, my husband went to all public schools, which apparently aren't as good now. He has memories of it being safe to ride the bus alone at 7 years old. Of course there was a crazy military dictatorship.

I went to planetamama's forum, thank you! I need to spend some serious time trying to grok what it all says...it made me realize how crappy my spanish is now! lol.

Thank you!!!

 

[syngirl]

ArielM -- My husband also went to public schools, which today are no longer of a decent quality -- in fact when I filled in the form for Islands and they asked what schools we went to I just listed our universities, it kind of irked me that they should judge us based on our primary / secondary education when everyone knows that especially in Argentina the quality of most institutions has changed a lot in the last 20 or so years. There are a few public schools that are very good, but there is such high demand for them, you would have had to be there at 4am on the morning that they open up the wait lists etc.

Don't worry, you will find something. Try that forum I recommended to start gathering a list and to get some insight into tuitions. You may even want to just go for a spanish school -- your son will pick it up faster than you think, especially if he already understands, and the 2 year old will take to it like a sponge. There are some good spanish schools in Nunez (Jacaranda off hand) and then there are some other kindergartens in Palermo that you could consider as well (Amapola has quite a few foreign children there, not sure if bilingual, but they will have had experience with foreign children coming in midway through year etc.)

 

[Dublin2BuenosAires]

Do you use a nespresso coffe machine? If not read no further....

..if so, stuff every crevice of your suitcases with capsules as they are farcically expensive. I recently found out (from a friend in their legaldept) that the capsules can only be made in their factory in Switzerland, possibly the most expensive place to make anything in Europe combined with the most expensive place in South Americato import anything!

I am restricting myself to one a day and considering the reusable capsules.

Apologies, this was me complaining to myself ; )