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October 11, 2026 Highlighted Articles

Choosing the Right International School: Advice for Your First Move Abroad (Part 1)

October 6, 2026 Highlighted Articles

Is Your International School Pension Enough? 5 Ways to Build for Your Future

September 29, 2026 Comparing the Schools and Comments

Comparing the Schools and Comments: Working in Kuala Lumpur (2026)

September 21, 2026 Highlighted Articles

Rules for Counting Countries You’ve Been To

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Blogs of international school teachers: Tim Woods (Preparing Tomorrow’s Leaders)

Are you inspired to start up a blog about your adventures living abroad?

Our 11th blog that we would like to highlight is called “Tim Woods.”  This international educator has much experience in the international school community, having worked at international schools in Canada, Costa Rica, Bahrain, Eng­land and Bel­gium.  Check out the blog entries of this international school teacher who is now working at Overseas Family School Singapore in Singapore.

Entries we would like to highlight:

Around the World in 80 Seconds

“My wife and I were recently grounded by ash from Iceland’s infa­mous vol­cano. The name of that beast, Eyjaf­jal­la­jokull (sounds like “AY-yah-fyah-lah-YOH-kuul”  if you’re brave) is much fun­nier than the real­ity of it, I assure you. In our case, what should have been a short 2-hour flight from Helsinki to Brus­sels turned out to be 4 days of pac­ing in a cold air­port and then a 47-hour com­bi­na­tion of fer­ries, buses, taxis, trams and trains.


I men­tion this only so you can under­stand why it is I appre­ci­ate this clip so much: the feel­ing of traveling, with­out hav­ing to actu­ally leave my din­ing room. Perfect.  If you liked this, you might also enjoy Sin­ga­pore and Back in 5 Min­utes.”

This photo journey idea is a another great idea!  We all can relate to the traveling experience of going back and forth, back and forth to our home country.  The feeling going back and then the different feeling of returning to your host country.  Sometimes the journey goes smoothly, sometimes not!  A journey of 4 days sounds like a nightmare indeed!

Guarantee the career you want

“Your job is not per­fect. Me nei­ther. We have hid­den gifts you and I.  First instinct, espe­cially in the heady days of early Jan­u­ary, is to re-evaluate and con­sider mas­sive life changes.  Have we in fact missed our call­ing? In a word: yes. But it’s an eas­ier fix than you might think.

Have you ever heard the expres­sion: “When you’re doing what you really love, it doesn’t feel like a job?” Do you know why this is true? It’s because when you’re doing what you really love you prob­a­bly aren’t at work. Day jobs are some­times less-than-totally ful­fill­ing. They don’t nor­mally appre­ci­ate or hon­our our full great­ness. They nor­mally can’t. (Because that’s not their job). They are not designed with us in mind, but rather with our clients in mind. But their imper­fec­tion doesn’t mean they are wrong for us. We accept their imper­fec­tions as they accept ours. And that’s not bad.

Non-jobs are an anti­dote to less-than-completely-fulfilling careers. They offer a ful­fill­ing ‘third place’. A place, that is not our job and not our home-life, where we grow in the ways we crave.”

Yes, international school teachers are very keen to find the perfect job at the perfect international school at the perfect school so that they can feel a sense of meeting their goals with their career.  If any of those things are not perfect, then you are more prone to thinking you have a job instead of a career at that school.  Then it is true coming hiring season it just might be time to re-evaluate.

*If you are an international school teacher and would like your blog highlighted on International School Community contact us here.

School profile highlights #10: Int’l School of Kuala Lumpur, Shanghai Rego Int’l School and Colegio Nueva Granada

Members of International School Community have written some new and informative comments and information on the following international schools:

International School of Kuala Lumpur (2 new comments) in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

New information or comment in the School section: “English is the primary language in the hallways. There are a number of EAL students, but are not the majority. The largest single cultural group is Korean (24%) but there is a cap of 25% per class year of any one particular cultural group, ensuring an international make up to the school community.”
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Colegio Nueva Granada (2 new comments) in Bogota, Colombia

New information or comment in the City section: “If you either speak or at least try to speak Spanish they will love you. It is a great city to learn the language and the people are very happy to speak to foreigners about their own countries, etc.”

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Shanghai Rego International School (6 new comments) in Shanghai, China

New information or comment in the Benefits section: “This year the school has given another option for housing. It’s a place called Royal Garden and everyone seems quite impressed with it! I’m still happy though with my own choice in the city but its good to have another option.”

Highlighted article: 6 countries that aren’t really countries!

From the Matador Trip section on the Matador website, they highlights a few “countries” that aren’t really countries.

With international school teachers always looking for new places to visit during their holiday breaks, this list of “new” countries is just what we are looking for!

Highlights from the article:

“If you’ve never heard of them before, it’s quite possibly because they don’t yet exist as countries in the eyes of much of the world. What is interesting is that these non-states, despite a lack of formal diplomatic recognition, often function as more or less independent nations. Many have their own currencies, governments, and visa procedures for would-be travelers, and some even see a respectable number of tourists each year. For countries that aren’t meant to exist in the first place, that is.

Some are places you can go and explore just like any other. They just happen to be the sovereign version of Schrödinger’s cat. They exist but they don’t. You can visit, but you can’t.”

They have highlighted 6 countries by they state this is by no means a complete list.  There are a few more like Transnistria to Bouganville Island and Sealand.  We choose to highlight the information that they provided for Kosovo.

Republic of Kosovo

Capital: Pristina

“The Republic of Kosovo was established in the aftermath of the Kosovo War in 1999, but was not recognised by Serbia, prompting a tug of war over the new nation’s identity. Eighty-five UN member states (plus Taiwan, who isrecognised in turn by only 23, but was not interesting enough to make this list) say that the Republic of Kosovo is a country. Russia, China, and Serbia disagree.

And so, pending any progress from the diplomats, the sort-of-republic plods along anyhow, signing up to the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in the meanwhile.”

How do I visit?

“You can travel to the Republic of Kosovo from most borders that are not Serbia. Trying to enter Serbia afterwards can cause headaches, as Serbia appears to consider entering the country via the Republic of Kosovo as an illegal entry. So if you would like to go, try and get your visit to Serbia out of the way first.”

So, which of these countries have you been to.  I must admit that I haven’t been to any of them…..just yet!

New survey: How many countries have you traveled to so far this year?

A new survey has arrived!  Topic:  How many countries have you traveled to so far this year?

 

Do you find yourself traveling to more than five new countries each year? 10 new countries? If you are an international school teacher that answer just might just be yes.  One international school teacher that we know was averaging 12 new countries each year in a three-year time span!

Is the number one reason for living abroad and working at international schools traveling?  We see time and time again many expat teachers planning out their trips months in advance in accordance to the calendar at their schools.  ”Where should I go to next?” we say to ourselves.  When we hear about another teacher’s travel plans to some cool, exotic location, then we also want to go there or go somewhere even better.  We are truly lucky that our lifestyles abroad allow us these amazing travel opportunities.

Many international school teachers are very conscious about the number of countries that they have been to in their lives so far.

World66.com and other websites help us create our own world maps highlighting the countries we have been to so far.  But surely we are not traveling solely to get another country checked off of our lists.  We of course enjoy the thrill and excitement involved in experiencing a different language, culture, climate, etc. first hand.  This possible issue though is that do those reasons diminish the more countries we travel to in a year.  Maybe a topic for a future blog entry.

We are curious to see what the average number of countries that international school teachers go to each year.

So, what is your number of countries so far?  Go to the homepage of International School Community and submit your vote today!

 

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