I found an article related to this very topic here.
It is about how there are many international schools in Riyadh in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia that have very high populations of Filipino students.
Is it true that in most places in the world, where there are international schools, that there is many times a “dominant” culture group at each school? I know that when people talk about many schools in China, one of the first questions out of people’s mouths is “Do you have a lot of Korean students?” It seems like there is a high number of Korean families living here in China that want to send their children to international schools to learn in English. Normally that wouldn’t be a problem, but it seems to be creating one for the owners/school boards. They even go as far as to limit the number of Korean students that they will allow in each classroom! It seems a bit of a touchy subject I think. Many international schools strive to have equal amounts of all their culture groups, not have one culture group ever dominate the school. But, that is not always possible in a specific city in the world.
So, what about other areas of the world? Are there students from one culture group “taking-over” certain international schools?
International School Community would like to encourage its members to comment on this topic, especially providing some insight about how things are in the schools that they know about.
I can honestly say that I did not realize that in Riyadh there was a huge population of Filipino students. Because of the high population of this specific culture group, according to the article, there seem to be a lot of people involved in decision-making based on this dominant group. The schools there are hiring specialized trainers to help the teachers that are working in those schools. The schools are also having to deal a lot with the national government of the home country to that group.
The article also highlights how there is definitely a demand for teacher specializing in giving professional development in-service sessions to teachers at international schools. International School Community would like to talk more about this topic in a future entry on our blog, so stay tuned!
School profile highlights #4: Int’l School of Havana, Copenhagen Int’l School and Int’l School of Curacao
Members of International School Community have written some new and informative comments on the following schools:
International School of Havana:
New Comment: “Due to the complicated situation in regard to support for teacher visas, the school encourages candidates with Canadian citizenship or German citizenship to apply because the Cuban govt. makes it basically impossible to hire US citizens.”
Copenhagen International School:
New Comment: ” The school definitely uses Skype as a means of interviewing. Sometimes there are 10 staff members in the Skype, accounting for many people in different positions throughout the school. They seems to make it a joint affair, hiring new staff.”
International School of Curacao:
New Comment: ” You basically need to get a car here. Even though the island is like only 10 Km wide, you still need a car. The roads on the island also are not the best, so using a motorcycle is not recommended, especially when there is bad weather.”