UK boarding schools are eager to attract more Ukrainian students, whose parents see education abroad as an investment in their children's future
Nataliya Stryzhak of Dnipropetrovsk has ambitious plans for her only son, 11-year-old Pavlo.
According to her vision, in around 10 years, Pavlo will graduate from prestigious Oxford University, get a well-paying job in London and stay in Great Britain for good. “What is there to do in Ukraine with an Oxford education,” Stryzhak asked rhetorically.
To make her dream come true, the 45-year-old wife of a well-off Dnipropetrovsk businessman is ready to send her child to a private boarding school in England when he turns 14, paying about 20,000 British pounds (around $34,000) annually for three years, so that Pavlo is “all set for Oxford by the time he is 17.”
It is this desire that inspired Stryzhak to come to a meeting in Kyiv with the headmasters of a dozen or so private British schools on April 15 and 16. The meeting was organized by the Kyiv-based company Business Link.
“I want to learn more about the British system of education and possibly choose a school for my son,” explained Stryzhak, adding that it’s nearly impossible to get this kind of information in Dnipropetrovsk, where her family lives.
Growing trend
The management at Business Link, which has consulted Ukrainians on education in Great Britain since 1997, says that while the number of Ukrainian parents sending their kids to boarding schools in Britain is still small, the trend is growing and will reach its peak in the next five years.
Valerie Samborskaya, who heads the UK education department at Business Link, said her company started focusing on boarding schools in the UK only recently, seeing it as a very promising niche on the consulting services market in Ukraine.
“The first wave of Ukrainian children going to private boarding schools in Britain coincided with the years that followed independence, but then it ended,” said Samborskaya, referring to the economic crisis of 1998.
“It’s only now that people can afford to educate their children abroad again, after they have made money from small and medium-sized businesses,” she said.
And as the children of this new generation of Ukrainians, who appreciate the advantages of Western education grows, Samborskaya is confident the trend will only increase.
Terry Sandell, director of the British Council Ukraine, agrees, saying that while there has been a definite upswing in the number of Ukrainians going to Great Britain for a higher education, with the figure doubling between 2004 and 2005, reaching 2,000 students a year, a growing interest in UK boarding schools has been evident as well.
“It seems that people have started looking at boarding schools as a great way to prepare children for a smooth entry into a British university,” said Sandell.
According to him, there are about 500 private boarding schools in Britain, most of which have accepted international students for centuries. Ukrainian children are now slowly joining the trend, he said.
Apart from better chances of getting into British universities, fluency in English and the all-round development of a child were the motives cited by some of the people attending the fair, which hosted headmasters from some 15 private British schools and about 100 children and parents. And if the prestigous British boarding schools, such as Winchester and Eton, weren’t present at the fair, it’s because “they do not really need the promotion,” Samborskaya said.
“I wouldn’t say British secondary education is much better than a Ukrainian one,” noted Iryna Moskalyk, who came to the fair together with her husband and their 12-year-old daughter.
“But I want my daughter to learn the international business language, which is English, and make her feel comfortable in a foreign environment,” said Moskalyk, who plans to send her child to study in Britain in two years.
Moskalyk wants her daughter to go for a higher education in Britain as well, but, unlike Stryzhak, Moskalyk says she does not like the idea of her staying in the UK for good.
“I see Ukraine as a place where it is now possible to make money and live nicely,” Moskalyk confided. “If we were able to make our money here, she will be able to as well.”
Iryna Bar from Luhansk wandered from one school’s booth to another’s with her 13-year-old son, busily picking up informational materials and conversing with the headmasters through translators.
“I will have to put all of my savings and a considerable part of my current income into my son’s education in Britain, but investing in my son’s future is my only goal in life anyway,” said Bar about her financial commitments. Bar has around $100,000 in total to spend on the three years that her son will spend in a boarding school in the UK, she said.
Wanted: Ukrainian kids
Meanwhile, the administrators of British boarding schools who arrived for the fair said they were very eager to recruit Ukrainian students and hoped for a “long-term relationship.”
“We already have seven Ukrainian students at our college, who are very good and well-motivated and who came to us mainly to prepare for university,” said Gino Carminati, headmaster of Kent College in Canterbury, who came to Kyiv “to reach out and recruit more Ukrainians.”
Carminati said it’s the improving economic situation and progressive political changes in Eastern Europe that have enabled people to seek an education for their children in the West. But while Carminati’s school has had kids coming from Russia for some time, it’s only in the past couple of years that they have welcomed Ukrainians.
“The parents are looking for their children’s education in our schools, which are not only academic, but can provide the students with all kinds of sports, arts and drama activities on very compact premises,” said Carminati. The schools, for their part, are interested in making their campuses as internationally diverse as possible, he said.
Sue Griffin, vice principal of Bosworth Independent College in Northampton, said that they get three Ukrainian students on average every year, all of whom come with specific plans for their future.
“They come to me and say: ‘I want to come to your school because I want to go to London School of Economics afterwards,’ or something like that,” said Griffin.
Griffin said it’s hard to comment on the academic performance of Ukrainians, as “it varies greatly,” but she did note that they tend to be more individualistic than other international students in her school.
“We tend to find that Ukrainian students are not afraid to voice their opinions, they are challenging in terms of expectations, and they bring an exciting taste to the college fashion scene,” said Griffin, whose school, unlike many other traditional boarding schools in Britain, has no uniform dress code.
Matter of choice
Stryzhak, whose son currently goes to a prestigious Ukrainian secondary school and studies both English and French, is already sketching out a plan of how to secure her son’s “good prospects in Great Britain.”
“Since I am not ready to send my son to a full boarding school right now when he is only 11, I will send him to Britain for one month this summer, then for one semester next year, and for a full year when he is 14,” Stryzhak said. That way, the mother figures, her son will get used to the British system of education and won’t have to leave home for an extended period, so soon.
Sandell of the British Council said that many Ukrainian parents still opt for short-term stays in UK schools, considering their high costs.
But Samborskaya of Business Link said it’s also a matter of a lack of information.
“Look at the costs of apartments in Kyiv and at the luxury cars on Kyiv streets,” Samborskaya said. “I think if people knew more about the opportunities, they would consider giving their children a good education over buying a new car,” she said.
Iryna Bar from Luhansk said her decision to send her son to England was a lot about her desire for her child to develop in a multinational and child-friendly atmosphere, which she believes British private boarding schools offer.
“I don’t want him to have any psychological barriers, so I want my son to spend his adolescent years in an environment, where teachers know how to love children,” said Bar.
But this kind of environment doesn’t come cheaply. The least expensive boarding school represented at the fair was 7,000 British pounds a year (approximately $10,900). “Obviously, in both Britain and Ukraine, to be able to send a child to a private boarding school, one has to be rich,” said Gino Carminati.
