To think it’s totally wrong to board children in another country during a global pandemic *title edited by MNHQ at OP's request*

[Totalbeach]

I live in a town with two boarding schools (junior and senior) and there’s another 3 - 18 school nearby. All are day as well as boarding. I assumed that they’d empty due to the pandemic but they are as packed as ever. As far as I understand, kids have always been able to fly home to parents as essential travel even during lockdowns etc, but many kids haven’t gone home for holidays due to quarantining restrictions either end. Pupils at the schools are largely from China but there are other nationalities too (including U.K. boarders of course).

AIBU to be totally shocked that even during a global pandemic families are willing to send their children overseas to live? I think it’s actually neglectful to the point of being deeply immoral. And I’m quite surprised that it’s even legal to have children age 7+ boarding in another country in the first place.

YABU It’s fine
YANBU It’s awful

What are you going to do about it, OP?

Fuck all?

Yes, I thought so.

I don’t have any power to stop people neglecting their children but I can have an opinion on it. If people only posted on here about things they could change, it would be a very quiet forum.

Mind your own own business, you’re sounding like a crazy hysteric (or Sarah Vine).

Hysteric is a horribly sexist word.

They’re not neglecting their children

@ComtesseDeSpair

You think the best thing for your child is to have them at home with you receiving an average education at the average local school. Another family thinks the best thing for their child is to receive an elite and prestigious education overseas which will allow them to return home compete in the international job market. Neither of you is more right than the other, you just have different views on how to best prepare your children for life.

jeez. this message couldnt have sounded more condescending if it tried...boarding does not equal to prestigious elite education, but certainly does equal ££££.

Still, if the elite, prestigious education is all it's cracked up to be, at least the kids will be able to afford the elite, prestigious psychiatrists' bills when they grow up and realise their parents dumped them in posh children's homes overseas rather than bring them up themselves.

You hit the nail on the head there. It really does feel like a posh children’s home situation. Boarding in itself is an iffy one but even putting that aside I just categorically don’t believe there are no suitable education options (including English language ones) in entire countries.

They’re not neglecting their children

How aren’t they? They’re thousands of miles from their children. They’re actually nothing to do with their children for months at a time besides phone calls and paying for other people to meet their physical needs.

DC board at schools like this - quite a few of their classmates are from Hong Kong - their parents feel that it is good for them to be anywhere but home given the political situation there at the moment.

I’ll say it again, what are you going to do about it?

Try having an opinion on something useful.

Being able to spend £40k on your kid to protect them and their education in a global crisis is probably what’s bugging you most.

Let’s see, do you prefer the term unhinged? Because it’s really not remotely normal to be this indignant about people you don’t even know.

@drainrat What a very odd question. I’ve also already answered it.

Well I have friends who have DCs in UK boarding schools. They live overseas. Schools are fine where they are. But it’s quite a transient society as expats move around quite a bit. So they lose friends fairly regularly. So their children chose to go to school in the UK. For the continuity.

First lockdown they got the DCs home to them and all had lockdown together. They went back to school in September here in the UK. Then went home for Christmas and ended up locked down again. They have just managed to get back to school here in the uk for the summer term. Because they were desperate to. They missed their friends. They love boarding and wanted to be back at school. They wanted normality.

They were teens when they began to board and it was totally their choice.

@drainrat Why are you so hostile about this conversation? I feel like I must have hit a nerve to make you so bizarrely abusive.

It’s not for you to say that parents are ‘neglecting’ their children without knowing the circs OP. At best it’s lacking in empathy.

I'd also highlight, in huge countries like China, boarding schools are far far more common than in the UK as well, due to the fact that population centres are so spread out. So it's fairly likely that if the parents are wealthy, ambitious and want the best possible education for their child that they would still be boarding thousands of miles away, just somewhere else in China. Which isn't necessarily much different, and probably results in fewer long-term opportunities for the child. Just food for thought.

I personally don't think the pandemic really comes into it - either you understand and agree with international boarding as a concept. Or you don't.

I personally would never board my children, but I can understand if you're from a small town in China and somehow had made a lot of money, you would see it as the best possible opportunity for your child, rather than sending them to the local school which would provide them very limited opportunities in an extremely competitive market.

Well, unlike you, I know some of these people and some of their children and some of their reasons.

You know fuck all, yet still defame them.

Envious judgement wrapped up as faux concern for children. Always the same on boarding school threads.

Being able to spend £40k on your kid to protect them and their education in a global crisis is probably what’s bugging you most.

A) You have no idea how much money I have.
B) If I had 40 million I wouldn’t send my children overseas at any time, and especially in a pandemic.

Don’t assume everyone shares your ‘values’.

@Totalbeach and referring to the parenting decisions if people you've never met and whose circumstances you don't know isn't abusive?

Beak out.

Are you just outraged by boarding school in general or does the pandemic add something? IMO the pandemic doesn’t make much difference as children are much less affected by the virus so you’re unlikely to need to dash to them for medical reasons. And if they were ill a parent would be allowed to get to them on compassionate grounds. Otherwise they are with peers in a familiar setting, being educated. Maybe even less neglected than all the kids left to their own devices in their bedrooms while their parents worked over this last year....

Disclaimer: I’m not a fan of boarding schools

Don’t assume everyone shares your ‘values’.

Ditto

They aren't neglecting their children by having them in a boarding school, you don't know the reasons for it or even if the children enjoy a boarding school.
Fair enough you wouldn't do it and neither would I, but I'm not judging parents that do.

[quote Ednafrommooneyponds]@Totalbeach and referring to the parenting decisions if people you've never met and whose circumstances you don't know isn't abusive?[/quote]
Should be a neglect in there. Typed in anger.

I wonder if you are in the small town that my DP works in , the school attached to the premises where he works ( nothing to do with him or his work ) had about 20 kids from oversea all through last years lockdown , the school was not teaching as such , I think the kids were much the same as all the others just locked down in their school boarding houses instead of at home , in some ways if they get along at least they have each other to play / chat to

Are you just outraged by boarding school in general or does the pandemic add something?

The pandemic adds something. It’s the fact you can’t guarantee that you can get to your child in a crisis. You can send a 7 year old alone to another country but you can’t break quarantine to be with them SO you’re potentially always a good few days away from being with them even if they break their leg or just really, really need you.

Don’t assume everyone shares your ‘values’.

The irony.