ISO Brussels Schools

[DonotMessUp]

Greetings and salutations. First off, many thanks to all who have contributed to the wealth of knowledge on mumsnet! I've learned quite a bit.

My family and I are moving for a few years to Brussels (from the US) this summer and selecting a school is pretty daunting. It seems the more I research, the more tricky the decision. My two DDs are 6 and 3, both with birthdays later this year. The former will be in grade 2 in late summer and it seems the younger would be in maternelle before beginning reception/kindergarten during the 2023-24 school year. Employer will cover housing and international school tuition. Although, we're considering entering the girls to a local school, thinking they would learn and (hopefully) retain French more easily that way. Such was the case with me with a different language. What experience do you or others you know have with the local schools, especially integrating a child with no exposure to French? Was it a complicated process? Were school teachers invested in seeing the child thrive? I understand outcomes differ widely. My DDs would have the option to enter a bilingual English/French language or an English language (US) school after departing Brussels.

The international schools that I hear about the most are ISB, BSB, BJAB, and St. John's. They all seem good. How would you compare them and others aside from their different locations, particularly for primary school-aged children? Which private schools seemed to have strong French language or bilingual instruction?

What local schools that offer maternelle have teachers and/or administrators who have worked with English-speaking children? Do families choose which school they would like to send their child or would the child's school be decided based on their commune? For instance, if a child lives in Stockel, then they have to attend maternelle there?

Separately, what local extracurricular sports activities exist for expat children (e.g. swimming, football, basketball) and how do you sign up for it? Only the big schools mentioned above seems to offer such, making me think we'd need to find recreational activities in the local community.

Work will be in/near the European quarter. Employer will find housing, partly based on school choice and key preferences. For example, we're seeking to be in a suburb "close" to the city and don't care for personal green space as there are myriad parks.

Please don't hold back. All input is welcome and much appreciated! Thanks in advance!

I'm not much of an expert on the international schools but there is Facebook group with lots of knowledgeable people:
Belgian Schools Network: Public, Private, Home.

In my experience of local schools they are very used to integrating children from all over. You mentioned Stockel. EC de Stockel has children with something like 50 different mother tongues. Woluwe St Pierre is a very popular expat area with easy access (Metro line 1 and trams) to the centre/EU institutions.

You can send your child to any school where there are spaces - it's not dependant on your address. The only time this becomes an issue is for Secondary school applications where a calculation is done on the distance from your home and the primary school, and the primary school and the secondary school. So if you lived miles away you'd be very short on points.

Feel free to PM me.

I do not know anything about Brussels but I do know that young children settle into school very quickly even if they have no knowledge of the language they are being taught in. Your younger child is still preschool age so will have the advantage of picking up French before starting school. Good friends of mine moved with kids aged 4&6 to the U.K. the kids knew no English but within a term they were fluent and within the year the elder was top of the class in English! We start school at 4 in England so the British school in Brussels would probably start September assuming turned 4.

Remember Belgium is bilingual so some schools are in Flemish not French.

Thanks for your responses, MissAmbrosia and motogirl!

How is your French (or Flemish)? If you are putting your children into a local school it will be much easier if you are able to communicate in the language, read the emails, talk to other parents.

Also do you have the possibility of exposure to the language for the children before you come? It can be pretty tough for children to get thrown into a class where they can't communicate at all, despite all the stories you hear of children being fluent in no time. I say this as an experienced primary teacher who taught in two of the schools you mentioned above.

The bottleneck in this is your language (French or Flemish) and whether you're going to be expecting teachers to speak to you in English. Some may be comfortable doing that, but others may not.

Another issue is social life. In international schools there will be other parents who are expats (rather than immigrants who have a permanent life in Belgium). There are often informal and sometimes formally organised things for parents. As a non-European (I'm guessing you don't have an EU passport?) then you're unlikely to have a work visa - if you and your partner are both have work visas then ignore this - and in a school with other non-EU parents you'll have more socialising opportunities. This often extends to child socialising at the age yours are.

In a Belgian school you may find one with a larger English-speaking contingent (or your second language) who have parents who aren't working, but you'd need to keep an eye out for that specifically.

And it's important to pay attention to your socialising opportunities because it will make your family's life easier if you're all happy, including you!

If you're working then it's different because you'll be working with people and while they may not be friends, it's completely different then trying to find people to even speak to, never mind do things with, in a new city.

That's a good point about the family social life @DonotMessUp