School

Hi there. In Gent I'd say you have 3 options :
1 if you are fairly certain you're staying in Belgium for a limited period of time, perhaps 3 years or less, you might prefer an English language school. There is only 1 in Gent and it is completely private, fees somewhere around 10k per year. At the moment it goes up only to 12 years old and is housed inside a local Dutch medium primary school called "de Kleine Icarus" - that might be a good option if going local, epecially if you wish to live quite centrally in Gent.
http://www.isg-ghent.org/

2) find a local school in Dutch. They are consistently good. If you choose a particularly nice area to live in, you're likely to find a range of very good schools in that area. Just visit a few and choose one with a place. If your son is born in 2005, for school year starting September 2013, he'll be in 3rd primary (dritte leerjaar).
Here is a map of all primary schools in Gent.
http://batchgeo.com/map/ca779ab67ddf29a … a7e930e26d

Here is a brochure containing details of schools in Gent.
http://www.doosg.be/Scholen_brochure_2012.pdf

3) if you want French, or a bigger range of private English schools, you'll have to live in Brussels and your husband commute. I wouldn't recommend this option, but some people have a real hang-up about Dutch. Personally I'd go with option 2 and choose the local school in Gent!

If you want a local school, be aware than schools will close on Friday 28th June and not open again until 2nd September. There will be personnel in school perhaps the first week of July and last week of August.

I've sent you a private message. I know a few parents who live in Gent and have children in local schools there.

If you make it to Gent by August, I'd highly recommend sending your son on a Roeland language course, if you are able to secure a place. They are only for children who are newcomers to Gent. The courses are as you can see super cheap. Fingers crossed there would be places left.
http://www.roeland.be/en/language-cours … /taalzomer

This organisation helps newcomers to Gent, could be a very useful tool, the website is unfortunately all in Dutch! I'm sure they will speak English to you.
http://www.kompasgent.be/

Kompas Gent is even on FB.
http://www.facebook.com/KomPasGent

Having looked at what Kompas does, it looks ideal for you and your family. They might even help you find which schools have vacancies and might be able to put you in touch with longer established Turkish families. It's a great pity the website is however in Dutch, I'm fine in that I'm able to negotiate it, but you'll have to google translate the whole thing.

All I can say on the Flemmish education system. Is the school are hard work but they are so good in my opoin. I grew up in UK and I got very poor support for my dyslexia. The schools have teachers that help with problems such as language and other issues. However there is a lot more homework then for example uk. My friend who is a teacher however is always saying it dosnt work unless the parents are on bored and doing there bit. Cheeking agendas for notes and helping with homework etc. The schools are one of the reasons we arnt considering going back to UK. However i cant compare it to other countries just from the type of school experience I had and children I took care of in UK compared to the school experience of children I take care of here in Gent. As was said there is a international school in Gent its very small but isnt free that might be a option with your work maybe? From what i know of it it has 2 teachers and has mixed age classes. If you have facebook I can maybe put you touch with a teacher who works there?

On a side note they are always very willing to speak English to you so as long as they know your tring to learn some teachers will usually explain things to the parent in English and translate they did with me in the begging.

Dear tervurener, thank you very much for your concern .... Our idea is to find a local Flaman school. But, we do not know which part of genth we will find a home. We do not want to live in the city of Genth, we prefer suburbans of Genth.  Also, we do not want to live within a expat or immigrant bubble.
Within these conditions , which part of Genth will be suitable for a newcomer  or in  which part of genth, local people behaves newcomers friendly  and how we will find a right school who is accepting and providing necessary support to a kid who does not know the language .
I will check the schools through the map you have sent me.

Any more advices ??

Im not sure if he lives in Gent so ill also put what i know of the area.

Areas sort of depend on what you want. They are some very Turkish orientated neighbours Gent Damport sint amandsberg and parts of GentBrugge (a little further out) that are among the cheapest and have good access into gent itself. From people I know who have lived in them it was be difficult at first but they are fine once you get to know them. I personally have no issue with them.
We currently live 20 min drive outside of gent a place called Nazareth its geogous however its classed as Gents countryside and without a car at time it can be hard to get into gent. Lovely friendly people. However me and my partner decided next 2 years when we buy somewhere we wish to live on the outskirts of the city with good bus access so mariakerke and parts of Gentbrugge is a fave option of ours with good schools etc. I also had friends who lived right on the vrijdag maakt nice place but noisy at night.Your best bet is to decide were in the city you want to  be how close to things etc. Then look into a few places.

Gent on a whole is a wonderful place live here for 2 years now and have decided if we stay in Belgium this is were we still stay

Dear Hannahhadman,
Thank you very much for your kind replies. Actually, we prefer to live in a countryside at outskirts  of Genth. We are looking for a place which will be suitable for a family.  Also, for us it is preferable to live within local people instead of any expat community region. For example, nevele, nazareth or Merelbeke.....do they suits to a family having kid ?

Our other issue is to find the school. Do we have to ask school one by one ?  Do the schools are open minded to answer to such  an application ??


Thanks..))

Nazareth is lovely very safe. I dont have children yet but i actually came as a au pair for a family there who moved from nederlands with there children. 10 and 12. They are table to give them lots of freedom. They are about 3 schools for ages up to 12 and then the higher schools are a little further our in dheinze zwijnaarde. But the older boy used to take bus with friends many do here. They rents and house prices are a little higher here however. There is a couple of busy roads you need to be careful off and train communt acess is good however last train is around 10pm from gent. Also Nazareth has very few expats I myself a bit of a novility there. I think I have met an older woman from england and a couple from spain also older. But the school that the kids I take care of go to are pretty much all flemmish children who grew up in the area. People are friendly lots of store locally food shoes brakers butchers etc

(sorry is i have miss spelled any of the place names)

I will ask around about the school thing but i think u may have to get in touch to each one.

Also id like to point out we plan to try for baby Jan ish time. We will live another 2 years in Nazareth However the only reasons we plan not to say is becouse i am heavly involed in the Gent Expat community i orginise events etc a lot of my friends live in the centre of gent. When my kids are older i want to be able to allow them to go out with busses etc when they are 18 ish as i said the last train is 10pm and they are every 2 hours on weekends and we live a 40 min walk from train station