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Making Kids A Relocation Priority |
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 (CNN) -- Traveling overseas for business is one thing, relocating overseas for work is another matter.
If you are moving abroad, one of the biggest concerns is your family, especially children and their education.
"More corporations are realizing it is too expensive to have a
corporate assignment fail because of their children's education needs,"
Kathleen Cocklin from education consultants Childtrack told CNN.
Firms have taken note since the Global Relocation Trend Survey report
in 2001 found that 40 percent of overseas postings fail mainly because
of family concerns.
Yet making the move overseas a success for you and your children is all about planning, experts say.
"It is wonderful when families move happily, usually they are the ones that have done the most preparation," says Cocklin.
"Two days should be spent actually in the classroom (overseas). It does
not take more than a week to do your survey trip, if you have done your
homework beforehand."
The biggest question is whether children should follow the system back
home, join an international school, enroll in a local one or sign up
for distance-learning from home.
The expert's advice is know your child and their needs and make sure
the transition to the next destination is as smooth as possible.
"If you keep track of your children then you have an idea of their learning pattern," says Cocklin.
"You can go ahead to the next school and say 'this is how the last
experience has been' and connect the new teacher with the old teacher
via e-mail."
Cocklin also advises familes to think about the long term strategy,
since promotion or moving to a different company can shift the family
back home or to a new destination -- each with its unique schooling
system and set of problems.
When children move, not all fit in. They may be behind in class or find
the social change difficult, leading to a loss in confidence that
affects the child's learning and happiness, believes Cocklin.
Families should focus on the positive points they have learned from being overseas, she says.
"The strengths would be -- rock solid geography; a knowledge of another
country, learning about different food and ways of living," she
explains.
"On return your children are going to be ahead of the others that have
never been anywhere and never intended to travel overseas."
 February 2004
CNN's Meara Erdozain contributed to this report
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First Steps 
