Education Education Education
Like everywhere you go, people complain about everything,
including education.  My own personal experience has been very
good.  

Although my children are being educated privately, the education
rules apply to all institutes.  Private institutes have to follow
government policies.

The first thing I found out here was that the children do NOT
automatically pass to the next year.  Children that fail a year, have  to
re-do the year.  It can be re-done at the same school or the child can
change - it depends on the child involved.  This being so, means
that the children study really hard to pass their exams.  I have to say,
that the children here do exams all the time, but they do not have
course work.

Most Argentine children can tell you where their country is situated,
how their country is made up and where all the provinces are
(including my own children).  They all know about grammar and not
only Argentine grammar, but English grammar.  Argentine children
were more knowledgeable than my own children, although this has
now been rectified with thoroughly grounding in grammar, spelling
and punctuation. The children have to write using proper grammar
and good spelling and punctuation.  They lose marks for bad
grammar in exams.  They also need 70% to pass!

Although state schools (known as public schools) are only half day,
many children still proceed to higher education.  Private schools
vary from being half day to full day, depending on the institute and
cost.  Half day private schools cost about 30-50 pounds per month,
depending on the amount of English input.  Full day private schools,
of which there are three cost between £150-200 per month.  Two of
these schools are International and do IGCSE and IA levels which
are based on the old O'levels, which are exam based.  Schools such
as Harrow and Rugby use these exams today, even though they
were introduced for international use.

Full day private bilingual schools

Trinity College - International  http://www.trinity.esc.edu.ar
Northern Hills  - International  http://www.northernhills.esc.edu.ar

Higher education is free for all.  Mar del Plata has a very large
University http://www.mdp.edu.ar with an excellent  department for
English as a second language attached, whereby all Cambridge
qualifications can be achieved.

Although the University has excellent courses and excellent
facilities, such as law and architecture,  there are also many private
colleges/universities, such as sports journalism and interior design,
media, travel etc.  Depending on the amount of classes taken,
private colleges can cost between 30-100 pounds per month.  Most
students study a further 5 years after high school (i.e. after 17/18
years old), so it is totally different to the UK.

There is a very strict policy for going on to further education -
students need to have a very high level of English of approx. Higher
Intermediate level.  This being so, all the local private English
schools do wonderful business as parents are very happy to pay for
their children to study English 2-4 times a week on top of what they
study at school.