[Education is my second passion in life. It has become so not only because I did not have a very satisfied experience myself when I was small during the Chinese Cultural Revaluation, but also the comparisons I have been able to make while our children grow up in the UK. ]

One other thing that I like about our daughters’ school in Oxford is the fact that despite of being a private school, the teachers are making every effort in “working” with the children to raise money for different charities - not only for disabled kids in the UK but also for the poor in Africa.

The effect of doing so is that from a very young age, the children in the school know that there are many less fortunate people in this world and that they don’t even have enough food to eat or clean water to drink. The children start to understand that although they are still little, they ought to do something to help those poor people elsewhere.

The ideas that the school has created to achieve this purpose are pretty amazing and an eye-opener. The aim is to make the events as much fun to the children as possible (may not be so for the parents, I must say). According to school regulations, during the term time, all girls must wear their school uniforms under a strict dress code (no fancy coloured hair band, no hair dye, etc). But on those charity days, the girls have the opportunities to wear their home clothes and bring in a pound with them for doing so (the money will go to the charity of course). Bearing in mind that not all the families are willing to do so, the event is not compulsory and if anyone does not want to, she can just come to school in uniforms and there are no questions asked. They have also given names to these days - Red or Pink Dress Days, Jeans Day or other days with even funnier names such as Red Nose Day (which is a National Event in the UK of raising money for charity)!

The children always enjoy these odd days when they can “show off” their home clothes as well as make good contribution to good courses – a typical win-win situation if you ask me, ^_^!

Background reading:

In the UKOxford, one of the most expensive schools is currently charging nearly nine thousand pounds per term (there are 3 terms in a year)., amongst all the school aged children, less than 10 per cent can go to private schools.  The school fees are varied between Day and Boarding Schools. The Boarding Schools are more expensive due to the costs on food and accommodations. In

(To be continued)

Other related reading:

Kids and Education (IV) – School Concert