There is a very well-used open-ended science activity, often used in primary schools, whereby students are given a stack of cards showing, for example, different types of animals and are asked to work in groups to “sort” them. No other direction or information is given.
The results are always interesting and varied: one group may sort by the number of legs (grouping horses, dogs and turtles into one group, kangaroos and humans into another); a second may sort by colour (grouping crocodiles, turtles, parrots and grasshoppers together) while another may assume the teacher is looking for “scientific” classification, and sort the reptiles, mammals and insects into distinct groups.
None of these students is incorrect. They are each able to justify the choices that have led to the classifications made; the features that stood out to them are the ones that were used to categorise the animals.
This activity could just as easily be used for the classification, or categorisation, of international schools; as stakeholders, we can categorise the schools based on the features that are of significance to us.
“The use of ‘tiers’ has no official status, though they are often used by schools in their marketing.”
For example, James MacDonald, director at the International School of Brussells, has suggested that you could use ownership to classify three types of international schools as “traditional” (the historic, not-for-profit, parent-governed model), “corporate” and “single private owner”.
Another commonly used term to categorise schools is “tiers”, more specifically Tier 1, Tier 2 and Tier 3, though there is no agreed definition for this terminology which, again, depends on the stakeholder discussing the school.
For parents, it may be tuition cost (the higher the tuition fee the higher the tier), university entrance and general reputation. For teachers it may be salary, working conditions and importance placed on professional development. The use of “tiers” has no official status, though they are often used by schools in their marketing (especially those that consider themselves to be in Tier 1).
Perhaps the most ubiquitous of the international school typologies, at least in academic research, is that created by Hayden and Thompson (2013). Their ABC typology is based on the raison d’être of each school: Type A are schools created to cater for those expatriates who cannot access their local education system; Type B have been established with an ideological view to develop ‘global peace and understanding’; Type C are for the local socio-economically elite students who seek a perceived better education than their local system can provide.
“As the diversity of the student body has changed, so has the diversity in curriculum.”
Since 2013 there has been discussion, including by Hayden and Thompson themselves (2018), as to whether this typology continues to be appropriate in today’s international school sector.
Naturally, there is also the option to categorise international schools by curriculum. British, American, Australian, International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma Programme (DP) (and Middle Years Programme (MYP)/Primary Years Programme (PYP)) are just a few examples of curriculum to be found in the international school sector.
As the diversity of the student body has changed over recent years, however, so has the diversity in curriculum, especially among those schools that are nationally-affiliated (such as British or American).
Not only is this diversity in the curriculum offered across different schools, but also within schools. There has been an evolution in how nationally affiliated schools present their curriculum model and there is now evidence to suggest that internationalising the national is present in many international schools.
For this reason, in a recent article I presented an emerging type of international school: the internationally-national school.
The internationally-national school is a school that remains grounded in its national curriculum or ethos, yet is still an international school. The national affiliation might be in the name of the school, how the school organises itself, the school’s day-to-day functioning (for instance if the students are organised into houses) as well as in the curriculum basis for learning.
However, there is also certainly a “more nuanced and complex” (Pearce, 2023) group of schools than those that purely align themselves to one homogenous category of school. For example, in my research I found schools that presented their curriculum in a number of ways that deviate from a single national curriculum (see table). Each of these schools includes their national affiliation in their name or as part of their marketing on their website.
National affiliation | Curriculum | ||
Primary | Lower Secondary | Upper Secondary | |
British | British based | British based | British based or IBDP
students may choose which pathway to take |
US | IB PYP and US based (Common Core and American Education Reaches Out {AERO}) | US based (Common Core and AERO) | US based school diploma and/or IBDP
students may choose IBDP in addition to the school diploma |
Canadian | PYP | Canadian (Prince Edward Island) | Canadian (Prince Edward Island) and US based (Advanced Placement)
students may choose AP classes in addition to Canadian diploma |
German school abroad | German | German and US based
students can graduate with two qualifications: German International Abitur (DIA) and diploma from state in which school is located |
|
Australian | PYP underpinned by Australian curriculum | Year 6-8 Australian curriculum
|
Australian curriculum Higher School Certificate or IBDP
students may choose which pathway to take |
Year 9-10
British based (IGCSE) |
The schools included in the table, and presumably many other internationally-national schools, were once created for the globally mobile citizens of that country who sought an education for their children that would allow them to return for study to their home countries.
“This could change the way in which schools define themselves.”
These schools have now become institutions that are open to students from all over the world, including host country students, and incorporate an international dimension while remaining aligned with one national affiliation.
In a further fork in the road of international school development, the reversal – or at least slowing – of globalisation may have an impact on how international schools (and within this grouping, internationally-national schools) may develop and thrive in future.
This could again change not only the way in which schools define themselves, but also in how they are defined by others. Categorising schools will become increasingly difficult, and typologies that remain stagnant may render themselves inadequate; this is therefore an aspect of international schools that should be regularly reviewed.
As stakeholders, however, we will – like primary school students grouping animals – continue to define school types in a way that is important to us and our needs at the time.
References
Hayden M and Thompson J (2013) International Schools: Antecedents, Current Issues and Metaphors for the Future. In: R Pearce (ed) International Education and Schools : Moving Beyond the First 40 Years. London: Bloomsbury Academic. [pp3–23].
Hayden M and Thompson J (2018) Time for new terminology. International School. Autumn: p3.
MacDonald J (2022) Inflection point? Exploring the contemporary purpose of an international education. International School. Summer: pp4–5.
Pearce S (2023) Internationally-national schools: A critical review of this developing sector and the frameworks that define international schools. Research in Comparative and International Education. https://doi.org/10.1177/17454999231167948
This article first appeared in the Autumn 2023 edition of International School Magazine, out now.