For parents

Despite the negative aspects for Staff, BSB is probably still the best school in Bucharest for those wanting a British Education.
The kids are great, the majority of teachers are really good, the parents are very supportive and rapport between pupils and teachers is excellent and the resources are improving all the time.

So what is the problem. The problem is best illustrated by asking the question - Why do so many teachers leave every year.

International Teachers are a very mobile lot, they frequently move from country to country and rarely stay more than 5 years in any one place. As a consequence the annual loss of teachers from international schools is up to 30% a year. Less than that average over a period of years would indicate a school where staff are very happy, greater than that indicates that there are some problem with the school.

At the end of the 03/04 year I believe that Jo Wells was the only returnee, I dont know the number for 05/06 but for the 06/07 year the turnover was about 70% . Five staff left within a month or two of arriving at BSB and the rest left at the end of the year. Prior to the coup to oust the old principal staff were frequently leaving over weekends or at holidays.

Stability in the teacher workforce is important for continuity, particularly with respect to discipline and what is expected of the children as well as classroom continuity.

When BSB addresses the issues that cause teachers to leave then that will make it the best school for everybody. So why do they leave.

Apart from those who have decided to move on anyway the major reasons come down to three issues.

Working illegally in a country, the workload created by the KS2 coordinator and the management of the school (poor distribution of workload, lack of meaningful staff meetings and an abrasive dominant control of staff). A lot of the problems are caused by Corina but unfortunately the principal nearly always sides with the owner.

For one of those teachers who left within the first few months of the 06-07 year the straw that broke the camels back was the KS2 coordinator. I know of other staff who have stayed at BSB but asked for transfers out of KS2 in order to avoid the demands of this KS coordianator.

The working illegally situation may have changed now that Romania is partly in the EU. But other issues would best be worked through with the present staff. Unfortunately this requires an open honest meeting where there would be no repercussions on staff for being frank, given the personalities of Jo and Corina this would be unlikely.
For instance there was a staff member who asked the principal for a reference for another school. She did not get that particular job but BSB refused to renew her contract for the following year (also refused to explain why - they simply kept brushing off the fact that they had not given her a new contract to sign).

This is appalling, International teachers do move on and when an opening comes up for them which is better suited to their skills or is a promotion or experience broadening job then they should be helped to apply and appreciation given for the work they have done for BSB. What a terrible predicament to put a teacher in, teachers normally need a reference from their present principal but if they ask Jo Wells for it and do not get the job then they are denied reemployment at BSB as well.

Allowing difficult pupils into BSB
Another aspect of BSB that has already had a detrimental effect on BSB and could get much worse, is the change in enrolment policy (or failure to implement the policy they have would be more correct).

In the past new pupils were required to undergo some tests tto determine if they were suitable students for BSB, but in the last year or two several have been allowed in who have had severe learning difficulties and have also been very disruptive in class. Dealing with these students makes the teachers task very difficult and generally lowers the standard of discipline in the school as well as significantly reducing the class time the teacher has for the rest of the class.

One such student caused such mayhem that what was a good working class became very difficult to manage and the performance of the students dropped off markedly.

There is also a problem in English speaking schools of allowing too many local students into the school. As a rule of thumb when local students exceed around 25% of the school roll then they start to communicate in the local language instead of English. This then starts to have a very serious effect on their ability to learn english and to use if fluently, it also excludes non local children from their conversations. BSB has been largely free of this but when I left it was starting to creep in quite badly in some classes.

The solutions - Well only the parents acting collectively would have the clout to cause any real change- BSB has the potential to be a really great school, but it needs Corina to pull right back out of the day to day management and interference with the teaching staff and allow a well qualified manger to come in and do a proper job of administration. It also probably requires a new principal.

Well that is enough for today.