The Foreign Service Journal, December 2009

90 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / D E C E M B E R 2 0 0 9 S CHOOLS S UPPLEMENT E mployees of government agencies assigned overseas are granted allowances to help defray the cost of an education for their children in kindergarten through 12th grade, one equivalent to that pro- vided by public school systems in the United States. In most cases, posts abroad are served by one or more English-lan- guage schools with an American cur- riculum. The majority of these are nongovernmental, nonprofit, nonde- nominational, independent schools, usually with a board of directors estab- lishing policy and a superintendent, headmaster or principal as the senior administrator. Even though these schools may be called American, they are not entities of the U.S. govern- ment. Some receive government grants for specific purposes, but these grants represent a small percentage of the overall budget. Children of many nationalities attend these schools — including, in most schools, a signifi- cant percentage of host-country stu- dents. The allowances for a specific post are determined by the fees charged by a school identified as providing a basic U.S.-type education. Parents may use this allowance to send their children to a different school of their choice, say a parochial or foreign-language institu- tion, as long as the cost does not exceed that of the “base” school. If the alternative school is more expensive than the “base” model, the difference would be an out-of-pocket expense for the parents. An allowance covers only expenses for those services usually available without cost in American public schools, including tuition, transporta- tion and textbooks. Fees for lunches, trips, computers and school uniforms are not covered, even if required by the school. Parents may also elect to home- school their children while at post, using a home study program. They will receive an allowance to purchase materials and services while posted abroad, but this allowance will not be continued if they are reassigned to the U.S. If a foreign post does not have a secular, English-language school with an American curriculum, or has such a school that goes only through certain grades, an away-from-post or “board- ing school” allowance is provided. A T HE ABC S OF E DUCATION A LLOWANCES B Y P AMELA W ARD