Schooling Our Children

Clive Austin, Headmaster West Point Grey Academy

In Vancouver, our children attend West Point Grey Academy. This is a private school located in Vancouver which emphasizes academics while encouraging children to explore all aspects of their education, including art, music, computers, and athletics. Clive Austin, Headmaster of WPGA, has been completely supportive of our talking time off to travel with the children and enhance their education with a rich set of experiences.

Greater Vancouver Distance Education School

Onboard Dragonsinger, we teach our children using resources of the Greater Vancouver Distance Education School. The GVDES provides learning materials, teachers, and a framework for people who want to learn or teach at home.

Susie Mah (Grade Two)

Susie Mah

Allen is in Grade Two for the 2002/2003 school year. Like last year, his GVDES teacher this year is Susie Mah. It is a challenge to make home schooling interesting for Allen. We have been working with Susie to provide a lot of variety and motivation for Allen. There is a lot of new material to cover in Grade Two and Allen is challenged every day to move ahead. We are glad that Susie is a supportive teacher that provides lots of feedback to Allen, Karalee, and David.

Steve Lott (Grade Six)

Steve Lott

Kevin's Grade Six teacher is Steve Lott. Last year Steve was Jocelyn's teacher for Grade Seven. Steve has led an interesting and varied life which we think adds a lot to his ability to relate to Kevin as we travel this year. Steve sent us the following background about himself:

The sports I described in my resume are: cycling, sailing, skiing and hiking. My sailboat is an 18 foot Hobie catamaran that I keep at Jericho Beach. It is a great boat to sail; fast, fun and very wet! I entered into the North American Hobie Championships this summer and had a great time racing in English Bay. I didn't do very well, but we sure had fun! I am also a very keen skier and have been skiing at Whistler since 1971. So that gives you a little idea of my age. I was born in 1955, which may sound like a long time ago, but I am still going strong!

As for traveling, I really got into it when I was 19 years old. After working for the BC Railway one summer, I had saved up a bunch of money and just decided that I needed to see more of the world. I bought a ticket and flew to Geneva, Switzerland. For one month I skied on several different mountains including Zermatt and Wengen before I decided that it was getting to be a bit too expensive for my limited budget. So, I started hitch-hiking and for the next seven months traveled through Spain, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Italy and Greece. Near to the end of this trip, I bought a beautiful Italian bicycle. I threw what little clothes I had left (it was summer) into a plastic garbage bag and strapped them onto the back of my new bike. I then rode across the Alps and back to Geneva where I flew home. It was quite an adventure and I have loved to travel and to cycle ever since. Ten years later I came back to Europe with my wife and we rode our bikes from Amsterdam to Rome.

Several years after my first trip, I did another long trip on my own. This trip lasted for almost two years as I explored the Southern and Eastern hemispheres from Hawaii to India, through New Zealand, Australia, Indonesia, Thailand, Burma, Nepal, India, Sri Lanka and many other countries and islands in between. Traveling this far and for this long was extremely exhausting for me and it took many years after I had returned to get used to the lifestyle in Canada. But it was because of this journey that I became a teacher.

I have taught in Vancouver for over 14 years now, although this is only my third year in Distance education. I taught ESL at Killarney Highschool for 5 years and grades 6 and 7 in Moberly Elementary School in Vancouver. Now that I am working in Distance Ed I am suddenly discovering that I can be in contact with students and their parents living and traveling all over the world. For a teacher and traveler like myself, it can't get much better - I can learn from you and travel with you at the same time as I am working with you while living and working in my home city. Not many teachers are lucky enough to do this.

Tom Bercic (Grade Eight)

Tom Bercic in Vietnam

For the 2002/2003 school year, Jocelyn's Grade Eight teacher is Tom Bercic. Tom grew up in Toronto and received a B.A. from the University of Toronto with a major in history and a minor in geography. After graduating from university, Tom moved to Vancouver. Since moving to Vancouver, Tom has completed his B.Ed from the University of British Columbia and his M.A. from San Diego State University. Tom travels extensively and has visited China, Malaysia, Philippines, Peru, El Salvador, Germany, Korea, and Cambodia. He has taught with the Vancouver School Board for eight years now, four with the Greater Vancouver Distance Education School.

Tom sponsers four children in Vietnam so that they get an English education (three of them are in the picture above). In Vietnam the best chance a child has for a productive life is to get an English education. Quoting Tom:

Love sports, love reading, love philosophy, love life. That is it in a nutshell. Tom Bercic

David Anderson (Grade Five)

David Anderson

For the 2001/2002 school year, David Anderson was Kevin's teacher. David was our first contact at GVDES where we met him in March, 2001 to discuss schooling during our time away. David provided an overview of the entire program, including specifics for Grades One, Five, and Seven. He also arranged for us to receive all of the teaching materials for the next year. There is an enormous amount of material. Not only do we have to be disciplined to get through all of it, we had to find room on a forty-three foot sailboat to store it all.