Moving Abroad With a Teenager in an Exam Year

A school can tell you it offers English and science without offering the exams your teenager has spent eighteen months preparing for. The course title may sound familiar while the set texts, practical requirements and assessment dates differ. Start the planning with the exams officers at both schools. Their answers will help you decide whether the teenager can carry on with the same courses, transfer to different ones or finish before the household moves.

Get the exact entries in writing

Ask your current school for a subject-by-subject list of the qualifications your teenager is working towards. Record the awarding body, specification code, tier or route where applicable, and the exam series. For each subject, ask which components the student has completed, which remain and who holds the record. Some assessments happen long before the final written papers. An apparently free week in the spring may be when pupils finish coursework, perform or sit a speaking assessment.

Ask who in the school can discuss each part of the handover. The exams officer can explain entries and administration. A subject teacher can explain where the teenager is in the course and what would need to be covered before changing specifications. If your child has access arrangements, ask the person who administers them to identify the evidence and discuss what the receiving centre needs to do. Keep those documents secure and send them through the process the schools agree.

• The full course and specification details, including any optional units and the level of entry.
• Written exam dates, internal submission dates and the school’s entry deadlines.
• The status of practical assessments, coursework and supervised work, with a contact for each.
• Evidence and contacts for any access arrangements the teenager uses.
• Dates when a school or college needs grades, transcripts or other evidence for the next stage.

Ask the new school for a subject-by-subject answer

Send the course list to the school with the proposed arrival date. Ask it to answer in the same order. A reply that it teaches a British or international curriculum is a useful opening. You need to know what it offers your teenager in the year they would enter and whether the school can administer the assessments for that specific course. For a compatible subject, ask the teacher how far the class has progressed. Two classes can cover the same material in different sequences and reach the transfer date with different topics outstanding.

For a different specification, ask about the size of the catch-up job. A subject teacher might identify a different set text and a unit the teenager has already studied. In another subject, the difference could be a piece of supervised work that the teenager cannot reasonably start and finish in the available time. Make a list of changes the student would need to make and ask which the school can help with. Estimate the hours alongside the work for the courses they would continue.

Confirm the local timetable. A Cambridge International centre, for example, uses the timetable for its administrative zone. Ask the relevant centre to confirm dates and venues. Keep the instructions for attendance with the family’s travel dates, and check when results and certificates will be available. If your teenager is applying to a college or university, ask the receiving provider directly which qualifications and evidence it will accept and when it needs them.

Put the options into a decision sheet

1. Complete the current course before moving. Price a later start, including any extra housing, transport and a clear plan for adults and siblings. Check when the last obligation ends and whether the student can receive results from abroad.
2. Transfer to a school with compatible courses. Ask it to identify the courses it can continue, who will arrange the entries and what it needs from the current school. Plan the first week of lessons and any catch-up support.
3. Change qualification or entry date. Discuss how long the new route takes and what that means for the next stage. Include the teenager’s view and get an answer from any institution that has already made an offer.
4. Explore private entry where available. Contact centres in good time. AQA explains that a private candidate needs a centre willing to accept them for the components they need. Confirm what the centre offers, charges, deadlines and access arrangements in writing.

A private candidate route can involve teaching at one provider, a booking at another and an examiner with separate requirements. If you are relying on it, confirm the whole chain before leaving the current school. Check any local schooling requirements for the period between arrival and the exam. If the plan requires flights back, map the trips around the actual exam timetable and allow time for changes. Do the same for the route in which a parent stays behind with the teenager.

Work through what it would take to move in February

Imagine Ash is sixteen and the family has an offer that starts overseas in February. The receiving school can continue maths but offers a different English course and has already started its science practical work. A first plan is to book the February move and arrange exams after arrival. Ash’s exams officer asks the family to check who would handle each assessment and whether the destination school can offer the original entries.

In a revised plan, the family compares three things. The first is whether the employment start can shift. The second is whether Ash can finish with their current school while the adults make a phased move, with agreed supervision and a budget for visits. The third is whether changing a subject or exam series would affect the offer Ash hopes to take up next year. They ask Ash which version feels manageable and what help they would need during the transition. Once they have answers from both schools and the next provider, they can weigh the real choices.

Give the teenager a copy of the plan

Keep a transfer folder with the information the schools agree to share. Save reports, written confirmations, assignment titles and relevant exam references. Ask the current school which supervised work it can release, in what form and who will authenticate it if needed. Agree how to send records that contain personal information, and give the new school a person to contact if any file is missing. When you receive an entry confirmation, compare it against the course list while there is time for the exams officer to query any difference.

Put the catch-up work on a separate calendar. Give each subject one or two named tasks for the first fortnight, and ask teachers which work can wait until the student knows the routine. Protect time for ordinary sleep, meals and a familiar activity alongside revision. The new commute, different classroom systems and language outside lessons may already be taking up more of the student’s attention than they expected. Review the workload with them once they have experienced a complete week.

Put the subject list, contacts and dates somewhere they can find it. Agree which tasks they will handle and which an adult will own. They might prefer to ask a teacher about coursework while you confirm the school’s written commitment to the exam entries. Keep one review before any booking you cannot change and a second after the receiving school has seen the records. At each review ask whether the teenager has enough time to prepare and someone they can approach if the arrangement starts to slip.