I'm also facing similar choices for my daughter: CKY vs DGJS. I do really appreciate the philosophy of CKY and that's why it has been my family's top choice. However, our main concern is their implementation and lack of track record on IB exam results. Afterall, good implementation is quite key to even the best philosophy. For example, we have heard some rumors about CKY - would appreciate it if someone can help clarify:
1) Language: I've heard that the students don't really have such good level of English, especially the upper years students. Some of them don't even compare well with the English level of a very average traditional school.
2) High turnover of teachers: I've heard that a lot of the good teachers leave CKY very soon to say international schools because of reputation or pay. Wonder how true that is.
3) Workload: this I don't really mind, but I've heard that the workload of CKY is actually quite heavy and students need to do projects that are beyond their abilities. Therefore, parents need to either hire tutors or spend a lot of time helping their kids with school work.
4) Outside tutoring: heard that more and more CKY students are getting outside tutoring help on various subjects. One main reason I like CKY is I thought that this is not necessary...
I understand this is not the main discussion topic here, so I will post similar questions under CKY and hope to get direct feedback from CKY parents.
Hi Kyliema2006
Thanks much for your detailed feedback. I very much agree with you. I've spoken to several CKY parents over the past few days and have some new insights too. I believe they are quite in line with what you've mentioned:
1) the language level might vary, esp. for the upper class students, but that applies to all school and CKY already has an excellent language environment
2) for project work, it's expected that the young students in early years would need support from parents, but they also learn a lot through the process. Then upper class students will be doing projects all by themselves.
3) I also can't agree more that whether outside tutoring is needed very much depends on the parents' availability and philosophy, rather than the school itself. For CKY, this is definitely not necessary/required.
Thanks again. I will be doing registration tomorrow or Thurs. Hope they would allow us to roam around to see some students' work. =)