Pre-Christmas Local Coordinators Meeting, South

from front clockwise: Fiona Walters, Jane Forester, Adele Thurlow Reed, Carol Gill, Sian Delaney, Linda Genge, Tracey Welding, Bridget Phillips and Martyn Pape

Yesterday, 26th November was the day for our first group meeting of our Local Coordinators in the South for the academic year 2009/10.

Martyn Pape Dorset, Somerset, Tracey Welding, London and East Surrey, Bridget Phillips, West Sussex, Sian Delaney, Buckinghamshire, Berkshire and Oxford who are all establised Bright World Buddies, along with the Head Office team all welcomed our new Local Coordinator for Devon, Linda Genge.

We see our group meetings as an excellent way of sharing information and talking about our service and students. We are always looking at ways of improving our service to our students and their parents as well as developing closer links with schools.

The picture shows us enjoying a slap up lunch after the meeting.

Bright World joins Facebook

We like to think we are forward thinking at Bright World Guardianships and realise that social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter are becoming a way of life and are very useful ways of keeping in touch with a network of friends.

Last week we launched our new Facebook site and this can now be found via our website. We will inviting all our students, agents and parents to join our fanbase over the coming weeks.

In Memory of Jake

Lana and James are very sad to announce that Jake, their beloved Border Collie dog, passed away peacefully on Wednesday, 14th October. Jake had been diagnosed with cancer back in 2007 so he did very well to fight it for as long as he did.

Jake was very much a part of our Bright World office team as well, coming to the office every day and helping to guard us. He also welcomed visitors, always with a wagging tail and lots of kisses.

We will miss him terribly but we are sure he is up there watching down on us all and still guarding us and looking after us.

Congratulations to Sarah & Adam Forsyth on the birth of Molly Isla

Our guardianship students, families and clients in West Surrey area will all know and love Sarah. Sarah has been our Local Coordinator and Bright World Buddy to students at Priors Field School, King Edwards School, Witley and Royal School, Haslemere for two years now.

Sarah is currently at home with her new born baby, Molly Isla pictured here with Sarah, her husband, Adam and two sisters Ava and Isobelle. We love the picture so much we just had to share it.

Congratulations to you all.

Local Coordinator's Summer Meeting

The Bright World Guardianships Head Office and Local Coordinator Team June 2009

At the end of June each year once all our students are safely on their way home or just about to leave, the Bright World Guardianships team, in its entirety, get together for a review of the year past.


This helps us to review how we are doing things together and makes us all feel much more part of a team.

This year was the busiest year yet with over 20 of us at the meeting. We were welcoming several new members of the team for the first time:

• Ellie Wood, Local Coordintator for Yorkshire


• Astrid Martin, Local Coordinator for Hertfordshire


• Sandra Clarke, Local Coordinator for Essex
  

We all agreed that the year has been very successful with very few problems. We all enjoyed a buffet lunch afterwards before heading home for a long summer ahead.

Lana Foster completes the Race for Life

Fran (left) and Lana (right) on the home stretch.

Back in June Lana put on her trainers and ran the Race for Life with colleague Fran Clarke. The day was boiling hot and over 2,000 ladies from the Mid-Sussex area took part. Fran, being a fully qualified instructor, was given the task of taking the warm up session - the biggest class she will ever teach! She did a grand job and then Fran, Lana and a team of other girls from the local gym we all attend set off on the run.

Fran and Lana came in pretty much in the top 100 runners and did a time of 25 minutes.

We were very proud of our achievement and the money we had raised for Cancer Research.

Thank you to everyone who sponsored us. In case you think we look a bit strange, we were dressed in 80's aerobics style but Lana ditched the leg warmers - too hot!!!!

Summer days at Bright World

We hope all our students are having a good summer back in their home country with their parents. Life certainly changes here at Bright World in the summer. The windows are open all day (when it is not pouring with rain) and we are busy getting readying for the next academic year, enrolling new host families to take care of our newly arriving students, answering nervous emails from new parents and students in an attempt to reassure them that all be in place by the time the summer term starts.

It is really a different time of year and we do enjoy it. That is not to say we are not looking forward to seeing all our students back in September.

We are still chasing nearly all our students for flight details - please hurry and give them to us as soon as possible. Our drivers get really booked up at the beginning of term and it does help for us to be able to book your airport transfers as soon as possible.

Have a lovely August, and looking forward to seeing you all again in September.

The Bright World Guardianships Team

Brittany Wong Graduation

Here's a photo of Jimmy Wong's (our top Hong Kong agent and a dear friend of Bright World) daughter Brittany Wong, six, seen here in her graduation gown from Kentville Kindergarten, Kowloon, Hong Kong. Jimmy said 'I am just so proud of her. She will begin her New Primary School in September this year.'

Well done Brittany and keep it up.

Lana Fosterxx

X Factor excitement interupts Bright World Local Coordinator Meeting

There was much excitement last Thursday, 25th June during the Summer Term Local Coordinator review meeting for Bright World Guardianships. Lana Foster was in the middle of chairing the meeting with our now team of 20 when her text message announcements started to distract her! Basically her twin nieces Charlotte and Natalie were in London due to audition for the X factor in front of a studio audience of 2,000 people.

She and James dashed off after the meeting up to London and they were lucky and managed to catch the audition in time! The good news is that the girl band they have formed with three other friends (called Aspire) has got through and they are heading for Boot Camp!

We will keep you informed of their progress.

Bright World lowers deposit for guardianship students

The Directors of Bright World, have today made a decision to lower the initial disbursments deposit for our guardianship clients to just £1,000.

We had set the disbursments deposit, which is used for paying host family fees and transportation, at £2,000 as for some students who do not go home at half term and use our transport service this is actually what they will spend in one year.
By only asking for one amount this saves us time.
However, we appreciate that an outlay of £2,000 as well as the guardianship fees and of course school fees may be too much for some people and also sometimes it is excessive as some students go home at half terms so dont use our host family service.

We hope that this news will be welcomed by our clients.

click here to see a full summary of our fees

Can I go to London?

Here we are mid half term and if I was given a pound for every time I had been asked already this week 'can I go to London?' I would be so rich I could give up working forever!!

Before I blog on about our rules and regulations and why in many cases I have to answer NO to the above question, let's just look at some statistics. First of all let's look at London - it is that big thing next to this text. It is HUGE.

It covers 241 square miles.

So when I am asked can I go to London it is like asking 'can I go to Hong Kong? - what do you mean? Are you going to Mongkok, New Territories? Kowloon? Disneyworld? Tsuen Wan? - see what I mean?

All those parents out there take note - London is not a small green village - it is a huge cosmopolitan city full of all types of people, good and bad. Our underground system is very complicated. I even get lost all the time on it. No-one has time to stop and help you if you are lost.

I know that half term can be boring in your host family - just staying in and studying but I am afraid we all had to do it. I can remember my half terms were boring when Mum and Dad didnt take me out every minute of the day but you make your own fun, watch TV etc. I was not allowed to go to London on my own until I was at least 17. My parents kept me safe and sound and that is what I am trying to do to you, our guardianship children.

So here are the answers to the question 'can I go to London'

If you are 15 or under - absolutley NO - unless you are with a responsible adult who is 25 or over and who has been approved by us and your parents. A signed permission to travel form needs to be sent to us from your parents.

If you are 16 or over - yes you can in the daytime and only if you are with other friends.

17 plus yes - but you must be back by 11pm.

You cannot under any circumstances, regardless of your age, stay out overnight unless permission has been granted by your parents and we have details of where you are and the adult of 25 plus who will be looking after you.

These rules have been set using Child Protection guidelines, after much consultation with parents in the UK and after much thought and consideration. We urge our overseas parents to listen to us and support us in our rules.

Our host families are the best you will find in the UK and with them our main goal is to keep overseas children here without their parents safe and sound. We dont want them to have bad experiences, just positive ones.

Anyway I wish a great half term to all and hope you enjoy the rainy weather! Apparently it will be warm at the weekend.

Lana Foster

Managing Director

Bright World launches new Summer Programme

Bright World Summer Homestay Programme

Learn English Naturally.........

Well, we have all these lovely host families who care for our students during the academic year for their exeats and half terms then we don't work with them all summer.......

This is why we have launched this new programme. Students can stay with one of our elite host families and spend a few weeks with them in the summer - no classes or lessons - just hanging out with a British family and doing the stuff they do.

We think it is one of the best ways of gaining exposure, learning about our culture and learning English.

Have a look at our leaflet on the website by clicking on this link.

New Online Booking system for Guardianships

Bright World Guardianships
new and easy online booking form now available

We are very pleased to let you know that you and parents can now book online for Bright World Guardianships. We hope this will make life very much easier for you all round. There is a section to tell us that you are the agent for the student so there is no danger of leaving you out of the loop.

Click here to try it out.....

Easter greetings

We wanted to take this opportunity of welcoming all our guardianship students back from their Easter holiday. Apart from a few delayed flights all our students have arrived back safe and sound with no glitches. This is due to the fantastic team of drivers that we have and also Jane Forester and Carol Gill's hard work.

Communication with our students and their parents and agents is vital for the smooth running of our guardianship programme, especially if there are delays or flights change.

Thank you to all our students, parents and agents for their help in making this Easter holiday departure and arrival back a huge success.

We are now gearing up for the summer term, host families in place and all arrangements made.

Happy Easter and here's to a lovely warm summer.

Brittany Wong performs in the Hong Kong Children's Choir

Bright Worlds' close partner agent of Hong Kong Overseas Studies Centre and his wife, Rae are rightly so proud of their daughter, Brittany, they wrote us this blog. Thank you Jimmy and Rae and of course Brittany - we like to keep up to date with all your news!

Jimmy wrote:

Hi Lana, James & Sheena and all at Bright World!
Happy Chinese New Year of the Ox. This is a recent photo of Brittany performing at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre for the Hong Kong Children's Choir. She's part of the HKCC and has done 3 performances so far. I'm so proud when she's on stage wearing her beautiful red dress...