Amanda Dixon taught second grade at Kings Center Charter School in Buffalo, New York, while her husband, Solomon, 38, led writing workshops at middle schools in upstate New York.
The couple was working long hours to support their three young children, then 4, 2 and 1, when Amanda, 43, thought to herself: “I spend all day teaching other people’s children and all that stuff.” “Doing things I’ve always wanted to do with my own children, with other people’s children.”
Amanda and Solomon Dixon founded a “world school” with their four children in the Dominican Republic. Now they travel around the world with twelve other families. Courtesy of the Dixon family
But she didn’t know how to change anything – she still loved teaching and wanted to work. They decided to become “world schoolers,” where families travel for short periods of time while others open schools and stay on the road for months or years to teach their children.
The couple didn’t consider homeschooling because “we wanted our kids to be around other kids.” Solomon, a poet and spoken-word artist who grew up cycling in foster care and was a risk-taker, suggested opening a school in another country.
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But Amanda saw no opportunity to move abroad, open a school and travel with her children. “It seemed impossible,” she says, and in contrast to her upbringing: “You go to college, get a good job and get your pension, you stay there.”
The couple began researching and saw on social media that many other frustrated families were leaving the US, UK and Canada to begin their own educational adventures. The couple thought, “People do this. How can we do what they do but in our own way?”
What world school education is – and what it isn’t
Followers of a growing traveling community who teach their children on the go, commonly known as “world schoolers,” can be defined in many different ways. While the number of families on the streets is not fully known, one of the largest Facebook groups dedicated to the practice has more than 62,000 members.
However, the main theme is the desire for a community of travelers, a similar approach to education and lifestyle, and the desire for a feeling of living in a place and not just traveling through it. World students are funding their trips with a mix of remote work, including online classes, real estate and stock trading. In many other countries, the cost of living and healthcare tends to be significantly lower.
The global pandemic has helped boost U.S. families’ interest in homeschooling, with numbers increasing 30% from 2019 to 2022 – but even as the world has slowly transitioned back to in-person learning, interest has not waned. According to an analysis by the libertarian Reason Foundation, the number of homeschoolers has doubled since 2019, and the numbers remain stable as parents are “increasingly interested in non-traditional learning opportunities for their children.”
Children learn at a local school in Peru through the Working Without Borders program Courtesy Working Without Borders
Traveling families offer their children a variety of educational opportunities. Many families in the US and UK enroll their children in their state’s homeschooling program. Then it is up to these families how they raise their children. Some mix their year with studying at home and abroad. Others travel for an indefinite period of time and come up with the idea of dropping out of school. Others travel and enroll their children in formalized online programs while traveling.
Los Angeles-based family therapist Terra Horton traveled with her husband and three children, ages 14, 9 and 6, for about a year. Knowing that the family would return to Los Angeles after the trip, she enrolled her children in a home-schooling charter school and during her trip, all of the children participated in an online school program called “Time4learning.”
Horton said the children learned at their own pace while the family traveled. Two years have passed since they returned home and school. Horton said the children were a little behind at first, but quickly caught up. She said the family often talks about their time on the streets and it was one of the best “life experiences they’ve ever had.”
How do world students travel around the world with their families?
In the last three years, around a dozen collectives known as “World Schooling Hubs” have emerged around the world. Some programs are loosely run by parents. Others are more ad hoc and arise spontaneously when enough people gather in one place or region. The cost of visiting a more informal “hub” can range from $250 to $900 per month, not including living expenses and airfare. In Egypt, world students can pay $600 to $700 a month to rent a three-bedroom house with a pool, and meals cost just under $10 a day. More formal hubs can cost thousands of dollars but typically include all associated costs.
There are hubs in Egypt, Spain, Thailand, Morocco, French Polynesia, Peru, Colombia, Portugal and Bulgaria. These centers are usually short, four to six week sessions that families attend together. Typically, children participate in structured educational activities for a few hours a day, giving parents the time they need to work remotely. The hubs offer activities for the whole family in the afternoons and evenings, and planned excursions are offered on weekends. Some hubs also offer adults-only events, and many work to create a sense of community among participants.
Working without Borders, a California-based travel company, gathers “world students” in Peru. Courtesy of “Work without Borders”.
Because these programs are typically one- to three-month educational experiences, many families are able to travel to the countries on tourist visas. While each country has its own visa rules and regulations, some countries, including the Dominican Republic and Egypt, impose overstay fees that travelers must pay upon departure. In other countries, travelers can extend their stay if they register on site.
What do children and families gain from going abroad?
Louise Marie Morris founded the One Family Luxor Worldschool Learning Hub after moving from Portugal to Egypt in 2021 with her two young children. Morris had worked at the BBC in London, but after the birth of her second child she knew she wanted something different for her life.
When she arrived in Egypt, Morris saw an opportunity. She wanted visiting families to be able to explore the local temples and tombs, including King Tut’s Tomb, and also play soccer with the local children.
Morris started the hub in the garden of a local hotel with 10 families. “We had no idea what we were doing.”Now Morris has built a classroom and a garden area and her center attracts about 25 families per six-week session, and children and parents have built an Egyptian-style oven on an old farm, the Valley of the kings and took a cruise through the valley of the Nile. Families join local sports clubs and rent houses from local families. Because they stay for a while, they get a real feel for the rhythms of Egyptian life.
Entrance sign to Luxor where the One Family Luxor Worldschool Learning Hub opened. Courtesy of Jesse Scolaro
“We have people from different socioeconomic backgrounds coming and going, and everyone is thrown into this new environment,” Morris said – not easy, as many Western families will experience a real culture shock. But it’s from those interactions that “the most precious moments come,” she said.
Children learn at a “world school center” in Luxor, Egypt. Courtesy of Jesse Scolaro
Companies have begun offering a structured version of global schooling. In August 2020, Sam Keller moved to the island of Moorea in French Polynesia with his wife and two children for a year. Keller said they have seen the positive effect living on the island has had on their children and family, allowing them to slow down and spend quality time together. “It was so profound for us,” Keller said.
Shortly thereafter, Keller founded Working without Borders, a California-based travel company that offers month-long educational experiences for families. Programs have been conducted in Moorea, Colombia and Peru.
Jamie Neilans, 46, of Honeoye Falls, New York, traveled with the company to Peru with her 12-year-old son Jace over the summer vacation because she wanted him to experience life abroad – and she wanted to do it with him. When she was younger, Neilans lived in Mexico for six months, which “changed her life.”
The single mother wanted her son to have a similar experience to understand “the important things in life,” which for her are not “a big, beautiful house or an expensive car.” She says she wanted her son to learn: “You don’t need any of this, you can be happy with the people you’re with and who you are.”
As an independent medical biller with her own business, Neilans saved money for months to embark on the adventure. Their month-long experience together in Peru, Neilans says, helped them strengthen their bond even further.
On the last evening of her month in Peru, Neilans said the local school held a thank-you ceremony for visiting students, and she cried as she watched. She thought the experience taught her son that there is “a different way of looking at life and the way things can be.”
What can world schooling look like?
In September 2020, the Dixons moved to the Dominican Republic to open their own school, Forever Wild Children’s Garden. The couple used their savings to open a food truck to support their living until their school grew. Three years and another child later, the couple has decided to close their base in the Dominican Republic and is preparing to launch a travel school across South Asia with twelve other families. The families will travel and learn together in six different locations in four countries, including Kuala Lumpur, Chiang Mai and Bali.
In September 2020, the Dixons moved to the Dominican Republic to open their own school, Forever Wild Children’s Garden. Courtesy of the Dixon family
Months of interviews led to the identification of the final families to join the Dixons and their four children. They will stop at each location for a month to complete structured programming and then there will be a specialty camp.
Families have two weeks to travel alone before moving to the next location. The family plans to be on the road for ten months before settling in a new location, where they will open another hub for three years. They plan to live as “long as possible.”
“Twenty-two years ago, when I was in college, there was no such thing as world schooling,” Amanda said. “I thought I would be in one place forever.” She said it was impossible to know what the next 20 years would bring.
The most important thing, the couple said, is the ability to adapt to what comes next. The only tool they can bring, according to Solomon, is “our spirit and our desire to educate children and our unique way of doing it.”
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Cara Tabachnick