Not-the-norm.
Every child is different in some way, be it through a special need or a specific
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No child is born to conform to a norm.
Yet, school systems certainly need their norms and standards to function. We understand that. |
So for the compulsory elements of learning, sensible norms are needed. However, our job is to cater for the freestyle elements! |
not-the-norm!
The real opportunities are usually outside the box.
Whenever your kids' best interests lie beyond established norms and standards you should look to
your Global Native partner families. Matching the right Haves and Wants holds a million solutions.
Whatever opportunity you long to create or solution you're looking for: There are so many families in the community who have an idea and quite likely an answer. Our family partnerships allow for opposites to attract and for kindred spirits to connect, to switch the city for the countryside and the mountains for the sea. A great match can motivate your kid to dive into a familiar subject with a vengeance or to opt for something completely new with vigour and motivation.
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Family partnerships cater for the unique situations in life, they are eye-openers for kids who need a bit of encouragement to pursue a more ambitious goal - like Eddie's story here!
Every strength and weakness, personal ability and challenge of every family member can (it is an option, not a requirement) have a place in the Haves-and-Wants profiles. That's how an autistic child or a teenager in a wheelchair finds access to just as many opportunities as the highly gifted and the exceptionally ambitious kids in the community! |
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Not-the-norm? Like what?
Like what, you wonder? Like having an IQ of 142 and a learning problem. All too often very bright kids have a hard time fitting into daily school routines. +++ Or like being blessed with an exceptional musical talent but too little self-confidence. Some flowers need a very special climate to flourish! +++ Many kids have the talent to pick up languages quickly, but their poor school performance in STEM subjects prevents them from getting the much-hoped-for grants to go abroad for a year. +++ Or what about Timothy: He wanted to be a soccer pro in the Netherlands and no club would have him, he's simply too short. He went to Chile for a year. Now his Spanish is fluent, he's playing successfully in a league two club and will be able to go to university in Lima. +++ Lilo had a stutter and was convinced that acting would help her overcome it. But no acting society would give her a try. The partnership with a family in London with a long family history of speech impediments was her salvation. They had all the relevant contacts, took her in as an exchange student and had her on a stage very soon. The experiment worked well for Lilo. +++ Benjy's dad is a bricklayer, his grandfather was a bricklayer too. Benjy doesn't have anyone in the extended family who has ever seen a university from the inside, so none of his teachers expected him to even think of it. But he did and he's an architect now. All along he had encouragement and backing from his partner family in Zurich. They, too, have a long family history in the building business and have over the generations covered all aspects of the trade. +++ Another way of falling out of the norm is being kid number seven out of nine. Some countries have application forms that won't even accommodate really large families any more.
Of course, this list could go on and on. And it will! Because that's the focus of our thirteenth year.
From April 2021 to March 2022 we'll look at every aspect of raising not-the norm kids.
Our task is to enable and strengthen the "the original child" instead of creating a standardized version,
our mission is to celebrate the world's not-the-norm children and raise a generation of independent minds.
Here's the nastiest norm of all - the price tag
We firmly believe that most of today's education systems have an expiry date. They waste way too much potential. Mankind can not afford such waste in the long run. The most harmful waste lies in the tremendous cost of good education. This barrier keeps millions of kids with more brain than money from ever contributing to the common good. That's why we urge politicians to take a closer look at the countries offering free access to schools and universities. It always pays off. Meanwhile, family partnerships open up a wide range of alternatives.
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Family partnerships have brought twelve-year-old Ken from the beaches of Greenland to the beaches of Greece; fourteen-year-old Milla from Finland with her exceptional love for Latin and Old Greek into the mentorship of a Cambridge professor; Ben from Stewart Island, NZ, to the Academy of Music for the Blind in L.A.; Emiko from Matsuyama into an equally talented family of avid chess players in Sydney and nineteen-year-old Johan from the Danish countryside to learn the craft of crystal cutting in the Tyrolean Alps.
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Please browse through the case studies to see
the tremendous spectrum of possibilities! |
We need your thoughts, experiences and proposals.
Give us your take on a future with new criteria! |
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To get an idea on the bandwidth of our diversity please visit the case studies section!
But first enjoy 6 minutes of young wisdom as a self-confident testimonial for not-the-norm power: