International School- Faith Academy

I had the chance to visit and tour an international school near our place. Located on a hillside overlooking Manila, Faith Academy is a k-12 international Christian School with over 20 Nationalities representing their student body and Faith Academy also accepts Filipino students.

Our tour around the campus includes seeing their library, one of the coolest I have seen. Then we proceeded to the classrooms  and was able to have a glimpse of their students (in different hair color as expected). We also got the chance to see their facilities such as their pool and their newly built auditorium. One of my most favorite part of the tour (except for the Chili Con Carne we had for lunch) was their arts center. Being an artist, it feels like heaven inside that room! (and makes me want to enroll my kids there right at that moment)

Then we had a sumptuous lunch of chili con carne and a very interesting discussion about third culture kids and raising global citizens by Libby Stephens.

It was my first time to hear about Third Culture Kid. According to Libby, Third Culture Kid or TCK is an individual who, having spent a significant part of the development years in a culture other than the parent’s culture, develops a sense of relationship to all of the cultures, while not having full ownership in any. Elements from each culture are incorporated into the life experience, but the sense of belonging is in relationship to others of similar experience. 

It’s quite hard to understand how it was define but with Libby’s explanation, I think I had a better understanding with what TCK is all about.  It’s like the students at Faith Academy, given the fact that there are more than 20 nationalities in their population, each student is expose to different culture and each learns a new culture different from their own.

I found great articles about TCK from Libby’s Blog, please do check them out if you have time to get a better understanding about TCK.

And here’s short video about Faith Academy:

Please visit Faith Academy’s website if you’re interested to be part of it.