Raising Wildlings
Raising Wildlings
From Australia to Tuscany: Embracing a Boundless Life of World Schooling with Denise Georges
How does a single mum from Australia's Sunshine Coast end up world schooling in Tuscany?
Denise Georges shares her courageous leap from skepticism about homeschooling to embracing world schooling in the beautiful countryside of Italy.
After losing her job during the pandemic, Denise discovered the transformative power of alternative education systems, all while navigating personal challenges and societal expectations. Her story is a testament to the strength required to break away from conventional paths for the sake of family and personal fulfillment.
We chat about the innovative Boundless Life program, founded by Mauro Rapici, which offers families the chance to live and learn in stunning global locations. With destinations spanning Europe and beyond, this episode uncovers how families can effortlessly balance work, education, and adventure.
Denise invites you to redefine family life and education by embracing travel and the path less travelled. Get inspired to break free from societal pressures, explore new possibilities, and perhaps embark on your very own boundless journey!
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Ever wanted to pack up your life, leave the country and whisk your family away to Tuscany to world school? Well, today we're chatting with Denise Georges, a mum from the Sunshine Coast who has done just that with the Boundless Life World Schooling Program. We like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land on which we record today the Kabi Kabi and Gubbi Gubbi people. We recognise their continued connection to the land and waters of this beautiful place. We recognise Aboriginal people as the original custodians of this land and acknowledge that they have never ceded sovereignty. We respect all Gubbi Gubbi elders, ancestors and emerging elders and all First Nations people listening today.
Speaker 2:Welcome to Raising Wildlings, a podcast about parenting, alternative education and stepping into the wilderness, however that looks with your family.
Speaker 1:Each week, we'll be interviewing experts that truly inspire us to answer your parenting and education questions. We'll also be sharing stories from some incredible families that took the leap and are taking the road less traveled.
Speaker 2:We're your hosts. Vicki and Nikki from Wildlings Forest School, pop in your headphones, settle in and join us on this next adventure.
Speaker 1:Hello and welcome to the Raising Wildlings podcast. I'm your host, nikki Farrell. Good, well morning and afternoon to you. Denise, thank you so much for joining us all the way from Italy. How are you today?
Speaker 3:I'm really good. I'm excited to be here chatting to you guys and, yeah, to your listeners about you know this incredible program that my son and I are doing currently over here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you might be a little confused because I've said welcome to Denise from Italy with a very Australian accent like my own. Can you talk to us, Denise? Let's go right back from the start. Tell us how the heck an Aussie ended up with her son. World schooling in Italy.
Speaker 3:Okay, so it has been a little bit of a journey. Now for your listeners, I have been listening to this podcast. Well, it's been a while, but back in 2020, definitely I was gorging on your content because, you know, I'm a single mum. I've been a single mum to my nine-year-old since the day he was born, and I had to go back to work when he was six months. So that's just the life that I unfortunately had to live. It's life. It's life. Put a roof over our heads and food on the table.
Speaker 3:It's not necessarily what I wanted to do, however and I am a dental hygienist by profession it was something that I've been oh gosh, it's 17 years now since I graduated, and so you know, growing up in Sydney and then I had him in Melbourne. We eventually found our way to the Sunshine Coast in Queensland, and I was working in a practice that had a lot of families coming through that were homeschooling families, and I'd never really been exposed to that before, been exposed to that before, growing up in a city very suburban and similarly, in Melbourne, I was right in the guts of the city. For me, homeschooling just seemed so wacky and so alternative and so left of scent, like just too alternative for me and I had my own preconceptions about it. But what I started to notice with all these families that I was now in contact with was how the children were just. They seemed so mature. They were able to have conversations with me rather than grunting at me. That's what I was used to. There was just something about it. It was one of my patients that said you need to listen to this podcast, it's going to open your eyes, and so that's how I found you guys, and then it was like totally on my radar.
Speaker 3:However, I never had the opportunity to homeschool because I had to work full time. There was no other option for me at the time. So then COVID happens and I lost my job. It was taken away from me. I was not going to partake in the mandates, so I found myself unemployed. I didn't have a plan B, but it was like, well, I've got this time now. So I actually put my son had completed one year of state school in prep and there were many issues that came up for me throughout that year that I was just not okay with.
Speaker 3:A lot of things that happened, and I am a state school girl, like I grew up in that system. I went to a Catholic girls school and I, you know, I came out of school with great grades. I also came out of school having no direction, no idea who I was, no idea what I wanted to do. And then, you know, because I was listening to your podcast at the same time like everything shifted in my thinking about education and so I decided, well, I don't have a job Like I literally have all this time now. I pulled my son out of school and I thought I'm going to homeschool him. And so, you know, in the meantime I had to pack up my life. I couldn't service my mortgage anymore. I had to. Luckily, my mom was on the coast as well, so she took us in and we lived with her for a whole year.
Speaker 3:I was working as a cleaner three days a week. I was able, as a cleaner, three days a week, I was able to find these incredible communities on the coast. Actually, he did come and do your forest school-like thing as well. So I found these incredible communities, and so he was going to a couple of different homeschooling co-ops a couple of days a week as I was cleaning in co-ops a couple of days a week as I was cleaning and in the time in between, I sat down and I was educating my son.
Speaker 3:My ideals, however, were very high and the reality for me didn't match that, and so I struggled, because I knew from listening to your podcast that I needed time to unschool myself, because it was I was coming into it with the same thought processes around how to teach and educate and learn, um, and so that you know that I was exposed to growing up. So it just wasn't working. So we spent a lot of time camping and hiking and doing stuff outside, which is where we just we thrive, we love it. So it was. It was fine for six, six months, and then he got a place in a local Montessori school and and that was wonderful.
Speaker 3:In the meantime, I actually started an online business, which I didn't have, you know, I didn't have great grand plans for it. I was hoping to earn an extra hundred dollars a week because at the time I was really struggling financially, I was burning through all of my small amount of savings and I just needed another way to earn an extra hundred bucks a week so I could fill my car up with petrol, cause at the time I was, you know, putting $40 in here, $20 in there, when I could. Some days like I remember this, one day specifically where I dropped my son to his homeschooling co-op and I drove away in tears because I didn't have enough money to actually pay for the day for him.
Speaker 3:I only had $20 in my bank account and I was just, and she said don't worry, just, you can pay me tomorrow. I was like this is not the life that I want. This is not the life that I dreamed, and at that time, there was no idea about when it was going to change, when it was going to end, when, you know, I'd be allowed back in my profession, or if I ever would. It was just. There was so much unknown, so I started this online business. I just need to be able to put petrol in my car and this is how I got to Italy. Because two and a half years let's fast forward to today. Two and a half years later it is now my full-time income.
Speaker 3:I am no longer doing dental hygiene and this business being able to work remotely. I can work anywhere, servicing my customers, helping out my team and the way that I came to be here and how I found out about it is my son. He loves to cook and he's been in the kitchen just pottering around with me since he could sit up straight and sit on the kitchen bench and, uh, I think it was it was a January this year when, um, I sat down with him. We're just sitting up at Rainbow Beach, which is a really, really beautiful part of the Sunshine Coast, if you guys know it.
Speaker 3:We we go there a lot to just fill our cup, and I was just sitting with him and I had this thought, just like download into my brain from absolutely nowhere. I just looked at him and I said you know what, one day we are going to live in Italy and you are going to refine your cooking skills over there, like using like the most incredible produce. I'm like you'll the taste of the tomatoes in Italy. Like you'll. Just because he didn't like tomatoes at the time. I'm like you're gonna, you are going to love tomatoes one day because you're going to taste them in Italy. That's a real tomato.
Speaker 3:Although I've got to say, like living where we live on the Sunshine Coast, we do have access to incredible produce, and tomatoes do taste pretty good over there. We do. However, yeah. So I just looked at him and he's like okay, mum. However, yeah, so I just looked at him and he's like that's it, okay, mum. And for the next week he was like peppering me with questions about why Italy? Where did I like to go in Italy? What food did I like to eat? What was my favorite dessert? And I hadn't been to Italy Like I've been twice, but I hadn't seen a lot. It was, you know, flying in, flying out, one of those like very quick trips, and I said, well, I didn't get to Florence. But one place I didn't get to was the Tuscan countryside, and that's where I would really love to go, having watched under the Tuscan sun a bazillion times.
Speaker 1:Every woman's dream.
Speaker 3:So I said that's where I want to go. And it was literally one week later. I was at the beach in Noosa wincing myself off under the showers with my eyes closed. I heard someone call out my name and I opened my eyes and it was friends of ours who I knew had been traveling the world for a year with their family. Like, she has two young girls that are similar age to my boy and I didn't realize she was back. I said, oh my gosh, congratulations on being back. I want to hear all about your trip.
Speaker 3:And and I knew that one of the first places they came to was Italy and I said, oh my gosh, like I want to hear about Italy, especially because I said to my little boy, um, last week that I really want to go to Italy. And she said, oh, but have you heard of Boundless Life? You've obviously heard about Boundless Life. And I said, no, I haven't heard of that. And she said, well, it's this program. And she went on to explain it to me and I said, oh, that sounds amazing because they're in a number of different destinations. And I said where are they in Italy? And she said they're in Tuscany.
Speaker 3:And I just like I got shivers down my body. I said, oh my goodness, you need to tell me all the details. I need to find out all about this, because I was literally saying to my boy that we might do this when you're in high school, when you're a little bit older. But she gave me the details. I jumped on a discovery call soon after and I said oh my gosh, if you have a space this year, book us in, take my money, like I need to do this. And so it was just. You know, when the universe puts signs in front of you, you just walk towards them, and that is what we did. So that was a very quick turnaround from knowing about it to being here, and we are currently I think this is our fifth week in Tuscany now, and we're here for the three month cohort, and it's just been absolutely fabulous.
Speaker 1:So good, I have so many questions and I'm sure our listeners do too. But again, like the alignment of that and we were saying before the interview, like the full circle of Denise, to be on the podcast sharing about world schooling within just a few years of listening to is just a mind blowing for me, cause I forget that again that this goes out to anyone but my little old self. So it's so, so cool. All right, so let's backtrack. Boundless life. What is it?
Speaker 3:So I. Last week we got to meet the founder of boundless life and, uh, I really enjoyed hearing because I didn't know the story about how it all came to be. Boundless Life has been in existence for only three years and we're in six locations around the world, mostly in Europe, but with more to expand. And the founder of Boundless Life his name is Mauro Rapici, I think. Hopefully I'm not getting his name wrong. He's originally from Brazil but has been living in Canada with his family for over a decade I think 14, 17 years, something like that he had been like. I think. He started two different tech companies. So that was his background software, tech, engineering. They had a beautiful life in Canada. He, you know, had a beautiful home, three young girls.
Speaker 3:But he said to his wife you know, I really just want to take off for a year. I just want to pack up and go travelling for a year and see the world with the girls. And she said, well, okay, well, let's do this. And so he spoke to some of their friends. There was one family. They're like that's a great idea, can we join you? And he said, well, yes, okay.
Speaker 3:So they started this WhatsApp group and then, very quickly, there was 40 families in this WhatsApp group wanting to do the same thing, wow. And he said wow, like am I meant to be organizing all of your holidays now, like what is happening here? But he was very intrigued. He's like why are there so many families wanting to do this? Like what? What's the instigator, what's the motivation behind this? And he wanted to know. So he started speaking to the families and interviewing them and he realized that, you know, they all had the same desire. They all wanted to spend time with their families and experience life before their children get old and don't want to spend time with them anymore. And I think your listeners probably are very aware of this statistic. Like 75% of the time we're going to spend with our children, it's over by the time they're 18.
Speaker 3:By then, like, they want to go and spread their wings and see the world and you know, if you're lucky, they might want to hang out with you, you know, a couple of times a year. Well, hopefully more than that. But so I think, because of COVID, I think families around the world are very I don't know, very tapped into that. The time is short, but life is precious and let's make the most of it. So that was. That was where the idea of Boundless Life came from. So their very first destination that they opened was in Sintra in Portugal, and it was rudimentary, like they found a location.
Speaker 3:So what the premise behind Boundless Life is is they set the families up that come with accommodation like nice accommodation. You have a co-working hub for the parents so they can have a space that they can work when the children are at school. Obviously, the education like the education is a big thing for the families is that families want to travel and immerse themselves into a culture. You know not just you know North Americans. They have two weeks holiday a year Like that's wild In Australia, I think four weeks holiday a year isn't even long enough. But they want to be able to go away and still carry on with living, working remotely, because obviously a lot of people are doing that now, or not working at all, taking a larger leave of absence, immersing into a culture, but they're not missing out their children, not missing out on quality education, and so not everyone is suited to homeschooling their children on their own I'm not and so this was like a really great, I guess, a way for families to do that Such a win-win Such a win-win, such a win-win.
Speaker 3:And so Sintra opened and ever since then I think there has been 15 cohorts. Ever since Mauro and his family, they do this full time. They've been to all of the cohorts in the different destinations, bar two, and yeah, it's's just. I just think he's kept it small, like there was four original founders. Two of them have left, um, there's still him and one other and I think another one has joined, and they had a lot of interest from big players wanting to, you know, invest into the company. But he's actually said no to some pretty big bucks because they wanted to control, you know, more than he was happy with. So they wanted to open, you know, I don't know a huge number, very quickly, of Boundless Life cohorts around the world. And he said no because if you his concern was doing that, you would compromise things and you would compromise the community, feel, you would compromise the education, and so he said no to that. And so he's expanding, but slowly, in order to make sure the quality remains the same in all of the destinations.
Speaker 3:And currently we are, we boundless life are in. They're in portugal, central portugal, steeros, in greece, obviously, tuscany, uh, they've opened up bali in indonesia, koto in up Bali in Indonesia, kotor in Montenegro are doing the first cohort right now and and I don't know if I'm pronouncing this right Andalusia in Spain, which is, again, they're just doing the first cohort now. And the destinations that they choose they really so far have wanted a space that feels safe, that is kind of a little bit off the beaten track, but also not off the beaten track, but off the tourist trail. Where we are right now. It is very close to Florence, like you jump on a train and you're in Florence in half an hour or 40 minutes and, yeah, the other destinations similar, so you actually feel like you're part of the community here.
Speaker 3:You know the locals welcome us and you know we use Google Translate a lot, but they also do speak English very well here too, and so what Mauro does is, twice a year they will interview the parents that have been through the cohorts and see what they can do to improve, and one of the things that the parents have been asking for are, this year, locations next, but within a space or a neighbourhood where all of the families are close by, so within 15 minutes, close, you know, in walking distance. That's what we have right here and that's what the other destinations are like, so I can walk to any other family's home like within minutes to maximum, I think, maximum eight minutes and the co-working hub is very close and the education center is very close. So for the first time ever, my son is walking himself to school, which I would actually just not allow in, even though we live in a very safe space in place in Australia.
Speaker 1:Um, that's so good, though, even environmentally, to know that your commute anywhere, for all the things you need is eight minutes.
Speaker 3:Yes, yeah.
Speaker 1:Oh good.
Speaker 3:Did that answer your question? I feel like I went on a tangent.
Speaker 1:No, that answered quite a few, but I have so many more. Okay, so let's talk about cause. I know one of the first questions are going to be logistics and practicality, so can you talk to us about how other families are doing it? You've kind of talked about how it's set up, but what does a day look like for you and for your son?
Speaker 3:Yes, sure. So firstly, logistically, that was one of the biggest draw cards for me is that they make it so easy. As a single parent, all of the decisions come to me like rest on my shoulders, and it can be a lot when you're traveling. There are so many things to factor in, so many things to decide, and I've got no one to bounce off ideas, it's just me. And so when I looked at Boundless Life and I spoke to the people from here, I realized that it was going to be seamless and it absolutely was. All I had to do was pack my suitcases, book my flight, I got picked up at the airport, I got welcomed into, someone was waiting for me at our home showing us through, and they had a little bit of food and care package waiting for us. And the next day we got here a little bit late. The next day, school started and it was absolute. Like the transition was seamless. My son he was a little bit nervous to start came out of there on his first day so excited he ran to school the next day. And they like logistically, I found it so simple, I didn't have to find my accommodation. Like, logistically, I found it so simple, I didn't have to find my accommodation, I don't have to pay bills, I don't even have to pack school lunches or clean my home. For three months that's never happened. Oh my God, sign me up, it gets done for me.
Speaker 3:So, like an average day looks like Monday to Friday. The kids go to school, so they start at. Drop-off is at a quarter to nine in the morning, pick-up is about a quarter past three. There's a couple of days when my son does extracurricular activities, so I pick him up at 4.30. And he walks himself to school. I get up, I work on my business until usually around midday, so for about three hours I'll be connecting with my team, with my customers, creating content. Uh, then I like sometimes the the mums here.
Speaker 3:We go out for a lunch on a Thursday and we, you know, have some wine. That that goes into. That's a long lunch. It goes into a school pickup, uh. And then sometimes, yeah, I might go for a walk, I might go and explore, I might jump on a train and go into Florence.
Speaker 3:It's usually on the weekends that we will go out into the Tuscan countryside. So the last two weekends I've hired a car and we've gone and seen some incredible things, like the southern part of Tuscany, has these cascading thermal pools, that just this warm water just gushes out of the ground and it just flows over these incredible cascades. Incredible stuff like that was a bucket list stuff for me, so there's been a bit of getting out of my comfort zone. Well, that was the biggest thing. That was the thing that I feared the most was driving on the other side of the thing that I feared the most was driving on the other side of the road, driving manual on the other side of the road, and I haven't driven manual for over 20 years, so that was a bit scary, but most of the weekend. So every second weekend the kids finish, sorry, every second Friday the kids finish school early, so at noon, which gives the families a long weekend.
Speaker 3:Some people just hang in town because there's actually there was festival after festival in this tiny little town since we arrived. On the weekends there's always something going on. The Italians love to celebrate all sorts of things. But then, yeah, other times we, you know, we had a weekend in Cinque Terre and did a hike over the beautiful you know mountains over there. It was absolutely gorgeous. So the day to the day, Monday to Friday, is fairly similar, I guess, to what we would do in Australia. The community here is amazing as well. So we do, like the families get together, we do dinners. Like the families get together, we do dinners. You know the where I am sitting right now, just outside of the co-working hub, is our small piazza and there's a couple of restaurants there that open early especially for us, like the boundless families, because we, you know, we like to eat dinner early because we've all got young kids, so we'll sometimes catch up there, have drinks, have pizza uh, yeah, it's, it's a beautiful, beautiful life how flexible.
Speaker 1:So if you wanted to take an extra day or two off, is that a concern? Is it almost expected? Like, how does that work? If you're like you know what, I've got a sudden urge to go somewhere for an extra long weekend. Is that a problem?
Speaker 3:I haven't had the conversation yet, but I know some families have done it. Look, it might be one of those things that they prefer you not to, but they understand if you do. And I haven't felt the need to do it yet, because most of what we want to see is quite accessible for a weekend. If we wanted to do something like go to Rome or further south, to Naples or that, then you'd need a longer weekend and I think some families are planning that. So, and it also depends, some of the families have younger kids and they're not quite school age yet, so they have their. They've got their different groups for the kids, so the one to five-year-olds are in the explorers group and I think they're fairly lenient.
Speaker 1:I was just thinking like the way you'd plan it anyway, like if you wanted to explore longer, you'd just tack it on at the end, wouldn't you? It's yeah, and, like you said, the urgency's then taken away. If you've got time in the afternoon yourself to explore and to research and think about what you want to do on the weekend, you're not tied to cleaning your home, doing the gardening, getting ready for the next school fate.
Speaker 3:You've got that time back. It really, yes. It feels so freeing, it's wonderful.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what made you take the leap, other than, you know, the universe slapping you in the face with all the signs that you had to go? There would still be a lot of people right that would have either looked at the price or just said, no, it's too scary, it's too much, it's too something. You know. Whatever objection you want to put in there, what made you do it and what would you say to those people that you know would have all of those objections?
Speaker 3:If you can possibly find a way to do it, I would jump on the opportunity. The thing that I guess for me. I don't want to compromise my time with my son anymore, and before I had kids well, kids a child I loved to travel and it's not something that I wanted to give up. And obviously, when COVID happened, my son was, I think, four or five and travel did come to a halt. And then, once I had that time, that extra time with him that I hadn't had before, I was like I don't want to give this up. And, and we did during the COVID times we still did so much camping Like we he and I were out in Queensland as much as we could be, um, and it honestly lights.
Speaker 3:It lights us up, it's what it just it's something that I have to do. It's not a I cannot just be a homebody Like. I have to go out and I enjoy pushing myself into you know, places of discomfort, because I know from experience that that is where the fun, juicy life stuff happens. And so I tell this story often to people that I know that when my son went to school which was so he was five for the first time, our connection fragmented and he, yeah, he, just, he wouldn't want to hug me anymore, he wouldn't kiss me anymore, he wouldn't hold my hand anymore, he would pull away, like just any time that I tried to get close to him, and even though we still slept in the same bed, and in fact we still do. But that really broke my heart and I thought surely this is too soon, surely this happens when they turn 13. Like, what is going on? And I thought that I'd lost my son in that way, like, and then it wasn't going to come back. But when I lost my job and we were spending more time together, like, it literally came back. He would hold my hand every time we were in the car, he would be the one to reach out to grab my hand and he doesn't mind so much being kissed and cuddled anymore. He will walk across the room to give me a cuddle and it. That was a real wake-up call as well.
Speaker 3:It's like the, the, the fragmented relationship happens because we I was that stressed out mum that was rushing him out of the door at a quarter to seven in the morning, that was not getting home till a quarter past six every night, five days a week, rushing him through dinner, through bar, through book to bed and rinse and repeat for a whole year well, even prior to that, because he was in long daycare and I'm like that is not. That is not. The reason we bring children into the world is to be this stressed out, rushing, you know, out the door person who doesn't have quality time to spend with their child. So I didn't want to. I didn't want to ever go back to that, which is why I worked really hard on my online business to build it to a place where I could, on a whim, decide to pack up our life and move across the world for three months, and so it's.
Speaker 3:I know that it can be. It seemed like an expense for some people, but the payoff is so worth it and what it shows my son is that you can put your mind to something and achieve it if you believe in it. You can do the hard, scary things and also it's just building so much resilience in him, like the people that he is meeting and the friendships that he has formed. There's families from seven different nationalities at this school and you know his best friends. Some of them, they barely even speak English. There's three families here that are from Israel that have escaped a war zone and he is so close to them, yet they barely speak English and they have playdates, yet they can communicate in their own way.
Speaker 3:And so he and I have had the most incredible conversations since we've arrived here and also just being out and exploring the history of Italy and you know the Romans and the architecture, and we've had like. Over the weekend we came across this Banksy exhibition in the middle of this medieval town, on a hilltop not too far from here, and we walked through there and we're looking at Banksy's artworks in this medieval town, talking about, you know, modern history and like you know Banksy's statements about with his it's just, it's been one thing after another. But what I've noticed is that his interest in the things that I'm talking to him about is like on high, rather than him sitting down at a desk and reading something out of a book and then having to write, learn dates and then, like, get tested on. You know what he was able to memorize about history. He's actually having this experiential experience.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And like feeling it and he's engaging, like he's engaging so much in the things that we're discussing and things that we're seeing and he's asking so many questions and it's just been incredible. So, for anyone that has these feelings that, oh, I couldn't do that, how's it going to work? In terms of my own work, I'm telling you you can make it happen, because I am seeing some of the families here are being very, very creative. Yeah, talk to us about that. Well, some families are permanently world schooling. They don't have a fixed location at all.
Speaker 3:Wow, permanently world schooling, like they don't have a fixed location at all, wow, uh, some have taken a sabbatical, like an extended leave of absence, because they heard about boundless life three years ago when it opened and they have been working for three years in order to make this happen for their family. Uh, some families have taken a year off and they're going to, you know, kind of maybe hop over through the different cohorts, uh, and you know there's one family where her, her work, does not even know she's left the state. Yes, so, so she, she, you know, sets herself up in the cohort between 5 pm and 2 am monday, monday to friday and she works and connects with her team from here and they have no idea she's in like on another continent that's gold.
Speaker 1:I am here for that, I. I'm here for shaking up the status quo. You know like we think what we're doing is normal and so we assume that it's healthy. But gosh, then our health statistics and our divorce statistics and our mental health statistics tell an actual the truth of the story. And so to to shake that up and, like you said, show your children that you don't have to live like that If it doesn't make you happy. If it makes you happy, go nuts, go prosper, go enjoy yourself. But if you want something different, you just have to set your mind to it. Like that's what I just love so much about your story. Tell me how you're finding it solo, parenting, overseas, with Boundless Life, anything you would want to see changed, or are you finding it fairly seamless?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I love it. And guess what? I'm not the only single mum here. There's two others. There's two other single mums.
Speaker 1:I think I've said so good about 500 times. I'll try and switch it up, but this is so good.
Speaker 3:I think that as a single parent, it's so easy because I've got the community support when I need it. We are actually living in a block that has a central courtyard and there's six other families within us and it's like a security door to get in. So it and it feels so safe. So if there was a time where I couldn't go and this is what happens within our community but there was a family that went bike riding off like 96 kilometres away for the day and they realised they weren't going to get back in time for school pickup, so they called on a friend and you know we are all here supporting each other and you know it just feels. It feels really safe as a single parent and, like I said before, it is so nice not to worry about, you know, doing the cleaning, packing the school lunches, because that gets provided for them.
Speaker 3:I get a cleaner one and a half days a week. So Tuesdays they do a full clean, fridays they do, you know, the floors and just wipe the benchtops and clean the bathroom. It's like this is absolute luxury for me. This is living, barry. Yeah, this is living.
Speaker 1:It's such an accumulation of solved problems, not problems, well solved problems, and desires as well.
Speaker 1:You know these things that we imagine in our heads. But then the logistics like I said, the logistics of organizing all that and actually stumbling across a similar community is pretty slim. Like you might randomly bump into a world schooling community, but you're not going to find an entire community for your child to hang out with. One more question Talk to me about do you know much about what their education? What does school look like for your son in a day?
Speaker 3:Yes, this is a great question because, again, it's another drawcard for families. So the education system is based off the Finnish school system. So if you don't know much about that, it's like the best, one of the best or the best in the world. It's a school system that they don't do standardized testing, they don't do comparisons. You know, child to child. The children have no homework to very, very little homework, small class sizes, very individualized learning as well. And I actually researched this. I was like, is this for real? And I came across so many papers saying that, yes, like the teachers care so much about the children and if something isn't working with one child, they're going to problem solve with that child. They're going to ask their co-workers, they're going to, they're going to figure it out, because they want the best for every single, every single child.
Speaker 3:Um, so for the little, well, actually, for the explorers and the pathfinders. So the explorers, the one to fives, and then the pathfinders, the six to twelve, um, they use Montessori materials. So my son is used to the Montessori materials. It's very, it's hands-on, practical learning. Um, and for the younger ones, it's definitely play-based learning and, you know, going at their pace, giving them the opportunity to kind of explore their world and gain their own confidence and that kind of thing. I can't really speak too much about it because I don't know exactly what the younger kids are doing, because my boy is one of the older ones. But firstly, all of the teachers. They curate and handpick the best of the cream of the crop around the world. So they are high quality, they're internationally certified educators and in terms of the school system. So what they're learning they have the kids work on through the whole cohort and at the end we have a learning celebration and the kids get to showcase the project they've been working on.
Speaker 3:Um, so yeah, it's project-based learning but actually involves all of the subjects like science, maths, english. Um, I'm forgetting something, I'm forgetting a few other things actually. But but what? When? I, when I looked into what a quest was, I don't know what came first, the actual idea of it or the acronym, but um, they, they say I quest.
Speaker 3:So I is like being inspired or having, like imagining something and then investigating something. So have an idea and then they question it and they explore it, and it's usually global issues. So one of the things that each cohort does is each cohort they work on one of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. So this cohort we're working on number 14, which is life below water. So they're doing a lot of like project work and investigation on that, on life underwater conservation, animals, like all sorts of things.
Speaker 3:And then with Questly they work to understand and analyse the evidence and then they evaluate, like evaluate different perspectives, so they don't just like go to one perspective, they want to kind of look at it from different angles and then they synthesise all of the knowledge and you know from the different viewpoints and then build their own personal idea. So the kids are very much encouraged to formulate their own, you know, ideas based on all of the information they've been gathering, and then use that to transform their learning into meaningful action and impact. So that's kind of, I guess, the basis behind what they try to do each cohort. And it's really incredible. I'm really excited to see what happens at the end, because I know all my son has told me.
Speaker 3:He's a nine-year-old boy, so I don't get a whole lot of information but, he's told me some of the different projects that they're working on and he comes home and he talks to me so much more about what's been going on in school than he did back in Australia, like he just seems very, very engaged, um, so yeah, I guess that's kind of the basis of what they do, uh, and depend, and it's the same every cohort. So here in Tuscany they're working on the same stuff as they are in Portugal or Greece and Montenegro right now, and so when some of the families actually I think more than 50% of the families end up being repeat boundless life families, so they go on to another one and then another one, or maybe they come back only once a year and do three months, but if they are to progress from one to the next, the education carries on Like it's not being.
Speaker 1:you know they're not going to repeat the same project again. Yeah, yeah. That was one of my questions, like what if you want to go for a year? You know three months here and three months here you're going to be doing the same stuff, and I assumed that you wouldn't, but it's reassuring to know that it is changing. Oh, that sounds amazing. Is there anything else you'd like to add about Boundless Life that I haven't covered?
Speaker 3:They are coming soon. They're going to be opening up Trailblazers, which is for the ages of 13 to 14. And what they're going to do with that is because at that age group they believe that children need um like, more of a continuous um like, rather than just doing three months, they, the trailblazers, they're actually going to go for nine months and they're going to immerse into like, a language. So they, I think they're going to be doing like the Spanish um trailblazing cohort, because they are about to open to South American destinations in Uruguay, uruguay and somewhere else. Oh, my gosh, I can't believe, I don't remember, but the the group is going to go from Uruguay to the other destination, to Spain, something like that.
Speaker 1:That that's coming Over the three, over the nine months. Yes, wow. So you're not just in one place for even nine months, it's three months in each. That's really awesome.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and also the support staff I should really touch on. The support staff here are fabulous, so they have an app that we can all communicate, you know, with the support staff, with each other. They organise activities for the parents and for the families. So we've done wine tasting and grape harvesting, we've got olive harvesting coming up, truffle hunting coming up, so they do try to, you know, keep us engaged together as a community as well, which is really beautiful.
Speaker 1:I'd be so interested to talk to you again after your three months and I'm sure you'll be back again too because I feel like those networks that you're creating too are going to actually be life-changing, you know, for yourself and for your son. But you know you're growing, not not just Sunshine Coast Australian networks. You've now got these global, like-minded networks in remote business. That can only be an amazing thing for your business. It can only be an amazing thing for your son if he chooses to be a traveler or wants to work overseas. Like there just seems like so many pluses to this.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yes, I haven't found any fault yet, that's for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, if this podcast just dies next year you know where I am or not Maybe I'll be doing it, but in Uruguay, who knows?
Speaker 3:Yes, exactly, I would love that.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's so many cool again, like just the accumulation, that they've really thought about all the barriers and the problems, and those problems that keep you up at night, stopping you from making that leap. And they've just solved them for you, haven't they? Yeah they have, oh amazing. All right, we've got a little bit of time left for rapid-fire questions. Are you ready?
Speaker 3:I'm ready.
Speaker 1:All right, Denise, what is your favourite book of all time and why? Or if that's too hard, what are you currently reading?
Speaker 3:Yes, I got anxiety knowing that you were going to ask me this question.
Speaker 1:I need to switch them up, but that might cause more anxiety.
Speaker 3:I'm currently not reading anything. I used to be a voracious reader, but I was just actually mentioning and this is a great book, it's not, it's not a um anyway. Actually mentioning and this is a great book, it's not, it's not a um anyway. Look, this is a great book that I mentioned, uh, this week to people in my community on Instagram was Dark Emu by Bruce Pascoe, and, and the reason that I brought this up is because Australia has a huge, huge history of, I would say, civilisation that isn't commemorated by you know monuments and unearthed you know buildings from the first century History textbooks yes, yes, that's right, and Australia's history, unfortunately, has been very whitewashed.
Speaker 3:And what I love about this book by Bruce Pascoe he opened my eyes to just the genius behind the First Nations people and the kind of world that they lived before white settlers, which we did not get taught at school and um. For anyone that doesn't know this book, I really recommend reading it, especially if you have children and you want to give them, you know a a deeper understanding about, like, how they cultivated the land and they saved seeds and they you know even just the, the structures and buildings that they lived in. They were much more civilised than you realise.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the whole you know, quote unquote just hunters and gatherers is a total myth. Hey, and the way that they lived in symbiosis with nature and yet was essentially agriculturalist, yeah, it blew my mind that I had. How sad that we weren't taught that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah and it was, yeah and it was. They tried to destroy it, like the early settlers tried to destroy all of that evidence. So, but anyway, yep, that's a great book.
Speaker 1:Great recommendation. All right when all right.
Speaker 3:Here's a, here's a more nuanced not nuanced more personalized question for you when do you go? What do you do to reset after a tough day? Can I say in Italy, oh, I pour myself a nice glass of wine and just like catch up with some friends here.
Speaker 1:But when I don't have any bad days here, If that doesn't sell the program to you, then I don't know what will.
Speaker 3:But definitely in Australia. My reset is going camping with my boy, uh, and often places where there's no phone reception. I'll take a weekend off, uh. We go to Rainbow Beach, we go to the beach, we go hiking um, it is just my favorite thing to do back in Australia yeah, so good.
Speaker 1:We just came back from a weekend in tin can bay with our one of our homeschooling co-ops and it was just, oh, perfect weather. It was delightful, all right. If you had to choose just one thing to change about the education system, what would it be?
Speaker 3:as in the state school standardized. Yes, let's go with that, yeah, but there's so many things I know, know what am I, it's a layered onion of a question, isn't it?
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, I would say eliminating the standardised testing. I for me, like I was, because I was a good student, because I was a good rote learner and my value came from my grades, and I don't want that for children because it also can devalue. They feel devalued. My son is an average student. He would not ever be top of anything and sometimes he's actually quite below average when he does the standardised testing. Yet I see this really brilliant, engaged learner right now and I just don't think that that does any good for, like, I understand why they do it in the standard school systems, but that's I don't know. I just think that that's a bit of a failure for children.
Speaker 1:So interesting I'm digressing here but that's, I don't know. I just think that that's a bit of a failure for children. So interesting, I'm digressing here. On a personal level, we had as close to a regular maths class as we would ever have this week and my children were just like flummoxed by it. So many like why? Questions like why did he teach it like that? Or why does it have to be like that, why can't we?
Speaker 1:And as a next teacher, I was like, oh, just, I just had most. I was like that's a valid question, that's. I've got no answer other than group management, like. So many of them came back to you like, well, group management. And like, but we're only a group of six. I'm like yeah, but that teacher hasn't de-schooled yet, so they're still teaching to you like they would to a group of 25 unruly, disinterested, disengaged students. So, anyway, that was yeah, and part of it was the comparison. They're like ah, I was really enjoying maths, but now I'm behind, I feel like I'm dumb from one lesson one lesson with friends no teasing, no bullying, no grading, no assessment.
Speaker 3:They'd already made that comparison I was like, oh yes, you know, I remember listening. It was an episode of your podcast where there was a lady on that was talking about this child who couldn't read until he was like eight years old and she said you know, he went on. When he turned eight he'd learned to read. He became this voracious reader but his passion was ballet and so he became this incredible ballerina and he had a career in it until he turned 27, 28. He gave that up, decided to go to medical school. She said if he was in a standard school system and he was eight years old and couldn't read, he would have been labelled. He would have been, would have been labeled as slow, learning difficulties needing special care and attention. He he's. His story about himself would have not allowed him to be a 28 year old man going into medical school because he would have taken that story about being slow and dumb or whatever, and through his life and.
Speaker 1:I that that story really stuck with me and it's stuck with me too, because my youngest has only just solidified his reading at nine nine and a half, I would say and as an English teacher this has been like my biggest. It's okay, it's gonna like having to talk myself through. It's gonna be okay, it doesn't have learning difficulties, I know it's just time and interest and it's okay. It's gonna like having to talk myself through. It's gonna be okay. He doesn't have learning difficulties, I know it's just time and interest. And it's finally clicked this year.
Speaker 1:And and from from that one math lesson I was like can you imagine if I had to put him in school like the hatred of reading that he would have now compared to him reading novels, like novel after novel after novel this year. So so yeah, and I know that's not every school student's story either, so I do need to pad that a little. But for those that are on the you know the Ds and Es and Fs side of the spectrum, that is the common story that by high school, as an English teacher, day one year, eight English hands up. If you love English hands up, if you hate it, I can split the class. I'm like they're my A-level students, they're my D, e's, f's. Wow, I guarantee it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, so sad, all right, and where can we find out A more about Boundless Life and give yourself a plug about your business too?
Speaker 3:Okay, so Boundless Life go to their website. Just type that into google, it'll pop straight up. You will find it, and they are on instagram as well. So on instagram you'll see a lot of other families um tagging boundless life, so you'll be able to see what they're doing in the other cohorts as well. Um, it's really great to follow along on their stories and my business um. Go to nisi at so n for nelly double e c y um you'll so N for Nelly double E-C-Y. You'll find me on Instagram. I sell high quality, low-tox hair care, skin care, skin care, makeup. I help other women earn an income from home, just like me, changing their lives as well, growing, you know, working towards their goals and their dreams. So that's kind of what I do. And, yeah, have a look and check it out. Get in touch if you've got any more questions about Boundless Life, like directly with me or with Boundless Life themselves. They're quick to respond.
Speaker 1:Amazing. Thank you so much Again. Like Denise gets no plugs from this, she's just a passionate advocate. So thank you for your time and your generosity of sharing with this. I can't wait. I guarantee next year there'll be someone on someone else going. I heard Denise's podcast. I'm now over in Uruguay and we're in our eighth month and just loving it, and that's what I love about this podcast is that knowledge is power and power it changes. It can change the course in the direction of your life. I could just think I'm still sitting in my little old sunroom in the middle of Sunshine Coast, queensland, and because you heard this podcast, you're now in Italy and you, being on this podcast now, you'll inspire someone else to take their family out and go and explore an adventure as well.
Speaker 3:Thank you, thank you for sharing my pleasure, and that is exactly why I wanted to jump on, because I think I want to see as many families and as many women mothers as possible. Like literally, just grab life by the ball, yes, and just like be with your children as much as you can, explore, have fun, create memories. That's honestly. Money comes and goes, but this kind of life like yeah, yeah, you're not going to regret doing it. Say all the time like we've got you know mine. Honestly, money comes and goes, but this kind of life like yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:You're not going to regret doing it. My husband and I say all the time we're like we've got. You know, mine are 10 and 12. Now can you believe it? And I'm like we've got maybe 10 years left, maybe if we're lucky to go and do all this cool stuff with them, and then if things go really well, we've got another 40 to do whatever we want on our own, wherever. But if we want to do stuff with them, we've got 10 years. So, like we always every year do a trips, you know, every month, like what are we booking in a camping trip, a weekend away? What's our big trip once a year? Um, and that's what keeps us on course, because if we don't do that, life just gets in the way. But maybe we need a three-month one next few years, or a nine-month one. Let the next few years, or a nine-month one, let's do it. Watch this space, yeah, thank you so much. It was so good to chat, please.
Speaker 1:I'm definitely going to follow you. Please post a lot. Let us keep up to date with where you're at and what you're up to, and, best of luck, everyone else stay wild Bye. What a way to shake up your life, break out of the status quo and see the world without compromising on your child's education. I love that Denise has really thought about what she wants her life with her son to look like in these really short years that we have together, and has just made it happen. It's absolutely incredibly inspiring.
Speaker 1:Chatting with Denise for me was a really great reminder about how, when we share our stories, we show people what other choices are out there and give people permission to do the same. I mean, life is really, really short, and our time with our children is even shorter. You really only do get one shot at it. If you want to go and do something different and it doesn't have to be boundless life it can be changing careers or moving to another town, just taking your career online or I don't know take up roller derby, dyeing your hair bright green, taking half a day off a week, downsizing your house, so you can do that. We just need to stop trying to keep up with the Joneses. We're probably in debt and miserable anyway. So this week, this is your permission to just do what it is that you want with your life, and particularly in this phase, with your children. That is so short.
Speaker 1:I can't wait to hear so many stories about people hearing this episode. So many stories about people Hearing this episode. The cycle now from Denise having started listening to this podcast to coming back on the podcast to talk about Boundless Life. I can't wait to see who we chat to next, who was inspired by Boundless Life to do something else even more amazing. Please let me know if that's you and want to come on the podcast. Until next week, stay wild.