How I have started the business

I've been in education abroad for so long that I couldn't imagine myself in anything else. I remember how it all has begun as if it were yesterday. Today I decided I should tell more about myself: how have I come into this business, why am I doing this, what are my plans for the future so you know more to whom you trust the decision of choosing en educational path for your child.

In the middle of the 1990th, I was doing my PhD course at the Institute of Economics and dreamed to see the world. Our Institute had good connections with research institutes in the United States and many students, who have known English, could apply for long internships. Despite the fact that I graduated from school with honor and learned English at school and University - my English level was to read and translate with a dictionary, well, like all of us after the Soviet school. At that moment, my desire to learn English and start traveling overcame the desire to finish my theses and begin researches. In the end, I have never finished the thesis, as in my third year of studying I realized that in my life I only wanted to do what was interesting for me. No, I haven't had wealthy parents who could support my interests, moreover, at that time I was divorced with a daughter in primary school whom I had to support and educate. But, when I have started to do what made me happy, everything began to fall in place. Since then, I live by this credo and trying to advise parents not to make the decision on behalf of their child what to do for life.

In the middle of the 90th, I realized that I wanted to learn English to speak fluently. With a scholarship as a graduate student, I only had enough funds for the rent, so I worked as an accountant in an advertising company. The founders of the company saw what I was capable of something more than accounting and proposed to develop any new direction within the company that could bring them some extra income. The idea came instantly, to start my own language school (there was enough space for classes and my English teachers from the graduate school were very experienced). That was how I started my journey into business.

That first business experience did not increase my income but I could study English as much as my time allowed me. Somewhere through half of the year, one of the students in my group started the discussion on the topic as being in the language environment helps people overcome the fear of communicating in a foreign language. The discussion captivated everyone and all of a sudden, she suggested that I should organize a trip to England so the group could go and practice the language. The teacher supported this idea and offered to arrange a meeting at the British Council, which had information about language schools in the UK. A couple of days later I have been comparing hundreds of schools in different cities, based on information that I could learn only from the catalog.

In the middle of the 90th, there was no Internet in offices in Ukraine. I wrote a letter to English schools, faxed it to the selected schools and waited for the answers. It took me several months to choose a school, book places in the program, get visas and arrange payment abroad.

We chose a small family school in Bournemouth, on the South coast of England.

Every day we spent on that trip was memorable. I still remember it as one of the most vivid in my life. The extraordinary difficulties of organizing this trip added an unexpected experience of novelty staying in England, the delight of the success in English, memorable time in the company of new friends from different countries.

The complex organization of the trip resulted in a serious passion for travel for the whole life. After returning from England, I knew for sure that I could organize my own business and the question was not about choosing a niche. In early 1996, I registered study abroad agency Aspect, which for a while offered English courses in Kiev. Since 1998, after attending my first international conference on education abroad ICEF in Berlin, I have gathered such a large a portfolio of educational institutions and programs that allowed to concentrate business in one direction and to become one of the first educational agency in studying abroad in Ukraine.

Since then I have visited about 60 countries and studied many languages in my travels, as learning languages have allowed me to know the country faster and deeper. I also had the opportunity to be in those countries longer than usual tourists did. People were changing around me, some had worked next to me for ten or even twenty years, others left and with an experience gained in Aspect created new agencies, increasing competition on the market.

In 2014, I have concentrated on secondary education, as this niche required a lot of experience and knowledge. Since then, I am travelling the world to see schools, to meet staff and students and leave all the feedback about secondary schools in this blog.

Gradually, I became even more international, I have started to live in between 3 countries: UK, Spain and Ukraine. That is why I started to translate my blog to more languages to have better contact with families from Europe.

I fluently speak 4 languages: Russian, English, Spanish and Ukrainian and will be happy to share my experience with any family who is looking for professional assistance in choosing the right school for their children and enrolling into the right school.