At Your Dream School, we work almost exclusively with internationally mobile families - households who have moved, or are about to move, across the UK, continental Europe, the US, and beyond. The same questions come up in nearly every first conversation. This article sets out how we'd suggest a relocating family start thinking about it.

Start with the exam system your child is actually in, not the passport they hold

The single biggest mistake we see is families assuming their child should apply "the way we would have at home." A French family posted to London assumes UCAS works like Parcoursup. A British family moving to Paris assumes their child will sit A-Levels somewhere and apply through UCAS as normal. An American family relocating to Italy assumes the SAT and the Common App still apply everywhere.In practice, what matters most is which curriculum and exams a child ends up sitting locally - A-Levels, the IB, a national baccalaureate, or a US-style high school diploma - because that curriculum determines which university systems are realistically open, and on what basis. A student finishing the IB in Geneva can apply to UK, US and most European universities without conversion headaches. A student finishing a national baccalaureate that a target country's admissions office doesn't recognise may need additional qualifications (or a foundation year) to be competitive.Practical takeaway: the moment relocation is confirmed, get the destination school's exam pathway confirmed too - before subject choices are locked in. Subject and curriculum choices made at 14-15 quietly narrow or widen university options at 17-18; families rarely realise this until it's too late to change course.

The UK, the US and continental Europe are not interchangeable "options" - they are different games

Families often treat "UK vs US vs Europe" as a single choice made at application time. It isn't. The three systems ask for different things years in advance, and a family that only starts comparing them in the final year of school has usually already missed some of what each one wanted.UK (UCAS): a single personal statement, subject-specific predicted grades, and - for competitive courses or Oxbridge - admissions tests and interviews. Students apply to a specific course, and depth in that subject (reading, competitions, relevant work experience) matters more than breadth.US (Common App and equivalents): a broader, more holistic file - essays, extracurriculars, recommendation letters, and (increasingly, depending on the university) standardised testing. Students apply to an institution, often undecided on a major, and a multi-year narrative of interests and activities carries real weight.Continental Europe (Bocconi, IE University, ESADE, and similar): often a hybrid - its own entrance tests or motivation-based assessments, sometimes alongside curriculum grades, with timelines and requirements that vary significantly by country and institution.A relocating family choosing between these systems isn't picking a "better" one; they're picking which kind of student profile they can realistically build in the time they have left before applications open - and that's a decision best made two to three years out, not the autumn before deadlines.

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Timing is the real cost of relocation - not geography

Geography turns out to be the easy part; families are used to researching countries. Timing is what catches people out, because each system's clock starts at a different point, and a mid-secondary-school move can land a student in the middle of more than one of them at once.UCAS applications for the following autumn's entry open in the spring before and close in January (earlier, in October, for Oxbridge and most medicine/dentistry/veterinary courses). Common App opens in August for the same admissions cycle. Many continental European programmes run rolling or earlier fixed deadlines with their own entrance exams timetabled months in advance. A family who relocates mid-secondary-school, without realising these calendars don't line up, can find a preferred deadline has already passed, or that a required test wasn't available in their new country in time.Practical takeaway: as soon as a move is confirmed, map the target systems' calendars against the child's current school year - not just once, but again after the move, since local schools' own internal deadlines for references and predicted grades often move faster than the public application deadlines suggest.

What we'd tell a relocating family, in order

1. Confirm the exam pathway first. Before anything else, establish what curriculum and exams the child will actually sit at the new school, and get that confirmed by the school directly - assumptions carried over from the old country are the most common source of late surprises.2. Decide which systems are realistically in play - early. Not every system is a good fit for every profile; narrowing to two, realistically, focuses preparation rather than spreading it thin.3. Build the calendar backwards from the earliest deadline, not the exam results date. The earliest binding deadline in the mix (often Oxbridge or a competitive European entrance test) should set the pace for everything else.4. Keep a paper trail across the move. References, predicted grades, activity records and any standardised test results can be harder to gather once a family has left a school system - start collecting them before departure, not after.5. Get country-specific advice, not generic advice. "Studying abroad" guidance aimed at a single home market rarely accounts for a family that's already left it; the right advisor should be comfortable moving between systems, not anchored in one.

The bottom line

Relocation gives families a genuine advantage most domestic applicants don't have: real exposure to more than one education system, often more than one language, and a broader frame of reference by the time applications come around. The families who make the most of that advantage are the ones who treat the university decision as part of the relocation planning - mapped out alongside the school move, not bolted on afterwards once deadlines are already close.

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Adam Girsault is co-founder of Your Dream School, a Paris and Tel Aviv-based university admissions consultancy that has advised internationally mobile families since 2018 on UK (UCAS, Oxbridge, LSE, UCL, King's), European (Bocconi, IE University, ESADE) and US university admissions.

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