Almost everything written about a junior English camp is written for the student. This one is for you. Your child is the one going, but you are the one deciding, paying, and lying awake wondering whether they will be alright. So here is what actually happens on a normal day at our junior English camp in Baguio, what we look after, and what you should ask us directly.
We have tried to keep this honest. Where something is a fact we publish, it is below. Where it is something only our team can answer for your child specifically, we have said so rather than filling the space with reassuring words.
What a normal study day looks like
Junior Camp is our most structured junior program. The timetable is not a suggestion, it is the point. Here is how a study day is built.
If that sounds intense, it is meant to. If you would prefer a gentler start, Junior Lite has three one-on-one classes and no required vocabulary test, and Junior ESL sits between the two. You can see all of them side by side on our course comparison page.
Where your child sleeps, eats, and does laundry
Students live on campus, so your child is not traveling across a city twice a day. Rooms are assigned by the academy rather than chosen by students, and roommates are assigned the same way.
Rooms are cleaned twice a week by a room attendant, and bedding is changed once a month. There is a laundry service, arranged through the Academic Office. Meals are served on campus, with brunch on weekends and public holidays instead of separate breakfast and lunch.
You can walk through the actual buildings on our facilities pages, including the dormitory rooms and the dining hall. The photographs there are of our campus, not stock images.
How we know they are actually in class
This is usually the real question behind "is it a good school". Attendance is tracked per class. A student is marked absent once they are more than fifteen minutes late, and where there is no valid reason a penalty applies.
Classes cancelled for reasons within our control are made up, either with a substitute teacher or a make-up class, usually on a Saturday. Classes lost to a typhoon or another natural event are not made up, which is worth knowing before you plan travel dates around the rainy season.
The full rules are published on our class regulations and school regulations pages. We would rather you read them before booking than discover them afterwards.
The paperwork we handle for you
Every foreign student studying here needs a Special Study Permit. A&J is accredited by the Bureau of Immigration to enroll international students, so our admin team processes that permit after your child arrives. Their first days on campus include time set aside for the photographs and forms it requires.
What your child needs on entry depends on the passport they hold, and those rules change by circular rather than on a schedule. Our visa and study permit guide explains how it works, and we have country pages for students from South Korea, Japan, ไต้หวัน and China. Please confirm the current position with the Bureau of Immigration before booking flights.
Why Baguio, from a parent's point of view
Baguio sits in the mountains of northern Luzon and is noticeably cooler than the rest of the Philippines. For a child studying through the day, that matters more than it sounds. It is also a university city rather than a beach resort, which shapes what there is to do at the weekend.
If you are weighing cities rather than schools, we wrote an honest comparison of Baguio and Cebu, including the parts where Cebu wins.
What to ask us, and any other camp
Some things cannot honestly be answered on a web page, because the answer depends on your child, their age, and the dates they are coming. These are the questions we think you should put to us directly, and to any other school you are considering.
Questions worth asking before you book
Take this list to any junior camp, not only ours. A school that answers all of these clearly is a school that has thought about it.
- Who supervises the students outside class hours, and how many staff are on campus overnight?
- What happens if my child becomes ill, and where is the nearest hospital?
- How and how often can my child contact me, and can I reach a member of staff directly?
- Who meets my child at the airport, and how do they travel to campus?
- What are the rules on leaving campus, and do they differ for younger students?
- How will I know how my child is progressing while they are there?
You can put any of these to our team through the contact page. If it is easier, tell us your child's age and the dates you are considering and we will tell you honestly whether Junior Camp is the right fit or whether one of the lighter junior courses would suit them better.
See it before you decide
We photograph camp constantly, so you do not have to take our word for any of this. There are junior camp photographs in our photo gallery, filtered by arrival day, welcome party and first day, and the Junior Camp course page has the full timetable and more pictures.
If you would rather read what the days feel like from the students' side, our posts on what a camp day actually looks like, the field trip to San Juan and the basketball class were all written from campus.
