Name: Sampson
Grade: 12 (attended Grade 11 with VVS)
School: Western Canada High School
Future plans: Sampson plans on attending Concordia University in Montreal
for his post-secondary Education with a Bachelor of Fine Arts—majoring in
Studio Arts and a minor in Business Studies. He is seeking a career that allows
him to travel and participate in the many activities he enjoys. As an avid realistic
painter and photographer, he aims to intermix his entrepreneurial interests with
art and travel.

“We have been on two year-long trips,” says Sampson. “During the 2009-10 school year, our family biked from Calgary to Mexico City and back. That trip was just over 14,000 km and it took us 14 months. We travelled through Canada, USA and Mexico.”

This latest trip was a bike tour across a large part of the world.

“On our most recent year-long trip, during the 2017-18 school year, we took our bikes around the world. In chronological order, we travelled through Norway, Finland, Sweden, Russia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Hungary, India, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Japan and Canada.”

Through the experience, the family learned about different cultures, exciting cuisine and travelling to places they never would have imagined.

“I don’t think that our travels would have been the same without all of the people that we met,” he says. “We met some incredible people that made our experiences so much more memorable and they also created connections for future travels.”

And by balancing his studies, Sampson feels the travel, experiences with different cultures, new languages and different ways of life, really opened up his mind about the world, that there’s so much more to life than what he’s seen Calgary (where he is from).

“I feel these trips have been far more educational than any classroom I have been in, but there were many times where my travels and classes through VVS intertwined,” he says. “I felt because I was able to find connections between my classes and my experiences while travelling, I was able to learn more effectively as an individual.”

And this meant he needed to balance his tours with schoolwork.

“Something I really liked about taking my schooling with VVS was that teachers were super adaptable to our variable plans and circumstances while we were travelling,” Sampson says. “I really enjoyed having the flexibility to work at my own pace and submit assignments whenever I had the chance. Nevertheless, it was challenging to pace ourselves and have a solid understanding of how far we had come within a class.”

Sometimes it was a challenge, as assignments could take a week to complete and others over a month—depending on travel, Internet access and exam monitors.

“Over the year, we ended up having teachers, doctors and professors from places such as India, Thailand and Japan supervise our exams,” he says.

And the family had it planned down to the day, as he needed to return to Alberta for his English Language Arts 30-1 Diploma Exam.

“We actually showed up the day before my exam,” he says. “So I guess you could say that we used our time away from home to its fullest!”

More photos from Sampson:

Name: Markos
Grade: 11 (attended Grade 10 with VVS)
School: Western Canada High School
Future plans: Markos’ next trip is a year-long study abroad program
in Switzerland. He’ll be living with a Swiss family and studying in French
for grade 12. Once he graduates high school he plans to continue
in post-secondary schooling somewhere in Canada, with the idea
to be able to do exchanges if there is an opportunity.

Markos has been on two year-long bike trips now—through Canada, USA and Mexico, and then Norway, Finland, Sweden, Russia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Hungary, India, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, Japan and Canada.

“Some of my favourite parts include eating foreign and new foods, as well as meeting people from diverse backgrounds,” he says.

“I feel these trips have extended my desire to learn in a general sense. I have become more interested in ways of life around the world, and I feel that learning by travelling has been an incredible education.”

It is through these experiences that he has learned about the world, even planning to study abroad in Switzerland next year—taking grade 12 in French.

And a large part of that was balancing his studies through the experience.

“Having the ability to continue my curricular studies through VVS was very important to being able to travel abroad for a year,” he says. “I liked doing my schooling with VVS because it provided the opportunity to travel and constantly be moving. Even with limited WiFi at times, I was able to continue my education.”

It required some planning and commitment, but in the end, it all worked out.

“There were definitely challenges with taking supervised exams. We had to plan ahead to be in a certain location with a teacher that would be able to supervise our exams,” says Markos. “Having limited Internet access at certain times also presented itself as a challenge to the amount of research required for some of the courses.”

Right now, he’s back in Calgary, working on his schoolwork whenever he can.

“I play rugby after school every day, and I work every weekend at a restaurant. The time I am able to do work is often late at night or on the weekends before I bike to work.”

His greatest takeaway from the learning was the ability to take courses at his pace and schedule. It fits well with balancing life with school.

“My favourite part about taking courses through VVS was the ability to move at my own pace and speed through the topics I found easy and spend more time on what challenged me,” he says. 

And this has benefited his learning style and opened up future opportunities for him to study across the world.

Name: Tarn
Grade: 9 (attended Grade 8 with VVS)
School: Western Canada High School
Future plans: Tarn is very interested in being an engineer of some
sort—either in the field of quantum physics, nuclear physics,
or just a mechanical engineer. He also plans to travel to more parts of the world.

Through taking two bike trips across the world, and visiting more than 18 countries, Tarn started his travels early—at four years old, and then again at 13.

“I’ve really enjoyed seeing the sights that you don’t usually get to see when you drive through a place instead of biking,” he says.

He did all this while balancing his grade 8 education through Vista Virtual School.

“The trip broadened my viewpoint of the world while still keeping me connected to my basic education,” he says. “Which gave a nice balance between the two.”

It was this balance that made things interesting, as when he travelled, he had to make sure he was on task with the schoolwork and that everything was coordinated properly so he could write exams, complete assignments, and stay in contact with his teachers.

“We had to plan to take tests when we were in big cities,” he said. “Sometimes we had to go faster in our studies to make sure it could happen. I did my schoolwork whenever the opportunity arose because WiFi was limited, and it usually made school easier if I had an Internet connection too.”

Besides an amazing trip, another of his takeaways through distance learning was that he could work on his own schedule.

“I was able to set my own pace,” Tarn says. “Which meant I if I wanted to finish something earlier, I could. It was really nice because I could lead my own learning, but also have the support of the teachers.”

Learning this balance has helped pique his interest to travel more.

Already his travels include Mexico, Norway, Finland, Sweden, Russia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Hungary, India, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, Japan, USA and Canada, and all on bike.