Have you ever imagined what it it's like to travel around the world following the teams of sailboat racers in the Volvo Ocean Race? It is an unforgettable experience for adults and children alike, but what does a child do while traveling around the world from stopover port to stopover port?

      Behind the scenes of the Volvo Ocean Race, away from the crews of shore personnel, racing team members, million dollar boats, shipping containers and crowds of visitors to the Race Village, there is a school. The school, called the "SEB School" is for the children of the men and women in the Volvo Ocean Race. There are about 35 children traveling around with the race, and although many are toddlers, those that are of school age come together three times a week and have classes in the SEB tent.

      Belinda Brightwood, the principal and founder of the SEB school, first got the idea to start a school when she began traveling around with her husband, Tom Breitwood, the bowman on Team SEB. "My husband sails on SEB, so I got dragged along on the race. I am a teacher in Australia. We trained in Portugal and then in Sweden, and while I was there I realized that I might get a little bored," explains Belinda.

     Belinda, who has been teaching for the past 6 years, realized that most of the parents in the race were going to homeschool their children along the way. With the support of her husband Tom, as well as Gurra Krantz the Skipper of SEB, and parents from several different teams, she began classes at the first port in Capetown, South Africa. " I went to the skipper of SEB, he has daughter who is seven now, and he helped me start the school. So its now the SEB school, but all the teams come. All the teams trained in different areas, so we only started the school in Capetown," says Belinda." All of the children came together for the first time in Capetown, South Africa.

     The children that attend the school are of all different ages and come from different countries. As a result, Belinda needed an assistant. Fortunately, another teacher was traveling with the Race. " Nikola’s husband works with the illbruck team- he’s one of the shore crew. I just met her through the race, and she’s a teacher from New Zealand. Since the children are all doing different things at the same time its handy to have two people."

     The SEB school  uses the different countries that the teams visit during the race to teach the children about geography, history, and culture, as well as the different animal species that exist in each region of the world. The children learn mathematics and reading in English and also go on field trips in each of the countries they visit. They enjoy playing games at recess with their new friends, but also miss their old schools and friends from home.

     Belinda herself is no stranger to water. She grew up boating in Australia with her parents. " My most memorable is just cruising with my family, when we had yachts when I was a kid. In New South Wales in Australia there’s a place called the Miles Lake which is a fresh water lake about a 3 hours drive north from Sidney. That’s a really beautiful area to go around in. My husband as a child sailed through the Barrier Reef and back, and did that when he was seven with his family. We both grew up on boats & stuff."

     "I think the best thing about boating is that it makes children make decisions, and learn how to make decisions and not be scared about that. Like if you are out on a boat by yourself, and something happens, you have to decide what to do, and there is no parent there to say, “What I think you should do is…blah blah”. You have to just do it. And also, the freedom. Learning about and seeing the environment, it makes you respect the environment," says Belinda.