Mr. Kaisar Dopaishi
Greetings to you! We are delighted to have our first issue of online SIS newsletter go in to the cyberspace! This first one is covering all aspects of our SIS community from August to November 2011.This blog based newsletter will be one of our communication tools. In future we will have a quarterly newsletter which will come along with the online FAT1 & 2 and CA2 report respectively. In this newsletter I will restrict myself on reporting about academics and broad policy initiatives.
Academic Updates
- The term started with large increase in the number of staff appointments across the grades levels to ensure better delivery of the respective programmes. Care has been taken to add diversity, expertise and experience elements in the staff body which now stands at 82 professionals representing ten countries.
- From Grade KG- 6 “two home room teacher concept” was introduced at each grade level to ensure better delivery of learning based on student learning styles
- The staff body has now comprehensive department systems with seating arrangement and regular meetings as per their departments. A better sense of cohesiveness and sense of direction is being attempted with experienced HODs.
- The cycle/day concept was adopted instead of following the week days which has helped to ensure that academic time is not lost in any subject area.
- At the IBDP we now have Standard and Higher level courses conducted separately so that the nuances of the courses can be better enunciated.
- New courses introduced in IBDP are History, Psychology and Film so that students with the liberal arts profile can also effectively catered to
- The paper options in IGCSE subjects and new subject choices were adopted and reviewed keeping in mind its alignment with IBDP requirements. Hence we now have English Literature taken with English Language,Coordinated Science and History being offered by the school.
- In Foreign Languages students of Grade 5-8 are placed as per their level of learning -foundation and standard level courses
- The reports will show separate academic performance in each subject area and also indicate the standard of attainment: Honors, Distinction, Merit and Satisfactory based on academic performance and attributes of all round education.
- Eduberry has our online reporting module. From the next term, FAT1 and FAT2 results will be given immediately after its period of assessment is over respectively.
- School Services :To compliment the academic endeavors, in house Special Educator, Personal and Career Counselors have been appointed and the systems which are being developed is already having positive spillover effects. We now have developed for SEN IEP (Individual Education Plan), increase in college representative visits at SIS and also systems developed in discipline matters with a more proactive intervention by the Personal Counselors. We also as usual continue to be guided and supported by our regular out sourced resource personnel in these areas. All these are but processes and systems put in place and will in time to come reap dividends in our focus to provide quality education. Yes, it is a journey and not a destination!
Integration of Technology with Learning:
To develop the skills of being an inquirer, independent and life- long learners it is necessary to have integration of technology in the learning process. The following initiatives were taken:
- The back-end hardware requirements (high end servers, LCDs, sound systems and laptops) and bandwidth have been upgraded to provide a proper platform to ensure that integration of technology in the learning process can be facilitated seamlessly.
- The KG- 6 Primary Division had the newly developed Apple lab for their exclusive use. Now all the students and teachers are using the platform of Singapore based e-learning management system. These are “initial days” I am sure with time “expertise” will be developed and its usage will promote active and independent learning in an effective way particularly for the many visual learners.
- The IBDP students are using Manage Bac software to communicate with teachers on IB requirements of internal assessments, TOK, CAS and Extended Essay.
- SIS is a member of IB Virtual World and that will take student,teacher and school collaborations to the next desired level.
- We have also developed our intranet which is also web- based. It is the Academic Hub with information and documents for Singapore curriculum, IGCSE, IBDP and can now be accessed through our Eduberry platform by all our stakeholders.
- Eduberry has our online reporting module. This will be one of our channels of communication and also is a common platform from where we can access SIS intranet, ManagBac, school website and the online SIS newsletter.
IT initiatives will be well grounded and yield good results over time. We also plan to hold workshops for parents interested in developing better understanding in the usage of software which we are using at SIS from Jan 2012.
IBDP Five Year Review
The Academic year 2011- 12 is also IBDP five year review period. In the background staff, IB coordinator and I have been involved in IBDP self study process. The process is lead by a Self Study Committee comprising of Heads of Department, IBDP Coordinator and Principal. We will be conducting a few surveys with you and the students in our bid to make our self assessment a more comprehensive and objective. We do require your cooperation in this matter.
Other Matters
Other Matters
There have been meaningful changes in house system, rules and regulations in adjudging the elocution, debates, athletics, champion house, best all rounder and best sportsman of the year so that it is keeping with the macro objective of a well developed and all round education system.
The newsletter report relating to individual student achievements, academic programme information, celebrations, co-curricular activities and sports and games are covered in detail by our SIS team in other areas of this newsletter. All one can say is that SIS community is always abuzz with all that goes into developing a well-rounded academic programme.
The key words guiding policies are trying to achieve a trade off amongst change,stability,growth,balance, prioritizing and doing all this for the sound education of each individual child in tandem with the SIS family.
The key words guiding policies are trying to achieve a trade off amongst change,stability,growth,balance, prioritizing and doing all this for the sound education of each individual child in tandem with the SIS family.
I wish to especially thank the parents for their support and valuable feedback apart from the students and the staff body. Here is hoping that the 2012 herald God’s choicest blessings, peace and joy for the SIS community and their loved ones.
Warm regards
Kaisar Dopaishi