From the Head of Secondary 27.06.2020

From the Head of Secondary 27.06.2020

Secondary Back in Action!

We were delighted to welcome our Year 10, 11 and 12 students back into school this week. Attendance was excellent, at over 90%, and while there was some slight trepidation on the faces of some…… “it all feels a bit strange”………. it did not take long for them to settle into the routine and get used to the changes that they needed to be aware of. This included following the arrows to make their way around school, observing social distancing at all times and only sitting at the designated seats in the classrooms and at break and lunchtimes. I was very pleased to see that all remembered to bring their laptops in so they could access the work in their lessons. We also welcomed two new students, Delia Dumpangol and Joseph Chang, who joined Year 11. They, together with Holly Nisbet, have been participating in the online lessons and will officially move into Year 12 in August.

Year 6 Parent Webinar

It was great to ‘meet’ with some of our Year 6 parents at the Zoom webinar on Wednesday. Hosted by Ms Smith, I had the opportunity to talk about the differences between Primary and Secondary and we covered such essentials as use of the Diary, the Lockers, Homework, and the different subject areas. Primary and Secondary colleagues have been working together to provide a virtual transition for Year 6. In a normal year the students would by now have spent three days trying out Secondary and participating in Secondary assemblies etc. When we return to school [hopefully in August] we will be having ‘gentle transition’ days initially for the students so that they will gradually be able to familiarise themselves with the routines and expectations of Secondary.

 

Global Citizenship Award 2020

As you may know we have been considering nominations for the Secondary Global Citizenship Award 2020. It has proven to be a very difficult task this year as all of our nominees are fantastic ambassadors for the school and all have the qualities that we expect to see in a Global Citizen. The winner will be announced next Friday in the final [virtual] assembly but I would just like to acknowledge our finalists here:

Tiggi Mornington Sanford Year 7

Julia Abenjoro Year 7

Grace Lee Year 8

Celeste Chung Year 11

Roshween Riar Year 11

Dania Danny Year 13

Cassidy Shim Year 13

Very well done to all these young ladies!  I know they will all continue to follow their passions and interests in years to come.

 

Mrs Margaret Renshaw

Deputy Principal / Head of Secondary

Duke of Edinburgh International Award: KIS Winners!

On Thursday we held a special socially distanced Award ceremony for those students who this year gained their Duke of Edinburgh Awards. This was the culmination of a year’s worth of effort. What is most impressive is the determination of these young people…..at times they surely must have felt that it would be so easy to just give up. The award conditions are rigorous and a real challenge. Nineteen students received their Award Certificates and Badges in the small presentation ceremony in the school library.

 

Bronze:  Justin, Qawiemah, Rania (Yr 11) Afiq (Yr 13) and Moksha, Jayden, Josephine, Chanel, Angelina, Freya and Yin Ling (Yr 10)

 

Silver: Iffa and Desmond (Yr 12), Jolin, Wilber, Celeste, Alex, JIsoo, Jed , Ling Qian (Yr 11)

 

Gold: Kaori (Yr13)

 

Ms McNutt, speaking at the ceremony, emphasised that the students were now qualified to continue onto the next stage of the Award, either at KIS or, if they were moving on, in other countries.

 

Many thanks to Ms Nutt and the DofE teacher team, without whose hard work and enthusiasm the Award would not run at KIS.

 

Congratulations to our DofE Students!

 

 

Global Action: Black Lives Matter Article 2

Racism: What is it and what can we do about it?

On May 25th, George Floyd was killed by a police officer in Minneapolis, and the incident sparked protest, riots and outcries around the world for justice against perceived systemic racism. Here in KIS, we believe that awareness of the topic of racism is extremely important as it occurs everywhere around the globe. There are several ways in which we can aid in this fight.

One theory is that racism dates back to 1616 when a Dutch ship brought 20 African slaves ashore at a British colony in Jamestown, Virginia. Soon, this spread to other European and American colonies and with colonisation, what started out as 20 men turned into millions. Racism was promoted as these African slaves were the ones that did the harsh, dirty, manual labour for the cotton boom.  One way that racism became institutionalised was through ‘redlining’ during the Great Depression. To reduce home foreclosures, Franklin Roosevelt created the Home Owners Loan Corporation (HOLC). Federal housing agencies would then determine if these areas were appropriate for investment. To differentiate between “acceptable” neighbourhoods and “physically demarcated”, they were either labelled with red, blue, or green. But this colour code was based on racial composition rather than level of income. Hence housing with minorities were given low marks and deemed as a risky investment.  This caused an uneven wealth gap which is still very prevalent in modern-day American society. While redlining was banned in the 60s, the effects and stigma still remain. This discrimination meant that the housing areas were left underdeveloped. Yet attempts of small-scale businesses were obstructed or rejected, leaving the blocks to crumble and stay empty. Alongside this there was limited access to banking, healthcare, groceries, and retail merchandise. Crime and proliferation of liquor stores and bars pushed the stigma of financial risk which made future investment less likely. This leads to the cycle that seemingly justifies the initial practices of redlining.

So you may be asking, “how can we help?  Educate yourself and face the facts: Racism is a thing, it’s around you whether you notice it or not. Understand that you have the power to change the minds of others by simply talking about the issue and being more aware of it. The keyword here is “awareness”. By educating yourself and the people around you, you can stop racism from happening in your world. It may seem far-fetched that something so small today can affect something so large tomorrow. But small steps add up to the larger objective.

If we recognize the ugly legacy of slavery and acknowledge it, then we can look at intentional segregation in neighbourhoods, schools, and workplace, and only then do something about it.

Until society refrains from listing things or people that are regarded as unacceptable and untrustworthy prejudice against black will remain in perpetuity.

Read the news. Share. Donate.

 

 

The Charity Committee