Signing reports and building an auditorium
Signing reports and building an auditorium
Sunday, 16 May 2010
I have spent much of this week reading students’ end-of-year reports and writing Principals’ comments. It may not sound very exciting (and as you can guess by the photo at the top of the blog, it did not provide many photo opportunities!), but I actually found the process very encouraging and exhilarating.
For privacy reasons, it would not be appropriate, of course, to quote any specific information from the students’ reports. However, as I read the reports, two things stood out for me. The first was how deeply each student is known by the teachers at the College. The detailed perspectives offered individually by every member of our diverse team of highly professional educators built up into an extraordinarily comprehensive and perceptive profile of each student. No student of Li Po Chun United World College could ever claim that they slipped through our College unnoticed or unknown!
My second vivid impression was the spectacular growth in character, involvement, achievement and creativity shown by the graduating students during their two years at the College. I think it is fair to say that every student who will shortly graduate is more capable, more assured, more all-rounded and more globally aware than was the case upon arrival just 20 months ago in September 2008. And certainly any element of initial shyness seems to have long since dissipated!
In many cases, the all-round growth has been phenomenal. We have students in the College now who are undertaking ambitious tasks such organising international conferences, engaging in coral monitoring and wetlands rehabilitation, building direct personal links with young people in closed societies such as Myanmar and North Korea, helping people in extreme situations such as victims of human trafficking and leprosy sufferers – and LOTS more – that would be considered ambitious undertakings for an experienced professional 50 year old. Most people would regard such initiatives as absurd for a 17 or 18 year old – and yet, at our College, it is the norm.
The other exciting event for me this week was receiving the news that after a frustratingly slow start, our new auditorium is back on schedule for completion in late September or early October (yes, 2010!). When it is finished, this facility will represent a huge step forward in our ability to hold functions, assemblies, productions, lectures, performances and meetings. For the first time, we will have a covered area where the entire College community can gather under cover, and I can hardly wait.
Those who have not visited our campus recently might be interested in a few photos I have been able to get despite the thick cover of surrounding vegetation over the past few months. Please enjoy them, and join with me in dreaming about completion day just a few months away.
January 2010, looking down the stairs (left) and from the roof of the Sports Centre (right)
March 2010, looking down the stairs (left) and from the roof of the Sports Centre (right)
April 2010, looking down the stairs (left) and from the roof of the Sports Centre (right)
May 2010, looking down the stairs (left) and from the roof of the Sports Centre (right)