Songkran Festival
This week we look forward to our school Songkran Festival which will take place on Wednesday 5th April. We will start the day with making merit by offering food to a group of visiting monks from one of the local temples near our school. There will then be three assemblies at slightly different times. In the gymnasium, the High School will have their Songkran Festival assembly and this will be followed by the Primary school’s Songkran Festival assembly.
Later in the day different year groups will have the opportunity to have water celebrations which will involve many people getting wet. Please ensure that your child has some spare dry clothes to go home in. If you are in school from 11.00 am onwards, and you do not want to risk getting wet, avoid our football pitch at the centre of the school. This is always a really nice celebration to bring to and end this incredibly busy second term
On Thursday, the school is closed for the Chakri Day holiday and our staff will be undertaking a range of different training opportunities.
Study Leave
From the end of this second term, our senior students in year 11 and 13 will go on examination study leave. During term three, each of the students in these two year groups will be sitting external examinations that are related to the particular individual programme of academic courses they have chosen. Our Year 11 students will be taking their General Certificates in Secondary Education, GCSE or IGCSE.
These exams cover a two year course of study in a wide range of subjects which the individual students chose to follow for years 10 and 11. They will take a corresponding range of external examinations which have to be taken under very strict examination conditions. Some exams start in early May, and the final ones finish in late June. All examination papers are sent by secure courier to the school, opened in the exam room, and then immediately returned to the examination board in UK where they are marked by the examinations board’s staff. The results are then sent to both the students and school in late August showing how well our year 11 group has performed against international standards of excellence that are applied externally on the school.
The graduating Year 13 class this year, the Class of 2017, will sit their final external examinations in May. When they entered Year 12, each student selected a range of courses across 6 areas of study that make up the International Baccalaureate Diploma Progamme. These individual courses each have a set of external examinations the students sit under strict examination conditions. They will have completed their Creativity, Action and Service (CAS) programme, handed in their extended essay and finished their theory of knowledge (TOK) course. The final stage is sitting these last external exams, the results of which they will receive in early July. Many of their University offers will be based on how well they perform in these exams, so they are all working very hard during this final period before they sit them. The coming week of study allows students in both year 11 and 13 to concentrate entirely on their revision. There will be revision workshops held by their teachers, and teachers are available to answer questions throughout the study period, either through face-to-face meeting in school or via email and moodle.
The Class of 2017 will finish their examination by Friday 19th May and graduate on Saturday 27th May the celebration being held for them, their families and teachers at the Marriott Hotel, Sukhumvit 57. I very much look forward to the Class of 2017 Graduation Celebration. This will be a wonderful way to say goodbye to a group of young adults who have been the leading group for our school for the past two years.
I know you will join me in wishing our Year 11 and graduating Class of Year 13 students the very best of luck for the next 6 weeks as they put in the final effort to prepare for the final examinations they will sit in the coming weeks.
Security Change for the third term
Following discussions with parents and security managers, there will be the following change for the start of the third term: The guard house on the walkway by the hard court blue area will be moved to the front of this walkway into school. This entrance will just be for students and families who are swiping into school. Those individuals who need to sign in as visitors or those who do not have their school ID with them will be asked to go around to the front entrance next to the main school car park. This will mean that we will have one guard at the blue hard court guard house checking that everyone is swiping in and advising those who need to sign in to go to the other entrance. There will be three guards at the main entrance so they will all be able to work together to ensure that all parents and visitors who have to sign into school are quickly dealt with as well as one guard ensuring that everyone entering school is using the swipe card system correctly.