High School: Residentials, and Mock Exams, Week

It’s Residentials Week, with students from Years 7, 8, 9, 10 and 12 on Residentials all over Thailand, and beyond, and Mock Exams Week for our Year 11 and 13 students.

Residentials Update

It’s Residentials Week, with students from Years 7, 8, 9, 10 and 12 on Residentials all over Thailand, and beyond.

Last Thursday, our NAE GC Expeditions left for Tanzania, with over 40 students from Years 10 and 12 participating in a highly rewarding programme of community service, learning about sustainable development and also exploring the Tarangire National Park where they will discover the diverse range of Tanzanian flora and fauna. Please see below for details of one of the recent fund-raising activities.

On Saturday, half of Year 8 left for Pranburi, where they are now scuba diving, climbing and abseiling, beach cleaning, trekking in Sam Roi Yot National Park and much more. This is a repeat of our very successful Year 8 Residential from the last three years, working with Wild Planet, but based at a new hotel as we were not happy with the previous accommodation.

On Sunday, Year 9 left for Chanthaburi. This is a new Residential, which we have planned with the JUMP! Foundation, who have over 10 years’ experience in running school trips to over 30 countries for schools across Thailand and activities taking place will include camping, community based tourism projects and activities including mat weaving, a treasure hunt in the historical centre of Chanthaburi, mangrove exploration, sustainable fishery activity, and much more.

This morning, Years 7, 10 and 12 left for their Residentials:

Year 7 will be visiting Kanchanaburi, spending half of the week at iCamp and the other half of the week with CDR Adventure. This combination of two different locations, used last year for the Year 7 and 9 Residentials, means that we have been able to tailor the trip to include the activities that students have enjoyed the most at each camp in the past to create a fantastic new Residential.

Year 10 will be flying to Chiang Mai and then visiting Chiang Dao, camping for three nights in Muang Khong and then staying at The Royal Ping Garden and Resort for the final evening. Like the Year 8 Residential, the visit will be organized by Wild Planet, with activities taking place including rock climbing and abseiling, a service project at a local school, and much more. This is our oldest Residential, and my favourite of all the St Andrews Residential locations that I have visited over the years.

Year 12 have two different new Residentials, to Udon Thani and Siem Reap, Cambodia. The Udon Tani trip is planned with Rustic Pathways, a leading tour operator specialising in student travel and the Siem Reap trip is planned with Buffalo Educational Travel, with both trips focused on the Service that is so important both to our Senior students’ CAS programmes and to developing them as responsible global citizens.

It was very quiet in school today, perfect for Year 11 and 13 students as they take, and study for, their Mock Exams. Please see the school’s Facebook page for updates from the Residentials throughout the week.

Storytelling for Tanzania

On Tuesday the 14th of January, a group of Year 10 made their way to the Primary School to perform an African story, Jambo Jamutai, to the Foundation Stage in an attempt to raise money for the people in Arusha, Tanzania.

Jambo Jamutai is a story about a young girl from Tanzania who helps different animals on her journey back home from the market. With this story we tried to show the children that if we do good, good will always come our way. Our aim was to help the children understand how they too can make a difference and how their contribution to this event will help many others in a faraway country.

It was a great experience working with the younger students. We had to push ourselves to the limit, trying to make the story entertaining for them.

The Year 10 and 12 are travelling to Tanzania this week to work together with an NGO. All proceeds raised at the FS Storytelling for Tanzania event will go to help the local community we are going to be working with, in Arusha.  We raised a total of 10,105 baht.

Asante Sana!

Imani Cintado-ODonovan (10g)

NAE Parent Satisfaction Survey 2019-20

There are now less than two weeks left to complete the NAE Parent Satisfaction Survey, which was e-mailed out at the end of last term, as your feedback helps us to provide the best possible experiences for your son/daughter. Please note that parents need to complete the survey once. The survey is designed to capture feedback on a per-family basis, but if both parents take the survey this is also fine. 

The views of all of our parents will be used to inform our strategies for continued improvement. The closing date is Friday 31st January 2020.

Roo Stenning (roo.st@standrews.ac.th)
Head of High School