Welcome back to the Secondary phase of DBIS after half-term

Dear Parents and/or Guardians,

I hope that your children and you had a very enjoyable October half-term holiday.

There have been many fantastic opportunities already this academic year for our DBIS secondary students, and they will have many exciting experiences during next week’s Week Without Walls trips and activities, both within Hong Kong and further away.

Week Without Walls Trips and Activities

There are a really wide range of activities happening next week for our students, and in fact, by the time you receive this bulletin, our students going to the Philippines to scuba dive, and those going to mainland China, will have already arrived. Our Year 7 students will be based in Sai Kung for their Dragonfly camp where they will have the opportunity to engage with various activities, including canyoning, hiking, survival skills and raft building amongst many others. Our Year 8 students will be based on Lantau island, and they will be involved in their own programme of activities. These include hiking across Lantau island and also camping for one night. They will also be organising a beach clean up at Cheung Sha beach as well as other events, whilst raising money for the following charities: Hong Kong Down Syndrome Association; Impact Hong Kong; Plastic Free Seas; and Forever Angels. These will be an excellent opportunity for them to develop both more internal and external awareness. Several students will be travelling to Beijing and Inner Mongolia, where they will be camping and hiking on the Great Wall, horseback riding, and visiting the Dazhao temple and the Genghis Khan memorial to gain a deeper understanding of Chinese cultural identity and history. The students spending the Week Without Walls week in the Philippines will be involved in diving across the week as well as appreciating the area that they are based. The other international trip this week takes students to Chiang Mai in Thailand, where they will be actively involved in a range of physical activities, which includes Muay Thai training workshop, mountain biking, as well as a jungle hike and opportunities to rock climb in Lampang.

The crafts Week Without Walls activity provides students with the chance to either do screen printing or make jewellery in the Three Keys Craft Space in Chai Wan. A sizeable number of students in Year 9 -13 will be actively engaged with the hiking trip, where they hike at various locations in Hong Kong, as well as surf and participate in coasteering, stand-up paddleboarding, indoor climbing, and taking on on an escape room in Mong Kok. The art workshop will be based in school as well as Peng Chau and Central, and will involve valuable opportunities for students to work on developing their own interesting pieces of art. The watersports set of activities will involve students sailing, windsurfing, hiking and active beach games amongst other activities. Our group who will work with Impact Hong Kong will be supporting street sleepers and this will include students handing out food and water to the street sleepers in Sham Shui Po during their Kindness Walks on both Tuesday and Wednesday. They will also be learning more about how they, and our wider community, can support others. We also have students in Year 12 and 13 using this week to build up their own skills through work placements across Hong Kong. These provide valuable insights and skills for all of the students who are involved with these organisations, and this will help further prepare them for the next steps in their life after school.

I would like to additionally say that we all regard student safety as our number one priority, and whilst we want to avoid changing plans that have been made for this week, we are prepared to respond to any challenges that arise, in either Hong Kong or elsewhere, to ensure that all students are not put at risk.

As we look to build upon the many excellent parts of these various trips and activities, we will be looking to engage with parents, students and staff to consider possibilities for making the WWW options even more attractive, as well as making the process smoother and more efficient for parents.

Year 10 – 13 Parent Evenings

I was delighted to see the really high levels of parental engagement with both the Year 10 and Year 11-13 Parent evenings, especially through the very high attendance. From numerous conversations with parents, it was clear that they were appreciative of the support that their children receive in our school. I look forward to meeting with parents of Year 7-9 students during their Parent evenings over the next two months.

I encourage you to contact your child’s teachers or tutor if there are any areas that you or your child is unsure about or would like any advice.

Year 9 & 11 Guidance interviews

On the 26th of September, every one of the Year 11 students met with either Mr Bridge, Mr Loran or myself. These conversations were designed to better understand their views on our school, their own progress and also their future plans. The three of us greatly valued the opportunity to listen to the insightful thoughts of our Year 11 students, where they consistently demonstrated their very positive views about the school as well as shared their thoughts on how we continue to develop and grow our school.

Mr Bridge, Mr Loran and I are planning to meet with our Year 9 students on Wednesday the 6th of November to also hear their views on these areas, and from this, we will be able to tailor our support for them in the future.

Year 9 & 11 Options Evening

We are looking forward to hosting our Year 11 Options Evening on Wednesday the 6th November 2019 and also our Year 9 Options Evening on Wednesday the 13th November 2019. They will both run from 6-8 pm and all parents & students of the respective Year groups are warmly encouraged to attend. The Year Group Leaders will be sending out more specific information about their own Year group’s Options Evening next week or the following week respectively.

Morning parent meetings with the Head of Secondary

I have warmly invited parents of students in the Secondary phase of DBIS and also parents of Year 6 students, who are already considering the transition into the Secondary phase of the school, to attend a morning meeting with myself. I have split these into two mornings, the first of these is on the morning of Tuesday the 29th of October and this is for parents and guardians of Year 6, 7, 8 and 9 students. The second of these, which is for parents and guardians of Year 10 – 13 students, is on Tuesday the 12th of November. They will both run from 9:30- 10:30 am and will allow you the opportunity to discuss things within the Secondary phase of the school and how we are looking to build further on the many excellent parts of our school.

Kind regards,

Mr. Simon Oakley

Head of Secondary

DBIS Hub