It has been a really exciting week at BVIS Secondary.
We celebrated the International Day of Peace by the entire school congregating in the Secondary auditorium to record a version of ‘One Day’ by Matisyahu. There were student soloists, and staff backing singers, and we had a staff and student band to accompany the 800 strong choir. It was such fun and a lovely way for the school to come together.
My thanks to Ms Sue Pogson for bringing this all together and making it such a success.
On Thursday, we had the first of our Parent Workshops of the year. This one was targeted towards Key Stage 3 parents and was looking at giving parents some strategies on how to support their child with reading. We had 40 parents attend and the workshop, which was led by Mr Jordan Anderson, Head of English, gave our parents some very useful tips on the kinds of questions they can ask their children to further their reading levels in English - even if the parents cannot speak English. The workshop was a practical one which finished in the library where some students demonstrated some of the techniques in the workshop.
My thanks to Mr Anderson for organising the evening, but also to So Jeung in Year 13 for providing the Korean translation of the information, and to the library staff and students who stayed behind to help make the workshop such a success.
Thursday also saw a group of basketball-mad students go to watch the Hanoi Buffaloes team play - a terrific trip to see top-class live sport in our own city. Sometimes only by seeing people at the top of their profession can we really understand what we have to do to be the best we can be. My thanks to Ms Alicia Smith, Head of PE, for organising this.
Finally on Friday, we had a non-uniform day. This was to raise money for the Nord Anglia Global Tanzania expedition which is going at half term. The students have been selling food at break times to raise enough money, and the non-uniform day was another way to help with this aim. Each student, as part of the trip needs to raise a certain amount, all of which goes to helping the local communities in Africa develop the education and resources they need to make their lives better. I have been pleased so far in seeing how our students have been prepared to talk to the school community about what they are doing, and how they are going about it to raise this money - and in turn it is lovely to see our students supporting their peers in this endeavour.
I hope you all have a great week ahead.
Nick Lee
