Island School PTA Newsletter

A big thank you to our parents for supporting each other and the Island School Community during a very challenging term. With mutual help and support we weathered some stressful times. We bonded together and can now face the new year with strength and optimism.

Last term the ISPTA focused on raising school spirit with events like the 12 Days of Christmas. Together, students, teachers and parents brought fun and excitement during the two last weeks of the term. Earlier in the term the Quest Week socials gave parents a chance to kick back and socialise with each other.

Please have a look at this newsletter to see what the ISPTA and parents were doing last term to build the parent community, raise students spirits, support students & school initiatives and enrich the learning environment of the school.

We look forward to another busy term. ISPTA will continue to support the school community, raise funds, and organise events. This week we have been busy helping with the first Whole School Walkathon, which will support Island School’s charities, and soon we will start work for our Spring Fair.

ISPTA is always looking for more volunteers as well as sponsors and donors. Please drop us a line if you are interested in volunteering your time or expertise. We look forward to seeing you in ISPTA events!

Tania Shao

Chair, Island School PTA Ltd

ISTPA held its Annual General Meeting on October 14. A new committee was elected, and a donation of $1.2M was announced, to be used to benefit the students at current campuses as well as towards naming rights on the new campus.

The elected office holders and committee members are

Chair - Tania Shao (8E/8E), Vice Chair - Tarja Joro (10N/11N) , Honorary Treasurer - Alex Chin (12F), Secretary – Manju Anand (9W/12W), Alefiyah Ebrahim (12E), Kathrin Leung (7E), Jennifer Seeto (8N), Lamey Chang (7R/9R), Mechelle Yu (7D), Rosanna Nongdhar (8W) and Soundari Mukherjea (13N).

Some photos from the event.

The end of the term saw some new ISPTA donations put into action. A new vibraphone was added to Music department’s instrument lineup, and new football goals were bought for both campuses. Thanks to our parents’ generosity, ISPTA is able to enhance Islanders’ learning experience and provide the school with equipment and support that go above and beyond. We also support the school in striving to bring balance to school day – the football goals will be there for PE lessons and school break games alike.

Some photos of the donations.

December saw a brand new Island School event - the 12 Days of Christmas. As the school and ISPTA had to make the hard decision to postpone school fair, a series of fun school-time events and activities with the original fair’s theme, 12 days of Christmas, was put together to bring holiday cheer to both campuses.

ISPTA helped to deck the halls on both campuses with donated decorations, both new items and second hand donations from parents. With generous help and delicious donations from parents of all year groups, ISPTA organised a bake sale on both campuses. The bake sales raised $9000 towards enhancing students' learning experience at Island School. The last day of the celebration saw an additional sweet touch with a candy sale raising $3500.

ISPTA also ran an online charity auction to support Island School Trust's Nicola and Kenneth Bursaries as an online auction. The bursaries are awarded to students from local schools throughout Hong Kong who are in genuine financial need to complete their sixth form education. Thanks to the generosity of the bidders, we raised $31,080, funding ten bursaries.

We thank all our auction donors and our event sponsors Sweet World, Vitasoy and ETAK. We also thank our bake sale coordinators Adeline Fung and Stacy Tan as well as all parent volunteers.

Please see the photos of decorations, bake sale and last day candy sale.

Year 7-8 and Year 9-11 parents got together for Quest Week Happy Hour drinks at Bizou. It was lovely to see many parents there, and we look forward to keeping this tradition going! The events raised $3518 which will be donated towards supporting Island School's initiative to reduce screen time and provide students fun alternatives to electronics. The funds will be used towards board games for classrooms.

Please see photos from the Y7-8 and Y9-11 events. Stay tuned for Year 12-13 parent social!

In addition to our Board Game donation, ISPTA is collecting gently used board games suitable for our students to use during break times and before school. Some recommended games are listed below, but any board games that would interest secondary school students are welcomed!

• Settlers of Catan
• Codenames
• Munchkin (any edition: maybe Adventure Time or Marvel)
• Spyfall
• Gloom
• One Night Ultimate Werewolf
• Colt Express
• Mysterium/Dixit
• Azul
• Dead of Winter
• Tiny Towns
• Jaws
• Pandemic
• Cash and Guns
• Sheriff of Nottingham

Donations can be left with General Office on both campuses.

Years 8 and 9 held their coffee mornings during Term 1 on Sha Tin Wai and Tai Wai campuses. Events were hosted by the Vice Principals of the year groups, Head of Junior Phase Jenny Hodson and Head of Middle Phase Nicholas Lee. Both events looked into the current status of redevelopment of the Borrett Road campus. Y8 coffee morning covered Y9 STEM education, language options and screen time. Y9 event discussed GCSEs courses and Elements, as well as six Global Competencies. Longer reports can be found here.

Y11 and Y12 coffee mornings were unfortunately postponed to Term 2, which will see combined Y10-11 event on February 26, and a combined Y12-13 one on March 2. Year 7 coffee morning timing is to be confirmed.

A big thank you to all parents who have supported the mother tongue books collection! Many great books have been added to Library's collection of mother tongue books – books in languages spoken at homes of our Island School students.

We continue the project, and reach out to parents to continue donating mother tongue books in new or near-new condition in approximately Y7-8 reading level. Please keep the initiative in mind during your travels!

As the Library already has good collection of books in English, Chinese, Japanese, French and Spanish (languages are taught at IS), they are focusing on all other mother tongues: Hindi, Korean, Finnish, Norwegian, Russian, Dutch, Urdu, you name it!

They are interested in both books originally written in mother tongues, as well as mother tongue editions of some of the very popular fiction series, like Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, The Land of Stories, The Diary of Wimpy Kid, etc.

For further questions, please contact our librarian, Mrs Emily Leung at emily.leung@online.island.edu.hk, or ISPTA through Tarja Joro through pta@online.island.edu.hk. Books can be dropped off at the library on either campuses.

ISPTA Key Dates

• January 10th- Whole School Walkathon
• January 20th-23rd- Baiwan Charity Week
• February 26th- Y10 and Y11 Coffee Morning, Venue-TBC
• February 27th- Parents' Roundtable, Venue- TBC
• March 2nd- Y12 and Y13 Coffee Morning, Venue- TBC
• Y12 and Y13 Social- TBC
• Spring Fair- TBC
• April 21st- Y11 Graduation
• May 28th- Y13 Graduation

Please see school calendar at http://island.edu.hk/calendar/ for details on school events

Island School uniform supplier is discontinuing the 100% cotton fabric, and remaining stock is sold at 50% discount. Sizes 12 (boys and girls) and 13 (boys) are currently available.

Boys Uniform Shirt (100% cotton) – 50% off !

Girls Uniform Shirt(100% cotton) – 50% off !

You can find the ISPTA membership form HERE. The membership fee letters and payment slips have been mailed to all parents from ESF.

We have a WhatsApp group for each year group to help to connect the parent community.

If you would like to sign up, please email ISPTA at pta@online.island.edu.hk. Please include parent's name and phone contact, and child's name and year/house.

As part of our sustainability efforts, ISPTA has launched an unofficial Facebook marketplace Island School Community Buy Sell & Swap where members of the Island School Hong Kong community can buy/sell/gift/swap school related items. This group is only for Island School actively enrolled families, students and staff.

When joining, you will be asked to state your affiliation to Island School. Any request to join that does not include this information within 7 days will be declined. Please read the group rules before posting.

Examples of items that are approved:

• School uniform pieces
• Uniform shoes
• PE shoes
• Sports shoes, such as football or rugby boots / cleats
• Other sports equipment, such as tennis, table tennis or badminton rackets
• Musical instruments
• Bags, including school bags and bags suitable to school camps or quest week travel
• Camping gear relevant to school camps, including clothing
• IB course books
• English readers required or recommended by school
• Other books relevant to school work
• Calculators and other stationery items related to school work
• Other similar items

ISPTA reserves a right to approve all posts. ISPTA is not part of any arrangement and will not facilitate them.

We have a furnished lounge, The Big Chill, on Tai Wai campus for the use of parents when they are at school. The lounge is located on the ground floor between the library and general office.

Tea, coffee, cookies, free wifi and power sockets are available at the lounge.

We welcome your feedback and suggestions, please email us at pta@online.island.edu.hk

Island School School Council: Tania Shao

ESF Committee of Parents: Tania Shao

Island School Trust: Tarja Joro

Contact us

Email: pta@online.island.edu.hk
Website: https://island.edu.hk/pta-home/
Location: 95CJ+P9 Hong Kong
Phone: 6765 2453

Disclaimer:
Island School PTA is the owner of the copyright in all content of this publication. Distributing, modifying, copying or using any content of this publication in any manner for public or commercial purposes without written permission from Island School is strictly prohibited. Views expressed in this publication do not necessarily represent those of Island School or the English Schools Foundation.