On Wednesday, we saw the return to school for KS5 students. It was fantastic to see the students arriving through the school gates with so many of them saying how excited they are to be able to return to school full-time. For Year 13 students, this is a crucial year, potentially with far-reaching impacts. As such, all of their teachers are very pleased to have them back in classrooms. As a reminder for any students who are self-isolating, quarantining or still out of the country, online (hybrid) lessons are still being provided. However, in cases where students are absent from school for sickness (non-COVID related), students should focus on getting better and not be attending hybrid lessons.
With this being such an important year for our Year 13 students, we have welcomed Ms Gurung as the new Higher Education Coordinator. Ms Gurung has wasted no time in getting to know the Year 13s and their university choices and courses. Unifrog has been reintroduced as a great platform for students to research courses and to see their possible university locations options based on various achievement criteria. It also has some more fun aspects to it such as personality traits and tests, which then link up to possible career choices with suggested university courses. Parents are invited to spend some time with their son/daughter and have a look at the endless possibilities offered through Unifrog. Please see information about the Parent Information Session later.
Around the world, this week has been Bisexual Awareness Week. Our Student Leadership Team has put together a presentation for secondary students, which will be discussed in morning mentor time soon. It is encouraging that our Student Leadership Team takes these issues seriously and wants to improve the understanding of such issues with all of the secondary students. Increased awareness is always a good thing! If you would like to know more about Bisexual Awareness week, please contact our Student Leadership Team. In order to not to spoil the presentation, here are a few slides of what students can look forward to:
Following on from this, it has been great to see our KS5 Curriculum prefects taking the initiative to set up meetings in order to discuss what they feel are important issues that should be discussed with all secondary students, if not already planned to happen. Ritu and Meghna made some pertinent suggestions this week for topics that could be added to our secondary PSHE curriculum.
Our Year 13 Media Studies students have been busy. Here is some of their recent work: a video clip of students sharing their thoughts and ideas on The Handmaid’s Tale, and also considering some of the world’s ‘bigger’ questions about media. Interesting topics and worthy of thought by all of us! Different colours refer to different students and it is good to see them all working collaboratively and sharing their own thoughts and opinions with each other to improve and further guide their own work.
HT Yr 13 Clips_3.mp4
Science has also been particularly glad to have students back in school in order for practical experiments to be undertaken. It’s been a while since that could happen!
In English Literature, students have also been sharing their thoughts about Shakespeare’s King Lear. Here are some of their collective thoughts about Act 1, Scene 1:
What problems does Lear’s division of his kingdom present?
Meanwhile in Year 13 Psychology, Aavash has been keen to share what he has been learning about: In Psychology, we have been learning about leadership currently, which includes: traditional and modern theories of leadership, adaptive leadership, Scouller’s 3 levels of leadership, and we have just started directive leadership. All of this has been really captivating to learn. We are getting to explore various styles of leadership, which is giving us a clear idea of what it’s like being a leader and what type of person is fit to be a leader. Also if leadership is a skill that people have from day one or if people can be trained for leadership. All we’ve learnt so far has created a slot in my mind which will be in my thoughts long term as it has given me a lucid idea on what all it takes to be a leader and the styles of leadership a leader can follow.
In Geography, as part of their Global Interdependence topic, Year 13 students have been considering trade and aid, and have looked closely at how aid can impact receiving countries and have been arguing the case for which type of aid works best, if any! This has then led on to the history and growth of tourism globally and how interdependent it has made the world. No study of tourism would be complete nowadays without discussion about the impacts of a global pandemic, of which there have been many, and which will, without doubt, be felt for many years to come. The UNWTO predicted that export revenues from tourism would fall by $910 billion to $1.2 trillion in 2020. This will have a wider impact globally and could reduce global GDP by 1.5% to 2.8%. COVID 19 has undoubtedly had negative impacts for Nepal’s economy. Based on the current evidence, UNWTO expects international arrivals to decline by 70% to 75% for the whole of 2020. In this case, global tourism will have returned to levels of 30 years ago, with 1 billion fewer arrivals and a loss of some US$ 1.1 trillion in international tourism receipts. This massive drop in tourism due to the pandemic could result in an economic loss of US$ 2 trillion in world GDP. So with this in mind, the Year 13 Geographers would like to wish you all a very happy Dashain break and encourage you to stay local, stay safe and help reestablish national tourism and boost Nepal’s economy.
