new mac books - the international school of penang · wednesday 14 september, 8:1510:30am at the...
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To all in the Uplands Community, This newsletter announces the impressive IGCSE/GCSE and IB exam results earned by our hardworking students. I am proud to see your results very well done to all! This academic year Uplands has its largest intake of IB students to date 64 in total. These new Year 12 students are presently experiencing their IB Retreat as they participate in team building and leadership exercises, further developing lifeskills as they build and strengthen bonds and friendships through the activities; an important precursor at the commencement of their IB journey ahead over the next two years. We also look forward to our other Year group Experiential Learning trips taking place over the coming months. Please note the date for UPTA’s first Coffee Morning of this academic year will be held on Wednesday 14 September, 8:1510:30am at the Parkroyal Hotel, Batu Ferringhi we look forward to seeing as many of you there as possible. I hope you had a great Merdeka Day!
Matthew Bristow Principal
Message from the Principal 1 Head of Secondary 4 Curriculum & Assessment 56 Drama Department 7 IB Year 12 Retreat 8 Primary School News 913 Boarding House News 14 UPTA News 1516 Academic Term Dates 20162017 1719
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Dear Uplands community. I hope you enjoyed the additional day off this week and that you had the chance to soak up theMerdeka day celebrations. I also hope that you had a chance to ask lots of ‘Why’ questions to your children, as agreed last week. I hope you did your homework! By the time this newsletter goes out, we will have students away on their IB retreat. The attendance and response to this has been fantastic. I have been very impressed with the signup rate for this opportunity and I hope and anticipate a similar response for the very exciting trips coming up very soon. I was very pleased to read Mrs Easton’s article about our recent IGCSE results. They really are very impressive and we are very proud of our students’ success. We have shared the results with staff, and subject leaders are now busying themselves with an analysis of their own data. We are constantly looking at ways that we can improve the outcomes for all our students. Exams, of course, are an ‘end product’ and any data should be taken with a pinch of salt. They give us an idea about how well our students perform under examination conditions and how much ‘stuff’ they can remember. (Hopefully) you’ll remember that last week I write to you and talked about ‘passive learning’ and the difference between knowing and understanding. Remember? This week I’ve been in classrooms looking at “the range of interactions between teacher and student and student/Student”. In other words, student engagement . Like last week, I’ve seen the full range. I’ve seen lots of lessons where children lead their own learning, ask great questions and where they make lots of links to previous learning (what they did before). I’ve also seen a smaller number of students still sitting passively and waiting for their teacher to pour information into them. Our staff work hard to correct this behaviour, but our job would be infinitely easier if more parents would help us by talking to their children about this. When was the last time you asked your child a why question? Next week promises to be another great newsletter with reports back from trips and opportunities. I hope to see as many of you as possible at the information sessions next week, and if you have not had chance to say hi to me yet, please do drop in. Finally, I had one email from 1 parent about their thoughts on school uniform. One (you know who you are!) Giles Mongare Head of Secondary
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IGCSE/GCSE Results 20152016 We would like to congratulate last year’s Year 11 students for achieving another fantastic set of IGCSE/GCSE results. Over the course of the academic year, we had 611 exam entries from a total of 100 students (including some early entries), with 52.9% of entries achieving the top grades of A*/A. Our A*C grade percentage was a fantastic 89.0% across the range of 24 subjects, which when compared to the world average of 68% for our specific subject selection, is an amazing achievement. Parents will be aware of our baseline testing policy when students enter IGCSE, and our results show that compared to baseline predictions, there was an average gain of nearly half a grade across every single entry. Although we are extremely proud of all our students, we would like to make a special mention for the following students, who across their subject selection averaged more than an A grade: Nuraishah Shafiq – 9 A* Annelise Ratner – 8 A* & 1 A Chloe Yin Jun Hng – 7 A* & 2 A Mahon Michael Leddy – 6 A* & 2 A Shamaine Chan – 6 A* & 1 A Thera Boonyamarn – 6 A* & 1 A Dhruv Pathak – 5 A* & 4 A Jasmin Eserman 5 A* & 4 A Aniqah Chen Binti Faris – 5 A* & 4 A Alinkar Aung Win Maung – 5 A* & 3 A Oliver Rose – 5 A* & 3 A Patrick John Main Hahn – 5 A* & 2 A Min Ern Ernest Teh – 4 A* & 4 A Ernest Wei Zhang Poon – 4 A* & 4 A Hey Gin Kim 4 A* & 4 A Win Wen Ooi – 4 A* & 3 A Caleb Wong Han – 4 A* & 1 A Wei Xuan Phor – 3 A* & 4 A Ria Jasmine Wee 2 A* & 6 A
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IB Diploma Results 20152016 We would also like to congratulate the Year 13 cohort who completed the IB Diploma last year and continued the Uplands tradition of averaging significantly higher than the world average IB scores. These results reflect the amazing dedication of both our students and teachers to the IB programme, which has opened up some fantastic opportunities to continue developing their IB learner profile in far flung destinations such as the US, Canada, UK, Australia, Asia, and beyond. Our IB statistics for May 2016 exams are as follows: Uplands Average Diploma Score: 34.12 World Average Diploma Score (May 2016): 30.07 Pass Rate for Subjects: 97.78% World Average Pass Rate: 79.30%
Again, a few special mentions have to go out to students who scored some really exceptional 40+ scores what a brilliant achievement! Ka Rin Sim 44 points Xin Tze (Juniel) Tan 42 points Caryl Teh 41 points Matthew (Wei Han) Poon 41 points Christine (Pei Xin) Tan 40 points Jo Xing (Eunice) Ong 40 points James Brady 40 points
Dawn Easton
Head of Assessment
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Upcoming Drama Performance You are invited! Where: Penangpac Studio 2, Straits Quay When: Thurs 8th Sept @ 8.30pm Cost: Admission by donation To reserve tickets, please email [email protected]
‘You’ve seen the battle, but have you witnessed the aftermath? Performed by four talented uplands students, ‘Shell
Shock ’ grasps the crude reality of war – away from the battlefield and alongside the dire consequences that linger on the affected.’
Alison Hurst
Head of Drama
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Another week has swept by quickly and it is hard to believe we have almost completed a month of the new academic year. Primary celebrated National Day on Tuesday with students and staff proudly wearing national costumes.
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Future Events: Friday 2 September Year 3 visit to Wax Museum (am) Monday 12 September School closed Hari Raya Haj Wednesday 14 September UPTA coffee morning meeting 8:30am, Park Royal Hotel Friday 16 September School closed Malaysia Day Monday 19 September Primary Sharing Assembly, 2:00pm Parents invited to attend Introducing our Primary Prefects for 2016 2017
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Back row from left:: UMin OH (Leo), Sang Wan PARK, Finlay GRAY, Alexis ALCAZAR SANCHEZ, Keira JORDAN, Vridhi CHHABRA, Johanne DALSGAARD
Front row from left: Zephai GABO, Filip HALLING, Liam EGGER, Karoline HILKJAER, Jaemi LEE
The roles and responsibilities of the Primary Prefects are to lead by example, mentor younger students, support school events and to work collaboratively to further develop their leadership and communication skills. The Secondary Prefects will also mentor these students providing continuity across our student leadership body. The House Captains lead in a similar role as the Prefects by initiating House activities within the Primary school and supporting whole school House activities together with the Secondary House Captains. We wish the students selected in these roles a successful and rewarding year ahead.
Introducing the Primary House Captains for 2016 2017
Kelawai House : Solytha DERUDDER, Benjamin JOYCE School House : Jensen WONG, Soahn LEE
Crag House : Pierina LEE, Hung Zhang CHAN (Carlson) Hill House : Li Xing CHEN, Min Fei TAN (Ranee)
Alison Nicholson Head of Primary
SciFi Club
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Every Tuesday at 14:40 Room B205 Years 4 13
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Students from different countries performing ‘Merdeka’ song as they wave the Malaysian flags.
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We hope everyone had a great Merdeka Day this week. We are nowwell into the first term of the school year, and are looking forward to the various events coming up this year. Coffee Morning: Please note that the date of the upcoming UPTA Coffee Morning, at the PARK ROYAL HOTEL, will be held on Wednesday 14th September 2016. We start at 8.15am, until 10.30am. All UPTA members, school leadership and governors are invited to attend this social morning celebrating the Moon Cake (Harvest) Festival. We will also be making some announcements about the school and UPTA in general. We look forward to welcoming as many of you as possible. Parent School Governors: There are now two parent governor positions that have become vacant, due to recent retirement and expansion on the Board of Governors. As a Not for Profit school, it is important that the schools’ members and customers the parents are well represented on this board. If you are interested in applying for this volunteer position, please contact [email protected] for more information. Community Privilege Programme: The list of vendors from last year should still give the same discounts as before, but we are in the process of checking and reconfirming the discounts with them all, so please bear with us. The new list will be finalised and reconfirmed in the next two weeks and will be distributed accordingly. If you have any queries or if you would like us to approach any vendor who may want to offer a special discount to UPTA members, please email [email protected] Arts and Crafts Club: The Arts and Craft group have had a busy week making rubber stamps, under the guidance of Year 4 mum, Wakako San. Please join us every Thursdaymorning, from 8:30 am to 11:30 am in the school refectory. We have different themes and are always making new and interesting items please join us and make new friends as well!
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School Closed Hari Raya Monday 12th September 2016 School Closed Malaysia Day Friday 16th September 2016 School Closed Awal Muharam Monday 3rd October 2016 School Closed CIS Planning Day Tuesday 4th October 2016 School Closed Mid Term Break MondayFriday, 1721 October 2016 School Closed PM CIS Planning Wednesday 9th November 2016 School Closed The Prophet’s Birthday Monday 12th December 2016
End of Term 1 Friday 16 December 2016 New Student Orientations Monday 9 January 2017 Start of Term 2 Tuesday 10 January 2017 School Closed Chinese New Year Monday 30th January 2017 School Closed Mid Term Break MondayFriday 2024 February 2017 End of Term 2 Friday 31 March 2017 Start of Term 3 Monday 17 April 2017 School Closed Labour Day Monday 1st May 2017 School Closed Vesak Day Monday 1st May 2017 End of Term 3 Friday 23 June 2017 New Student Orientation Friday 11 August 2017 Start of Term 1 Monday 14 August 2017 Please note we have upgraded our online calendar to allow you to view different aspects of the calendar. Please click on the relevant tabs. http://www.uplands.org/school/?page_id=15142 The new look online calendar!
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Please note the 6 different views you can choose from to find the events you want.
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