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IB Asia Pacific Newsletter

Quarter Four, 2006

Message from the Regional Director

Dear all

This is our fourth and final enewsletter edition for 2006. We would like to thank the many schools which have again supported our work this year, by hosting workshops, and/or releasing workshop leaders, committee members and authorisation team members or by joining schools to schools and responding to the call for volunteers. We wish the November session schools success with the Diploma examinations and a happy, relaxing and safe summer break.

Conference and Events

Over the last two months we have had a number of opportunities to meet up with many of you at the Hanoi Regional Conference, at the EARCOS Administrators Conference, in Shanghai at the International Forum for Teacher Education and at the Alliance for International Education held the same week and most recently at the Tokyo Symposium on IB Education.

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Dr Indu Shahani, IB Asia-Pacific RAC member and representative on the CoF pictured here with colleagues from the Indian IB schools and Judith Guy.

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Dr Ian Hill, Deputy DG, at the International Forum for Teacher Education, Shanghai

Joint Visits

Many schools will be pleased to know that we are making some progress with initiatives to offer joint evaluation and/or joint accreditation/evaluation visits in the future. A full day meeting was held with the Programme Managers and with Marilyn George from WASC and Margaret Alvarez from CIS on 1 November. Issues regarding the further development of documentation, the nature of the visiting teams and Oganisational requirements with respect to reports were discussed. Several schools will now take part in pilots over the next two years to streamline these processes.

Regional Advisory Council

Dr Masood Faizullah has accepted the position as Chair of the IB Asia-Pacific Regional Advisory Council. Masood has already served on the RAC for the past three years and is a trustee for IB Asia-Pacific under the Singapore Charity Law. He is a businessman based in Singapore and has two sons who have completed the IB Diploma. We thank him and all the members of the RAC for volunteering their time and experience to contribute to the further development of the IB in this region.

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Dr Masood Faizullah, Judith Guy and Ian Spence

University and Government Recognition

The Regional Conference in Hanoi gave us the opportunity to meet with schools representatives by country to update initiatives being taken to forward understandings of the programmes by University and Government Ministry officials specifically in Indonesia and the Philippines. Thank you to Mr A.P.Singh from GMIS, Jakarta for representing IB Schools at the recently held summit for Evaluation and Legalisation of International School Certificates held in Jakarta.

Our sincere thanks to Mr Chris Faisandier of AIS, Saigon for facilitating a meetings between Vietnamese MOET and IB Representatives on 5 October. 

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Chris Faisandier is pictured above with Dr Nguyen Anh Dung, Deputy Director General for the National Institute for Education Strategy and Curriculum and Ms Vu Thi Loi, Researcher with the Secondary Education Department of the Ministry.

Our thanks also to Mr Jason Xu, Principal of Shanghai World Foreign Language School for organising meetings with the Xuhei Education Bureau in Shanghai. 

rdshanghai IB staff with Shanghai Education Authority staff fron Xuhei Education Bureau

Meetings in China gave us the opportunity to appreciate the phenomenal achievements that have been made in the last two decades in delivering basic education across China and affirmed the potential demand for access to international educational programmes.

On Friday 24 November, Kyoko Bernard and I had the opportunity to meet with Mr Kazuo Watanabe, the new Director of the International Affairs Division of the Ministry of Education in Tokyo prior to the First IB Education Symposium held in Japan and hosted by Tamagawa University. More than 200 Japanese educators attended this event and our thanks go to the representatives of the IB Schools in Japan who turned out in force to support this initiative.

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Participants at the Symposium at Tamagawa University

Part 1 of the Australian University and Curricula research project is underway with a survey of Perceptions of the IB Diploma Programmes in Australasian Universities having been sent out to all Universities in Australia and New Zealand.

Further visits were made to the Vice Chancellors and key representatives of Indian Universities in early September. Universities visited included Delhi University, Pune University and the Symbiosis International Educational Institutes in Pune.

Indian Development Council

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Members of the Indian IB Development Council at HR College, University of Mumbai on 10 September, 2006 Prof. Mohan Menon, Dr Indu Shahani, Mrs Nita Ambani, Mr Dr David Wilkinson (Chair), Judith Guy and John McCandless. Obscured but in attendence were Farzana Dohadwalla and Nilofer Kalfra. 

The IBIDC Council will meet again in Mumbai  in February to further discuss issues of University Recognition, the IB’s commitment to Community Service and Access Projects in India and Intellectual Property issues.

We invite schools to provide articles to the January - March 2007 IB Asia-Pacific Newsletter with the latest happenings at your school or if there are any special events, please email ibap@ibo.org by latest Friday, 26 January 2007.

Our best wishes to you all.

Judith Guy, Regional Director

Email: ibap@ibo.org

 


HOT OFF THE PRESS

Information Literacy across the IB Programmes

Registration is OPEN for the second Annual Teachers Convention to be held on

31 March – 2 April 2007 in Singapore.

Staff Changes

Farewell and Thank You

Chanderni Devi will leave our events team at the end of this month to join a marketing firm in Singapore. We have sincerely enjoyed working with Chan and wish her well in her new post and with her ongoing football commitments.

Vacancies in the Regional Office

Due to the continued demand for our programmes and services in the region, we are currently advertising another three programmes positions. We are looking for a third PYP associate regional manager to join the PYP team. We are also recruiting for a DP Associate Manager and a University Liaison and Research manager to join the IB Diploma team. Please click here for the job advertisements [97 kb, PDF]. Applications close on 15 January 2007.

Congratulations!

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Aaron Pushparatnam - the British School IB student representative to the Mondialogo Schools' Context 2006, enjoys a light moment on Rome's Spanish Steps, in the company of other Symposium delegates, from Oman, India and Rumania - a truly international moment in his IB studies.

Congratulations to the CAS Students and Coordinator, Adrian Thirkell from BIS (British International School, Jakarta).

Aaron Pushparatnam, a Year 13 IB student at the BIS, Jakarta, became the IB program's first ever Junior Mondialogo Ambassador to be awarded the top prize in the 2006 UNESCO-Daimler Chrysler Mondialogo Schools' Contest. Aaron collected the trophy, along with Italian partner, Costanza Pozzo, at a glittering gala ceremony at the end of a 5-day intercultural symposium in Rome, November 5th to 8th.

Students from both schools had demonstrated international solidarity by entering the contest by jointly planning for the building of a school for so called 'scavenger' childen, in Jakarta. The school is to be erected in February.

Award in recognition of IB work in Sri Lanka 

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An award was presented to the IB at the Regional Conference on behalf of the Sri Lankan Government. Our STS Liaison in Sri Lanka, Mr Karu Gamage had received this award from Hon. Chamal Rajapaksa, Minister of Agriculture and the Hambantota District Development at a distinguished gathering represented by the top level government officers from the president's office and the Government Agent of the Hambantota District on 12th August.  The award recognised the support of the IB and the OSC in the relief and recovery efforts of Hambantota after the Tsunami devastation to develop the facilities and schools for the children and also to upgrade the livelihood of the effected community.