Term 2, 2012 - 2013 (6) · Rayong in Thailand hosted the sec-ond FOBISSEA Drama and provided a mix...

F R O M T H E C H A I R M A N

Issue No. 2 - 2012—2013

Dear Colleagues and Friends in FOBISSEA Schools, Welcome to the latest edition of the FOBISSEAN newsletter which is published three times per year. FOBISSEA Heads have been discussing and debating the expansion of the Federation for a number of years. These discussions have been in the context of our location in a region of the world where the number of good international schools is increasing and consequently,

so are applications for membership. There are more than 20 schools regionally who have expressed an inter-est in joining the Federation, which currently has 38 full member schools. In recognition of this, at the recent FOBISSEA Heads Business Meeting held at Dulwich College, Beijing, the member school Heads made several decisions that will start to prepare the federation for a period of steady, managed expansion. The first step will be to appoint a full-time Executive Officer who will be empowered to conduct FOBISSEA business in the lengthy periods of time between meetings. The new Executive Officer, once appointed, will support the work of the Executive Committee, which will continue to be composed of elected Heads. To support the projected growth of the federation, the membership sub-committee has been charged with finding ways to streamline the current membership application process and also to consider some changes to the existing categories of membership. A decision has now been made to formally change the name of the federation, so that it accurately reflects our geographical area of influence. The member Heads voted to change the name from FOBISSEA to FOBISIA – the Federation of British International Schools in Asia. This will officially expand the geographical area to include schools located anywhere within Asia. The legal process to change the name of the federation will take some time, so we will remain as FOBISSEA for now. As you read through this newsletter you will get a real flavour for the vibrant and exciting educational oppor-tunities offered by FOBISSEA to the leaders, teachers and students in its schools. The challenge now is to maintain quality in all that we do as we continue to grow and expand.

Shaun Williams CEO & Principal of the British International School, Ho Chi Minh City Chairman of FOBISSEA

T H E F O B I S S E A N

F O B I S S E A N E W S L E T T E R

Dulwich College Beijing, China enjoyed a special moment when they hosted the 1st FOBISSEA Heads’ Business Meeting/EGM away from the usual venues in Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur. This was the result of a change to FOBISSEA’s Constitution which now anchors Conferences in Thailand and Malaysia while moving Business Meetings throughout the regions. This was the first opportunity for many Heads to be able to visit the school which is a relatively new member of the Federation. There was general agreement that FOBISSEA Heads from around the region felt very welcome and were grateful for a brief opportunity to experience the unique culture and sights that make Beijing so special. A very big appreciation was noted to Teachanywhere for their generous sponsorship for the Reception Cocktails. A scrumptious dinner was also sponsored by SCI and held at an authentic Sichuan Restaurant called Na Jian Xiao Guan. Towards the end of the Meeting, the Chairman and its members bid a sad farewell to Sandj Wilderspin, Mike Embley and Christian Barkei who will be leaving FOBISSEA at the end of the academic year. In addition, a note of thanks was given to Brian McDouall, the host of the Business Meeting/EGM who would be returning to his previous post as Director of Dulwich Colleges at the end of the year. We look forward to the next FOBISSEA Business Meeting 2014 which will be hosted by the Taipei European School in Taiwan.

31st January—2nd February 2013 Kolej Tuanku Ja’afar, Malaysia hosted the FOBISSEA Choral Festival from January 31st to February 2nd. About 80 students from schools in Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia attended. Two days of re-hearsing culminated in the final concert that featured music rang-

ing from folksong arrangements to songs by Adele and Michael Jackson and ending with Bohemian Rhapsody. The choir was accompanied by the music staff and also by instrumentalists from KTJ.The students also took part in a dance workshop and visited the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur. After the concert eve-ryone had a great time at the Festival Dinner. It is hoped that more schools are able to participate in the next festival. Contributed by Stuart Carter, Head of Music KTJ

FOBISSEA CHORAL FESTIVAL 2013 Hosted by Kolej Tuaku Ja’afar, Malaysia

FOBISSEA HEADS’ BUSINESS MEETING 2013 - hosted by Dulwich College Beijing, China



Garden International School (GIS) Rayong in Thailand hosted the sec-ond FOBISSEA Drama and provided a mix of acting and action.

It was held at the Rayong-based school and was a complete success. The students experienced many hours of drama work-

shops during the event, which was held from February 13-16, that focused on everything from move-ment to dance, to soundscapes, to choreographed fighting!

Students, who came from several countries within Southeast Asia, enjoyed copious amounts of food, which was excellently prepared by the staff at Brookside Valley Resort, which is where the event was held. The FOBISSEA participants even found time to have a pool party and disco. On the final day, eve-ryone returned to GIS and put on various performances based on what they had learned before a packed audience. For more on GIS, visit www.gardenrayong.com

Contributed by Mr Mark Beales, Head of English

This year’s FOBISSEA Primary Performing Arts Carnival (PPAC) was held in Beijing, China from 14-18 March, 2013 and hosted by the British School of Beijing. The Taipei European School partici-pated by sending 10 students with choral and instrumental back-ground ranging from Year 4 to Year 5. During the 3 days of the Music Carnival, teachers and students were absorbed in workshops in dance, drama, and arts. Apart from working with their focused groups, students had a chance to ex-plore the related fine arts subjects. The theme of the Carnival was “ A World of Talent”, giving the opportu-nity to appreciate the variety of music and culture in this great continent providing the children with a variety of enjoyable learning experiences

within the fields of dance, drama, singing, and musical.

FOBISSEA PRIMARY PERFOMING ARTS CARNIVAL (PPAC) Hosted by British School Beijing, from 14—18 March 2013

Drama Success at Garden International School, Rayong



Five schools came to Beijing from across Asia to enjoy the FOBISSEA Primary Games hosted by Harrow International School Beijing from the 7th to the 9th of June 2012. FOBISSEA schools like Bangkok Prep Regents School Pattaya, Taiwan European School, Discovery Bay International School and from China the British School of Guangzhou participated in the games. Each of these schools fielded teams from Year 4 (8 to 9 years old), Year 5 (9 to 10 years old) and Year 6 (10 to 11 years old). As the new Harrow site in Beijing was not ready, the true spirit of education to provide great learning for all our children prevailed and ISB, Dulwich College and the British School stepped up and helped Harrow with venues for the games. On the first day, all the schools took part in swimming and athletics. The second day was dominated by T-Ball tournaments for each of the year groups and on the final day, everyone took part in football. At the Gala Dinner on the Saturday evening, the Headmaster of Harrow Beijing, Mr. Matthew Farthing, said “this games was a wonderful opportunity for the children to learn to win with humility and lose with grace supported by a framework of international co-operation and as Headmaster I felt proud to be part of the FOBBISSEA and of the community of schools in Beijing who freely lent us some of their facilities.” Everyone had a wonderful time at the games and we at Harrow look forward to meeting all our new friends again.

The 27 Under 13 FOBISSEA (Federation of British International Schools in South East Asia) athletes from British International School Phuket (BISP) have just returned from five days of tough competition against seven other international schools in Penang Malaysia (6-11 March 2013). The 12 and 13 year olds competed in athletics, swimming, football and basketball. Out of the eight schools, the students from BIS Phuket were the overall winners of the competition held in Penang, Malaysia,

and earned a fantastic set of team results: first in athletics; first in swimming; first in the girls football; first in the boys football, third in the girls basketball and fifth in the boys basketball. Mr Rex Grey, Athletics Director said when sharing the fantastic results with the BISP school community, “a tremendous thanks goes to coaches/teachers Rachel Duce, Dave Curran, Jamie Blake, Helen Sweeney, Liz Lewis and Josh Burge, and to BISP parent coaches, Mark Mallia and Bjorn-Erik Willoch; all did a great job in preparing the respective teams and giving up so much personal and family time.” cont/-

FOBISSEA Primary Games - hosted by Harrow International School, Beijing

BIS Phuket U13 FOBISSEA Team Victorious in Penang



BIS Phuket U13 FOBISSEA Team Victorious in Penang

A DATE FOR YOUR DIARY:- FOBISSEA LEADERSHIP CONFERENCE AND AGM 2013

27—29 October 2013

Mr Neil Richards BIS Phuket Headmaster, added, “many congratulations on the excellent results, you are certainly putting BISP on the map in a big way!” The seven other schools competing in the Under 13 FOBISSEA competition were: The International School of Penang (Uplands), Kellett School Hong Kong, The International School Brunei, The British International School Beijing, Dulwich College Suzhou, St. Andrew’s International School Bangkok and Taipei European School. Contributed by Kirsten Smallcombe, Marketing Manager

The Annual FOBISSEA Leadership Conference and AGM 2013 will this year be hosted by St. Christopher’s International Primary School, Penang, Malaysia from 27—29 October 2013 at the very exclusive Shangri-La’s Rasa Sayang Resort & Spa. This will coincide with St. Christopher’s 50th Anniversary academic year. Last year it was hosted by The Alice Smith School, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. This event will bring together the Heads of Schools and Senior Leaders to discuss, exchange ideas and share best practices, not forgetting working on networking. It will be an exclusive FOBISSEA Conference where it will focus on leadership within our Federation that is unique to British type International Schools. There will be also presentations, workshops and activities that will focus on members’ needs and our development as a Federation.

John Gwyn Jones, Principal of St. Christopher’s International Primary School, is in the process of securing excellent guest presenters for the Leadership Conference. To date, the following guest speakers have been secured - Sir John Jones, Martin Skelton and Andy Phillips.

A Pre-Conference training on school inspections will be held a day prior to the Conference by CfBT, CIS PENTA and Tribal. We hope to offer opportunities for school governors or school owners to also attend and benefit from having some training and dialogue by CIS.

We will also be welcoming our Affiliate Members as well as supporting exhibitors to participate in the Exhibition to get to know the Heads of Schools and Senior Leaders from FOBISSEA Member schools as well as to share their products and services.

Please look out for more information on the FOBISSEA website www.fobissea.org or contact John Jones at [email protected], his PA, Ms Doris, [email protected] or Gurmeet, [email protected] should you have any further enquiries.



Since 2009 FOBISSEA schools have ventured together to discover the preferred values of Community Service inspired by the Strategic Plan commitment 4.3:

• Develop a set of core values in relation to the needs of the environment and local/disadvantaged communities that FOBISSEA schools would adhere to and that would become part of the criteria for membership. • Share opportunities and good practice between FOBISSEA schools to extend the range of community partners to enable all students to contribute to and learn from environmental and community service projects. • To develop guidelines for FOBISSEA schools in the devel-opment of such projects especially where students from a variety of schools work together.

Conferences have been hosted by the following schools: 2009 The Regent’s Pattaya, Thailand, 2011 British International School, HCMC, Vietnam, 2012 St. Stephen’s School, Bangkok, Thailand and 2013 Garden International School, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The main objective of the conferences have been to create a working party to agree on the core values, the set of guidelines, to share opportunities, promote benchmarking for programs e.g. Eco-schools or recommended service trip providers, meet training needs and ensure that common good practice is shared. The first step was to define “community partnership” as being exactly that, a partnership, which is com-pletely balanced and mutually beneficial to both parties. The core values being devised to echo this definition. The working party aim to also agree and publish a Community Service Guidebook and resources and discuss student opportunities concentrating on: • Creating a bi-annual conference and student event for different age groups and cultural perspec-

tives, to share their practice, strengthen their skills and characters, and inspire! • Promoting Service trip opportunities within the FOBISSEA region

We look forward to bring-ing delegates together in Kuala Lumpur to continue development towards meeting the strategic plan for Community Service. Thus enabling FOBISSEA schools to collaborate and create the most sophisti-

cated and impressive extended learning provision for their students across the FOBISSEA network. Contributed by Ms Emma Jane Morris, Community Service Projects Manager, BIS Ho Chi Minh City

FOBISSEA Community Service Update



The 2013 FOBISSEA Short Story Competition is open to students of FOBISSEA schools only. This year will be the 3rd time the Short Story Competition has been held. This year the competition will be hosted by Harrow International School Bangkok. The theme of this year’s Short Story is “Secrecy”. All students from year 3 up are eligible to enter. There will be 2 categories with a word limit of 600 worlds for Primary (Years 3—6) and 1000 word limit for Secondary (open). The closing date will be Monday, 6th May 2013. The winner and two runners-up in each category will receive trophies and have their stories published on the FOBISSEA website Entries. More information about the competition can also be found on the FOBISSEA website:-

- http://prezi.com/dtsa9tb9xwkg/2013-fobissea-short-story-competition/

The Judge this year is Author and Illustrator: Joseph Theobald - http://www.contactanauthor.co.uk/authorpage.php?id=583 Joseph is the author of several books for children including the 'Marvin the sheep' series. 'Marvin Wanted More!' is a winner of the Macmillan Prize and gained a Welsh Books Council award for most borrowed library book in 2010. His books have

been published in over ten different languages and have captured the imagina-tion of children around the world. Website - www.sheepsy.com About Joseph Theobald Joseph lives mostly in France in an old farmhouse but is currently spending more time in the UK for school visits and workshops. Whenever possible he likes to travel the world living and working in exotic places, occasionally settling down for long enough to write a new picture book. He speaks English, French and Spanish. Joseph studied Illustration at Falmouth college of Arts and his first book 'Marvin wanted MORE!' is a winner of the Macmillan Prize for children's book illustrations. Wishing students all the best!

2013 FOBISSEA Short Story Competition



For contributions to the FOBISSEAN Newsletter please contact :

Gurmeet Kaur, Administrator: [email protected]

& for CPD contributions to:

Tania Donoghue, FOBISSEA CPD Facilitator: [email protected]

V I S I T O U R W E B S I T E www.fobissea.org

FOBISSEA CALENDAR DATES FROM APRIL — JUNE 2013

APRIL 12 - 13 April 2013 Senior Leaders

APRIL 19 - 20 April 2013 MFL JAWS

MAY 3 - 4 May 2013 Primary Creative Writing JAWS

MAY 3 - 4 May 2013 Gifted and Talented JAWS

MAY 7 May, 2013 FOBISSEA Primary C Games

MAY 8 - 11 May 2013 FOBISSEA Primary A2 Games

MAY 16 - 17 May 2013 HOPE (Heads of PE) Meeting

MAY 16 - 18/19 May 2013 The Music Teachers Conference

MAY 24 - 25 May 2013 Sixth Form JAWS

MAY 22 - 26 May 2013 FOBISSEA Primary B2 Games

MAY 31 May - 1 June 2013 DCB Netball/Rugby (Invitational) JUNE 8 June 2013 CPD Leaders Executive Committee Meeting

JUNE 5 - 9 June 2013 FOBISSEA Primary B1 Games

JUNE 10 June, 2013 FOBISSEA Executive Committee Meeting

JUNE 13 - 15 June 2013 Primary A1 Games (Invitational) JUNE 20 - 21 June 2013 Science JAWS











MAY 31 May - 1 June 2013 DCB Netball/Rugby (Invitational)

JUNE 8 June 2013 CPD Leaders Executive Committee Meeting



JUNE 13 - 15 June 2013 Primary A1 Games (Invitational)

JUNE 20 - 21 June 2013 Science JAWS















JUNE 13 - 15 June 2013 Primary A1 Games (Invitational) JUNE 20 - 21 June 2013 Science JAWS















JUNE 13 - 15 June 2013 Primary A1 Games (Invitational)

JUNE 20 - 21 June 2013 Science JAWS

Term 2, 2012 - 2013 (6) · Rayong in Thailand hosted the sec-ond FOBISSEA Drama and provided a mix...

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