Andrew Weiser
andreww@isb.ac.th
Dear Parents,
As always, if you are concerned about your son’s or daughter’s performance or experiences here at ISB or outside of school, do not hesitate to contact his or her counselor. We’re here to help.
Last Thursday or Friday (Nov. 27, 28) students received their semester exam schedule. December 8 and 9 will be review days and the exams are December 10, 11, 12, 15 and 16.
Grade 12 – The next few weeks will be quite busy in the counseling office as students prepare for exams and as a large percentage of Seniors will submit their university applications. As of today, 64% of Seniors have submitted at least one university application. Some students are completely finished.
Please remind seniors to schedule an appointment as soon as possible with their counselor to submit all of their applications. It’s best to do this before exams begin on December 10 so that students can focus solely on a strong academic performance on those end of semester assessments. Applications should be complete when a student sees their counselor to submit.
Finally, please continue to offer support to your Senior through what can be a very stressful time. We hope you can assist in bringing some balance to the conversations at home about university. For most of you, these are the last few months you’ll be living together as a family so it’s important to protect that time together.
Grade 11 – Last week Grade 11 students attended Junior Seminar with their counselor. The topic of the seminar was “How to begin researching universities and the university application process.” Students were given a packet work to be completed by February 2. If your son/daughter did not attend last week’s Junior Seminar and/or not receive his/her Junior Packet, please inform him/her to see their counselor.
Parents- Don’t forget, there’s homework for the parents too!! (Parent Perspective)
Grade 10 – All the 10th graders should have met with their counselor this week to talk about school, exams, and anything else that might come up about life both in and out of ISB! We’ve spent time with the sophomores in sessions about personality traits and career possibilities; this was a chance for us to hear from the students about how their year is going.
Grade 9 – This week in Freshman Seminar our 9th graders focused on finalization of their personal learning plan. This will be a working document / website that can be updated throughout their 4 years in high school. It is also an excellent tool for students moving to new schools to share information about themselves as a learner and young person. In addition, we also had a session on healthy choices – where we discussed adolescent drug and alcohol use. Part of the session revisited some of the effects and consequences of its use. Students then reviewed and discussed refusal techniques / skills and how they might handle different scenarios.
Freshman were also reminded that if there is a good chance that they will be relocating next school year then the second semester they should consider taking Chemistry 2. By doing so they will have a full credit of the same science. This can be more transferable for most schools that students will transfer to.
Every year we have a handful of students who may be applying to high schools / boarding schools in other countries for the following school year. Some of these deadlines are in January / February, especially for boarding schools in the United States. It is important that the student’s counselor and counseling office are informed of these January deadline applications by Friday December 5th so that applications can be prepared before the break and make required deadlines.
Upcoming College/University Visits
College Visits will resume in January
Please see Naviance for the extensive list of colleges/universities that will be visiting ISB.
Have a great weekend!
The HS Counseling Department