by Marc de Vries
marcwjdevries@gmail
On 15 September the Board of Trustees had its first Board Meeting of the school year. The main topics covered were (1) presentation of the Financial results 2014-2015 and (2) Outdoor Education.
Financial Results 2014-2015
Vivien Brelsford presented the Financial Results for 2014-2015. Overall the results for the year were satisfactory. Enrollment reached 1970 students at the end of the school-year divided as follows: ES 753, MS 487, and HS 706. Actual income was THB 1,699,370,517 only marginally below budget. At THB 1,633,227,795 expenses were also generally within budget with a few exceptions, including additional consultant costs related to child safeguarding and security assessment. As a result, the net surplus of the year was THB 66,142,722 or 4.4% of Income. The cash reserve increased to THB 887,307,191 equal to 60% of annual operating expenses (excl. depreciation).
With little debt and increasing cash reserves, ISB has out-grown some of the Financial Matrix stipulations established by the Board in 2009, so these metrics will be re-assessed by the Business Committee.
Outdoor Education (Wilderness Campus)
After several progress reports over the past few years, the Leadership Team presented a comprehensive proposal for the Board to decide on an Outdoor Education Program. In line with ISB’s vision of being “a model of excellence in educating students for success in the world community”, the idea behind outdoor education is to provide opportunities for students to develop character traits and learning dispositions that enable them to cope in an uncertain world. The curriculum will aim to teach skills around a progressive program of outdoor activities that will challenge and compel participants to learn how to manage themselves and work collaboratively with others.
The program will mostly benefit upper Elementary, Middle and High School students and will offer age appropriate outdoor education curriculum as well as provide learning opportunities for existing courses (e.g. Geography, Environmental Studies etc.) in an authentic context. While the outdoor education program is will replace some of the current school outings, for the most part, it will be complementary to existing field-trips and service-related activities, such as GCW and others.
Of the various options presented, the Board approved the development of a formal Outdoor Education Curriculum and the go-ahead for pursuing a dedicated environmental education campus owned and operated by ISB. This option has several advantages, including safety of students and quality of offered programs. Furthermore owning our own facility will involve lower annual costs compared to using non-owned sites and outside contractors.
As part of the evaluation process the board considered the potential impact the wilderness campus would have on other viable learning projects. The outdoor education program is expected to benefit most ISB students over multiple years and will fill a large perceived gap in ISB’s delivery of high quality education. Nevertheless the relative small investment and operational costs will not affect any other (potential) initiatives, and will only reduce the school’s cash reserves by an estimated 7%.
So far, several potential sites have been evaluated and the preferred sites are in the vicinity of Kaeng Krachan reservoir because of the ease of access to flat water, the ocean, mountains, and its relative proximity to Bangkok. The details of the site selection and appraisal are now delegated to the Business Committee who will make the final recommendation to the board after a full due diligence process.
The next Board meeting is at 6PM on Tuesday 27 October and is open to all stakeholders.