Welcome back – Connected
Justin Alexander
justina@isb.ac.th
Dear Parents and Students,
Welcome to the 2021-22 school year which will undoubtedly be a year like no other. Despite the challenges that lie ahead of all of us in these uncertain times, we are all looking forward to reconnecting with our students and ISB families as we kick off the academic year on Monday morning.
We hope you and your families have had relaxing breaks, and were able to see family and friends safely during this time, although it has been more challenging to visit and see friends here in Thailand due to the current COVID situation. We are continually monitoring the situation here in Thailand and we are looking forward to the situation improving sooner rather than later.
The excellent teaching HS faculty have been working hard all week (and over the summer) to make sure that we are ready to provide the best possible learning environment for our students as we once again enter a period of virtual school. We look forward to your help and assistance at home to keep our students well fed, nourished and with a nice environment at home for them to zoom, work and stay connected with their friends and teachers as we start the school year.
Our main focus at the start of the year is to be connected and to build relationships with all of our students no matter where they are at the moment. We will be asking all students regardless of the time zone that they may be in to please join the first three days of school ‘live’. This will give everyone a chance to meet their teachers and classmates and to receive an overview of the semester ahead for each course. For families that are in different times at the moment, please do reach out and email me justina@isb.ac.th to let me know what time zone you are in and what your possible return dates might be. I will be able to share this with teachers, so that they too can be aware of the situation your family might be in at the moment.
With a renewed focus on connections, well being and staying healthy, your children will have the opportunity to join and participate in their clubs, activities and athletics in dedicated time slots after the school days classes have finished. We hope to see many of our students re-engage in their Service Clubs, sports teams and other activities after school, even if it is online. Please keep a look out for messages from our Athletics, Arts, Activities and Club leaders (Mr. Mott, Mr. Giles and Mr. Assimakopoulos).
School starts on Monday with an assembly webinar at 9am. Details will be shared with students directly. If you are looking for more details about our virtual school schedule and protocols, please visit the learning section of our school website (ISB Virtual School | Online Learning ) and scroll down the page and click on the button to see the HS Virtual School Handbook.
Welcome back to our returning students and families and a special welcome to the new families joining us this year (nearly 60 new families in the HS)
Justin Alexander
HS Principal
PowerSchool Schedules and Schedule Changes
Justyna McMillan
justynam@isb.ac.th
Student schedules are now available on PowerSchool. Please ask your child to log into PowerSchool and access their schedule under the ‘MySchedule’ Link.
If students have any issues accessing PowerSchool, they should email Mr. Chris Bell (christob@isb.ac.th).
With the start of a new school year there are always a few disruptions and changes to a students schedule. Students may request a schedule change through their counselor up until the 26th August. Some course changes will require a completed form that includes a parent signature. Please be aware that due to some courses being full, change requests may not be possible for all classes. Please remember that we are also in the process of balancing classes, which may result in a change of section.
Please make sure that your child checks their schedule on Monday morning, to see if there were any changes.
Attendance in Virtual School
Andy Vaughan
andyv@isb.ac.th
As we begin the year virtually we will be closely monitoring attendance of students in High School. One of our successes through the different iterations of online learning we have offered has been maintaining close attention to the attendance of all students, we firmly believe this is linked to continued learning for students.
Attendance for students in local time zones
All students in Thailand and time zones that are within three hours to Thailand’s timezone need to attend class live.
Attendance will be taken in the first few minutes of all classes. For any student who is marked absent, an email will be sent to parents and the student to communicate that they are not in class. If there is ever a mistake with this attendance, please ask your child to contact the teacher in the first instance to correct their attendance on PowerSchool.
Attendance for students in very different time zones
If your child is in a very different time zone, which means that engaging in online learning is not possible for all blocks of the day due to either staying up too late or being awake too early, we encourage them to attend as many periods in the day as possible based on their location.
For example, for students located within America’s time zones, they should attend morning classes, which will be late evening in the USA. For students located within Europe, Africa, or Middle East time zones they should attend afternoon classes, which will be early morning.
The virtual school schedule will be changed to a 5/6 rotation after a couple of weeks to allow students to access all classes from different time zones.
For all students in another time zone, parents should have reached out to Mr. Alexander via email. All students in very different time zones will have attendance recorded with the absence code NPVS (Not Present Virtual School), which does not count towards total absences.
Andy Vaughan
High School Dean of Students
Monday August 16 – First Day Schedule
Andy Vaughan
andyv@isb.ac.th
All students have been communicated via email with the schedules for next week. On Monday we will follow an alternative schedule as detailed below and linked here
Delay Submission of Medical Form
Dhave Setabutr, M.D.
dhaves@isb.ac.th
Given the persistent elevation in Covid-19 cases and restrictions, all nonessential visits needed to update medical forms may be delayed. Although we have extended the deadline to October 15, 2021, please understand depending on restrictions this may be extended. Understand given the nature of the most recent outbreak current delays to these documents will not impact your child’s learning on campus. Students who newly enrolled last year (2020-2021) and are now entering grades 3, 6, and 9 are waived from needing a new physical exam this year.
Parents are encouraged to update other relevant Health Info in Powerschool in the interim.
To update info, scroll to the Medical Update tab and follow the directions below to:
- Review and update your child’s medical status
- Consent to the administration of over the counter medication if necessary
- Consent to the sharing of information with relevant parties
- Consent to treatment in case of an emergency
Updates to vaccine status can be done via one of our nursing team members.
All forms can be downloaded from the ISB website under Health Services.
If you have any queries, please feel free to email a nurse in the Health Centre at nurse@isb.ac.th or call the Health Center at Extension 1144 Monday to Friday.
Regards,
Dhave Setabutr, M.D. | ผศ.นพ.เทพ เศรษฐบุตร
ISB Medical Consultant / Health Coordinator
News from the College Office
Debbie McDowell
debbiem@isb.ac.th
Greetings from the university counselors! We look forward to working with students and families during the 2021-2022 school year as the students plan for their post secondary opportunities.
First, we would like to welcome Curt Nichols to our department. Curt joins us after spending 6 years in the US working as a university counselor at Oaks Christian School in California. Prior to that, he worked at International School Manila, Lahore American School, and the Thai Chinese International School here in Thailand. Curt has also worked with the University of California Berkeley’s Admission Office and the Elite Education Institute in California. Curt brings a wealth of knowledge as a true professional in the field. We are excited to have him join our team!
The university counselors will kick off the Senior Seminars with the grade 12 students next week and look forward to setting up Senior Family Conferences starting 25 August. Mark your calendars, Senior Family University evening will be on 1 September at 6:30 pm. Junior (Grade 11) Family University evening will be on 14 September and Junior Seminars will start the week of 20 September. All the university counselors are excited to start our work with the students and families.
If any students or parents have questions for their university counselor, please reach out by email. Students can find out which counselor has been assigned to your family by checking on Powerschool.
Colleges and universities are offering many online opportunities to find out more about their institutions and campuses. Please check out the Virtual University Visits that will list the events that universities have alerted us about. Remember to go directly to the admissions page of the colleges and universities that you are particularly interested in to find out more about opportunities to connect with their representatives, take virtual tours or attend information sessions.
We all hope that students and families have a smooth start to the new school year. We look forward to our time together and wish each of you the best.
Let me know if you need anything else,
Deb
Ms. Debbie McDowell (she, her, hers)
Head of University Counseling
Zoom ID: 987 104 3514
News from HS Counselors
Jackie Valenzuela
jackiev@isb.ac.th
Welcome back! We hope your family had a restorative break. We are looking forward to our time with your student/students this year.
As a reminder, students can make changes to their schedule until Thursday, August 26. They can email their counselor with their requests.
We will be reaching out to students to check in over the next several weeks. Your student is also welcome to send us an email requesting to meet anytime. We are here to support not only their academic needs, but most importantly their social and emotional wellbeing.
Here’s to a great 2021-2022 school year!
High School Counselor
Season One High School Athletics
Chris Mott
chrism@isb.ac.th
Season One Athletics for High School Students will begin on Wednesday the 18th of August. All Season One programs will be offered and we are excited to have students engaged in their respective passions and interests. Volleyball, Soccer and Cross Country are the offered sports during Season One Athletics.
While we will start Season One with an adapted schedule and program students can expect to see a regular schedule implemented as soon as we return to campus. High School students will receive further information about the schedule on Monday the 16th of August.
More information about the upcoming seasons can be found on www.inside.isb.ac.th/isbathletics
Wishing everyone a fantastic start to the year!
Lets Go Panthers!!!
Chris Mott
Athletic Director
AUDITIONS POSTPONED for High School Musical: The Musical
Anthony Giles
anthonyg@isb.ac.th
Dear Wildcats,
Hope this email finds you all healthy and feeling resilient as we once again face the challenges related to the pandemic and virtual school. Not sure about you, but starting online was not What I’ve Been Looking For. In fact, I feel like I need someone to shout, “Hey, Get’cha Head in the Game!” But who knows, with adversity comes change, and maybe this is really the Start of Something New, and a time when we will all learn to Bop to the Top!
Even though the materials have arrived for our production of High School Musical: The Musical, we do not think this is a time to Stick to the Status Quo with our audition schedule. So, until we have a clearer picture of when students will be back on campus, or In the House, so to speak, we are writing to let you know that auditions have been postponed.
While we remain hopeful that we will all be Breaking Free from remote learning soon, and inspired that once back, the show might serve as a rallying cry for our entire community that We’re All in This Together, we thought it was important to let you know about the production delay. Have a great start to the year!
Sincerely,
Mr. Giles, Ms. Fuson, Ms. McMillan, and Ms. Price
Multilingual Learning at Home
Avery Udagawa
averyu@isb.ac.th
Welcome to the new school year! Virtual School is a great time to use ALL our languages at home when discussing learning.
Here are ISB’s Tips on Multilingual Learning at Home (see below video).
Here are Four Resources for Parents of Multilinguals.
Panther Native Language Academy classes will begin virtually, on or shortly after August 30, in step with Panther Activities. More details to come.
If you have questions, feel free to email!
PantherNativeLanguageAcademy@isb.ac.th
Avery Udagawa