12 Oct 2018

Newsletter from the Principal

Dear Parents and Guardians,

As we arrive at the end of another CAS Week, marking the end of a busy and rewarding half term it seems an opportune moment to write to you. As you will have seen from our @stccasweek Instagram posts our students have spent the week exploring the culture, history, cuisine, and natural beauty of multiple overseas locations. Closer to home the College has been buzzing with students involved in cooking, coding & robotics, art, music, and the Year 7 ISTA Theatre Festival, to mention just a few.

Having had the opportunity to visit many of the local CAS Week activities it is clear students have challenged themselves to learn something new. Multi-age groups have put students in scenarios where they need to make new friends and work with a range of different people. The skills development, resilience and confidence children will take from these different, and often challenging learning experiences, whether in Hong Kong or overseas, is a crucial part of their education. This week sharply focuses in on the challenge for Sha Tin College to ensure we are educating our students for the complexity of an uncertain future.

Of course we shouldn’t forget our hardworking Year 13 students who have spent this week working on their IBDP Extended Essay. The week has also provided a wonderful opportunity to get a head-start on university applications. Our Strategic Development Plan highlighted a focus on our Higher Education (HE) provision, which is also something the PTSA have been talking with me about over the course of last year. The College was delighted to welcome Ms. Gigi Lam who joined us in September as a full-time HE Counsellor. This increase in staffing has been a welcome addition to the team along with the appointment of Ms. Jaqueline Kwan as a full-time HE and Alumni administrator.

Another member of staff joining us as our new Events and Communications Manager is Ms. Queenie Au. We recognise from parent feedback through the ESF Stakeholder survey that communications is something you feel needs to be further developed. As part of our Strategic School Development Plan we aim to focus on engaging parents with a richer sense of what is happening at the College. Please feel free to provide Ms. Au with any feedback or suggestions in regard to our communications atqueenie.au@shatincollege.edu.hk. We are working currently to enhance our social media and website communication. As part of that communications and engagement focus you will also be hearing from VP Greg Thornton in the coming weeks about enabling parent access to our SMART platform.

Looking forward, at the end of October we are hosting an IB MYP consultant visit to further support us with the implementation of our newest programme. Our new Assistant MYP Coordinator, Ms. Sarah Geraghty, working alongside VP Greg Thornton, will also be engaging with parents/guardians further, in particular around Year 7 MYP assessment. Into November, our very active Environment & Sustainability team will be challenging us all during ‘Green Week’. Be sure to look out for more information in the weeks to come.

As I mentioned in my last communication, the College has multiple spaces available for rental including excellent sports facilities and multi-purpose spaces. Anyone interested in facility rental should contact our Business Manager for further details.

If you would like to follow life at Sha Tin College more closely please follow our Twitter, Instagram and Facebook posts!

In the meantime have a wonderful and fun-filled October half-term!

Kind regards,

Carol Larkin

Principal – Sha Tin College