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| 28 August 08 (09:29 EAT) |
| 14 September 2007 Dear Parents, I wanted to give you a brief update at the end of our fifth week of term. On Arusha Campus, we invited a few parents from the different communities that make up ISM to come in on Thursday morning for a coffee and a chat with Adrian Moody and I about the school. About eight parents attended and we were able to have a very good discussion about their perceptions of the school and any issues they wanted to discuss – basically an open agenda. This format seemed to work well and Adrian and I plan to do more of these small group coffee mornings in Arusha during the year. I imagine this effort may draw some criticism from some quarters of the community because it may not appear available to everyone all at the same time. However, the intention is to allow more people to better communicate their views in an informal setting where they can speak so others can listen and listen so others can speak. Of course, we still encourage parents to see Adrian and I individually on any issues they like and you can contact us anytime to arrange an appointment. We will be looking to hold similar meetings in Moshi, of course. New Parents Association Constitution There seems to be some questions still circulating about the parent committees at ISM. Let me try to shed a little light here. Currently, there is a sub-committee appointed by the Board to propose terms of reference for a new parents’ association that will replace the PCM and PCA as one parent’s association for the whole school with representation from both Arusha and Moshi. The committee’s first draft was sent to PCM and PCA members for their comments and their feedback is now being considered by the sub-committee and a revised version will be presented to the Board at the end of the month. I want to thank the following people for their input into the process: PCA, which currently has three members: Saskia Rechsteiner, Richard Beatty and Sameera Remtulla, and PCM, which currently has five members: Satti Bhamra, Christine Baissac, Pauline Martin, Sylvia Vlaskamp and Elaine Macha. I expect the new parents association will have representation from both campuses, representation on the Board and an annual general meeting to which ISM parents are accustomed. S5 Trip The S5 classes joined on Wednesday to take a trip to Tarangire National Park for their Geography fieldwork. We are very lucky to have access to this beautiful park for the students and I am sure they enjoyed the excursion, but possibly not the washing up and the writing up. I want to thank Ms. Kitterer, Ms. Armon, Mr. Newman and Mr. Dawson for teaching and supervising on this trip. I also want to thank all the teachers who stayed behind to cover classes. Marketing ISM As you know, the Board has approved a new tuition/boarding incentive plan for classes P3 to M4 on Moshi Campus that was launched this week. The reason for targeting this sector is because we have the capacity to take in students in Moshi and it will be better educationally, and of course economically, to have more students in these classes. One parent told me this move was unfair to existing parents. All parents with children in these classes in boarding have been notified that they will receive the same package. We have many discounts in place for other ISM parents including family discounts, remissions, bursaries and boarding fee reductions for eligible students. The point is that we recognize the enrolment decline that has existed at ISM for a number years and we are now taking some action to address it. Overseas Recruiting We are trying multiple approaches to increasing enrolment this year. I have encountered some resistance on this from some parents who say we have to accept that there is a small market for ISM’s brand of education in East Africa. These parents enjoy our small classes and an IB curriculum taught by mainly expatriate teachers from abroad. Certainly, we all want to maintain the good things at ISM and we are fortunate to have an accredited IB World School of this calibre in northern Tanzania. Marketing to students overseas has not really worked (yet). We gain a lot of interest in our Visiting Schools Programme and regularly host schools from all over the world. However, as one parent recently pointed out, why would anyone from a first-world country want to send their student to Tanzania? Good point. I believe that it may be possible to attract students with a "study in Africa programme" over the longer term, and we are trying to latch onto the goodwill generated by the VSP programme to raise the profile of ISM internationally. We also are approaching ISM alumni abroad because they know both ISM and Tanzania and we have had some success with attracting a few of their children. Another area we are exploring is utilizing overseas student recruitment agencies. Our Own Backyard One area where I feel we can do a much better job right here on our doorstep is with the local community and in particular with the Asian community in Tanzania. Although we have some Asian families with us at ISM, I think we could be the right school choice for many more in the Muslim and Hindi communities. I understand some of the perceptions about ISM which have prevented the Asian communities from joining ISM in the past and I believe we need to change those perceptions. Certainly, we try to demonstrate our respect for different cultures and religions at ISM. This is especially in my mind with the beginning of the holy month of Ramadan later this week. Our boarding team makes a big effort to ensure that our Muslim boarders are accommodated during the holy month and we try to be mindful when setting our calendar for trips and events. However, I know we could do better with our calendar in this respect. One difficulty we have with our style of education is that we try to make it as experiential for the children as possible and that means teachers and students are busy all the time and there seems to be a trip or event almost every week. It is a good problem to have because the learning is more engaging, but it may cause difficulties for children who are fasting. This is just one example where I feel we need to work better with the Asian communities at ISM. There is no question that we have the best curriculum on offer in the region. I am hoping to begin visiting our Asian communities locally after Ramadan is concluded to present what ISM has to offer educationally. We have been doing this in Mwanza for the past three years, but I think it is high time we did the same in Moshi and Arusha. I also want to invite more families onto our campuses to meet our teachers and see how we teach. The Asian community has been in Tanzania for more than 100 years and has a proud heritage. ISM has only been here 38 years and many of our other communities have been here for even less time. If we truly want to reflect the make up of our host country, I think we need to find ways to reaching out to the Asian community and I am committed to taking the first step this year. Rugby World Cup Finally, I want to leave you with an observation. There has been great excitement recently with the Rugby World Cup. Mr. MacKenzie created a whole weekend’s worth of boarding activities around the theme of rugby last weekend. Teachers and students have created fantasy teams and there have been draws for the different teams in the staffroom. My observation is this. Whenever I watch a physical sport like rugby, I am always impressed by how professional the players are. They can appear to beat the life out of one another for over an hour in pretty violent competition, and then after the game is over, go and have dinner together. I have heard sportsmen talk about leaving it on the field. We ice hockey players from Canada talk about leaving it on the ice. Last year there were some difficult moments in our community and we can continue discussing how the issues were handled and decisions arrived at. Or, we can move on. Another school year is well under way at ISM and I am looking forward to working with parents from all our communities to make our school better. Have a great weekend. Best Regards, Barry Sutherland Chief Executive Officer | |
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