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The Principal's Newsletter

Hanova Fifth Year Concludes

By Francesco Masetti-Placci

Dear Parents and friends,

Our Fifth Year Concludes. Our fifth year has continued to see the school progress to become an excellent international school: last summer we received authorization for the IB Middle Years Programme (MYP), this winter we became an official member of the Association of China and Mongolia International Schools (ACAMIS), in spring we joined the WIDA Language Consortium and became an authorized center for the Associate Board of the Royal School of Music (ABRSM), and finally we closed the school year with the graduation of our first cohort of IB Diploma students and hosting the verification visit to obtain authorization for the IB Primary Years Programme (PYP).

There have been many rewarding, enriching and memorable times for all of us this year.

The entire school community – teachers, staff, students, parents and guests – have collaborated to launch new academic programmes and initiatives: we continue to progress to become a full IB World School during the next school year, we tried to increase the number and quality of events throughout the year – especially our charity projects and commitments -, we launched more clubs and academies and expanded the sports program with different teams and activities.

You can remember some of these moments through the Yearbook, through our photo galleries on the school web site and through the friendships developed in these situations.

From our side, I want to acknowledge the great support we received this year from all our staff, parents and students in our joint journey towards academic excellence in our school.

 New staff for 2016-17. The end of the academic year is always a time when some students, parents and staff leave to go on to other countries, posts or adventures.  I personally wish well to all the families from our community who will leave Hanova and thank them for all that they have done in support of our school. While we wish well to the teachers leaving our school, in order to staff this expansion and to cover natural turnover, we will inform during summer of the new appointments made, with a brief biography for each new teacher or member of staff.

2017-2018 Academic Year and Summer Break. School activities for the 2017 – 2018 Academic Year will start for all students on 14th August 2017, while new families and students are welcome on 11th August for a Family Induction Day on campus. The new school calendar is already available on our web site and if you have any inquiry, please contact Ms. Yang in our Marketing team ( zena.yang@his-xian.com ).

During summer, the school office will remain open, weekdays 9am-4pm, although with fewer staff than normal, still ensuring appropriate support to inquiries and admissions.

I hope all families will be able to have quality time and good rest over the summer break, while we will make appropriate maintenance and preparation of the school and related resources: hope that all will be ready, refreshed and energized for the new school year.

Last News. Since May, our students in Year 3 (Eagles, Hanova3b), Year 4 (Avengers), Year 5 (Y5A, Tigers) and Year 6 (Knight 6) took part in the 1st Interclass Football Tournament, a great opportunity for our Primary students to enjoy their snack and lunch time together, passing, shooting and playing as a team. It was also exciting to see a large number of girls playing and assuming an important role in their respective teams. This demonstrates the huge potential of our Primary sports teams, for sure we will have a strong PYP football team to play with other schools next year.

After 5 games, the best 2 teams were: Avengers and Knight 6. They played a final match this week, an exciting and tense game, where both teams did their best: both missed many opportunities to score, but at the end, Knight 6 scored in the second half. The final score, Knight 6: 1 – Avengers: 0, allowed Knight 6 to become our 1st PYP Interclass Champion. Congratulations to our Year 6 team!

Many thanks to Mr. Jorge and to all teachers and staff who supported this tournament.

The PYP Art Faculty (Mr. Dylan and Ms. Lily) hosted the annual art exhibition during last week in the first floor corridor. We would like to congratulate all the students for all their amazing artworks, which made this exciting exhibition possible. A big thank you also to our teacher, Mr. Trull, who has organized the exhibition.

All the Final Reports have been sent home (in Primary) or generated in Managebac (in Secondary) this week and we are all impressed by how well our students have done this year. Please read through the teachers’ comments very carefully, because in most cases they have suggested what students could do over the summer to improve their academic performance next year.

Several students in Primary and Secondary will receive certificates of academic excellence in different subjects. This fantastic achievement is a testimony to the hard work of the students and the teachers and the collaboration and support of all at Hanova. Thank you all very much!

Finally, we will post the last news and photo galleries on our school web site over the next days. Please take a moment to view these last additions.

International Painting Award. One of our ECA’s is Mr. Gallerno’s Role Playing Games Club. Part of the activities done in this club involves using plastic figures to represent various heroes and monsters in the game. These small models require a degree of skill to assemble and paint and Mr. Gallerno gave students lessons on how to do this during lunch times. A few months ago, Hanova’s Role Playing Club joined the Games Workshop Asia School Alliance (ASA) so that we could expand our network of students with similar interests in China, Indonesia, Thailand and several other countries. Great news! Five of our students entered an ASA model painting competition and, after all of the hundreds of submissions were judged, Alessandro Sanità-Boezio in Year 10 won 2 awards: neatest painting and overall best painter! He will get certificates for both of these categories and a package for winning the top prize of best painter. Alessandro will be writing a brief article about the painting competition and how he painted his model, that will be published in the Asia School Alliance newsletter after the holidays. Congratulations to Alessandro and the other students who entered the competition.

Carnival 2017. Saturday, June 10th was a huge success for the Hanova community when we came together to raise over 22,000 RMB for the Yellow River Soup Kitchen while enjoying games, prizes, crafts, food, and Talent Show performances at the 2017 Carnival event. This amount is enough to fully fund the Soup Kitchen for more than 6 weeks and help hundreds of less fortunate people in Xi’an. Many thanks to our generous parents and our sponsors from Shangri-La, Gran Mèlia and Marriott hotels for providing a delicious lunch and some great Lucky Draw prizes. Additional thanks go also to all our staff, especially those on the Carnival committee, who organized the event and worked hard to make everything run as smoothly as possible. We welcome comments, feedback and suggestions on the Carnival or how we could improve future similar events: please contact Mr. Gallerno ( richard.gallerno@his-xian.com ) or Ms. Yang in our Marketing team ( zena.yang@his-xian.com ).

International Award. Hanova is a licensed center for the prestigious International Award. And our first group of Award participants, pursuing the Silver Award – Jimmy Li, Kevin Qu, Lucy Li and Rose Jiang, all from Year 12 – completed their first Qualifying Adventurous Journey last week from 8th to 12th June. One of our Year 13 graduates, Harry Zhang also volunteered to join them in this adventurous journey. This qualifying journey was supported by Chengdu TianFu Mountaineering and Outdoor Sports Association, which is also an International Award Trained Activities Provider.

Supported by the licensed Award assessor, students spent a day planning their journey purpose, route and daily meals by themselves. Students then hiked for 7 hours a day, as required by the Award, and reached the maximum 3900m height. They also successfully built their own tent. It was a challenge, both physically and mentally, and we are proud to say that they’ve all completed the Award requirements in the Adventurous Journey. Congratulations to them!

For more information, please contact our Award Leader Ms. Hou (amy.hou@his-xian.com).

Yours,

Francesco Masetti-Placci

 
 

Upcoming Events

Thursday 15th June       Last Day of School 2016-2017 (Half Day)

Friday 11th August         Welcome Day for New Families

Monday 14th August      First Day of School 2017-2018


About the Author


Francesco Masetti-Placci

Former School Principal

Dr. Masetti-Placci was a former school Principal of Xi'an Hanova International School from 2015-2018. He holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from University of Bologna and a Master in Information Technology from Polytechnic of Milan, with studies also in France (University of Rennes) and the USA (Washington University). Before joining Hanova, he previously has taught in secondary schools and universities in Italy, France, USA and China.


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