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The Principal's Newsletter

Chinese New Year 2015 celebrations in Primary and Secondary

By Mr Martin Hughes

Dear Parents and

Chinese New Year. We are celebrating Chinese New Year in style.  Events are taking place both today (Primary) and tomorrow (Secondary) to see some of the talents of our community and students and to celebrate the culture of our host country.  The Primary celebration was played out to a packed hall and performers came from across the Primary with particularly strong representation from the younger classes.  We have many talented people in school whether it is at paper cutting, Martial Arts, playing the piano cello or violin, singing, reciting or dancing.  The stage looked stunning thanks to the huge efforts of a team of parents as it was converted into a traditional Imperial Palace environment.  We hope all who attended enjoyed the performances and celebration and we thank you for coming along to make the event more special.

Primary CNY Celebration:

Secondary CNY Celebration:

Art Exhibition. A wonderful Art Exhibition was displayed hanging along the verandah making a new corridor of visual treats ready for the Chinese New Year celebrations.  A variety of work was displayed from every student from Nursery up to Y7.  These are the classes taught by Mr Ajay Jain.  We hope you had a chance to see this brief (as the wind would destroy the Art), yet wonderful, outdoor exhibition of Art.  The children will be able to take their pieces home soon.

Primary Years IB Consultant Visit. On Tuesday and Wednesday this week we welcomed Ms Claire Forbes from the International Baccalaureate (IB) Headquarters in Singapore to our school.  She is working as our consultant and critical friend.  She provides us with an objective view of the school, what we are doing well in terms of our readiness for PYP authorisation and what areas we should focus on to meet all the standards and practices of a Primary Years Programme (PYP) IB school.  She was complimentary and identified many strengths of the school, including the huge day to day commitment of the staff and the vision and willingness to invest of the Board and also some areas that we need to work on.   These were issues that we are well aware of and are currently addressing.  Claire’s report helps us to focus those efforts.  We look forward to receiving her full report. 

It will be the role of our incoming coordinator Ms Melissa Biglands to lead on the future development of our PYP.  As I wrote to you last week Melissa has just joined us and is working alongside our current PYP Coordinator Ms Abhi Jain.  Ms Jain will complete her handover to Ms Biglands in the week after the holidays.  We thank Abhi very much for all the hard work that she has committed to Hanova in her time with us.

Student Council Shop. We are pleased to announce that the Student Council Shop is preparing to open for business every school day at lunch time from 12-12:30. The Shop is located on the 3rd floor outside the Senior Common Room for now, but we will make a move to the stairway leading to the auditorium after we build our shop stand. Our main mission is to raise funds for Student Council activities by providing an opportunity for Hanova students to purchase drinks, snacks, and stationery supplies. Operating a shop also offers a really good chance for students to get experience in running their own business. 

An effort has been made to keep most of the snacks on sale healthy (e.g. Apple Chips, milk) but there are a few items such as cookies available. The Student Council feels that it is important to listen to Hanova student requests for Shop items while promoting healthy choices. Please send a note to your child’s homeroom teacher or email the staff adviser for Student Council, Mr Gallerno (Richard.gallerno@his-xian.com) if you have comments, advice, or suggestions related to the Student Council Shop.

Like any business, the Shop does make a profit on goods sold. Funds raised from sales will go into the Student Council budget, which will be used to fund various school and community service projects. Please remember that the last day of school before the Chinese New Year holiday is Friday, 13th February (tomorrow).  School will reopen on Monday, 2nd March.  We wish you a lovely holiday whether you intend to spend the time in a traditional Chinese manner with your family or whatever you do.  We wish you a Happy and Prosperous Year of the Sheep.

Best regards,

Martin Hughes

 

Forthcoming events                

Thursday, 12th               Chinese New Year event (Primary)

Friday, 13th                    Chinese New Year event (Secondary)

Friday, 13th                    Last day before Chinese New Year holiday

March

Monday, 2nd                  School reopens to students


About the Author


Martin Hughes

Former School Principal

Mr Martin Hughes was the founding Principal of Hanova from 2012-15. Prior to his time at Hanova, he already had 23 years of experience as Principal in the UK and China at five different schools - including posts at Wuxi EtonHouse and EtonHouse's flagship Suzhou school. During his time as founding Principal at Hanova, he helped support the initial IB Diploma Programme authorisation (2014) and used his educational vision to help plant our then brand new school on a firm foundation. Under his leadership, Hanova's motto emerged, "Enabling children to become independent, creative and lifelong learners!"


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