Tenby Schools, Penang and COBIS Membership The end of January 2015 saw Tenby Schools, Penang awarded association membership to COBIS (Council of British International Schools). Our school joins with the other Tenby Schools in the Tenby Group in achieving this honour. COBIS is a membership association of British International schools of global quality and is one of 8 constituent members of the Independent Schools Council (ISC) of the United Kingdom. COBIS meets the needs and aspirations of its global members by: Providing quality assurance in member schools Representing members with the British Government, educational bodies, the corporate sector and Ministries of Education worldwide Delivering high quality conferences and training programmes for leaders, teachers, governors and support staff Engaging, challenging and inspiring students of all ages and abilities by delivering excellent interschool student competitions and events Commmunicating news and research about developing practice in the International and UK education sector Facilitating high impact 'Member to Member' professional networking. Membership entitles member schools to include the COBIS logo on all printed and electronic communications and provides our school community to access the services provided by COBIS. This organization s endorsement brings with it international recognition for our School s; High quality teaching and learning An international-mindedness that drives all of our programmes Benchmarking our students against international standards Philosophical alignment with international humanitarian and global citizenship Organizational and administrative quality, High quality of policies and procedures including; Teaching and Learning, Health and Safety, Safe Recruitment Policies, Crisis Management, Teacher Training and Development, Staff Induction, Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Procedures, and many others. More information about the functions of COBIS may be found at http://www.cobis.org.uk/ Gregory C Mowday Campus Principal Tenby Schools, Penang 1
Who s Who in Tenby Schools, Penang In January s Newsletter a graphic was included to show the faces behind the names of the Tenby Schools Parent Association. From that inclusion came the realization that it is likely that while parents know the teachers in their own section of the school, it is likely that they do not know the staff from other sections. We feel that this needs to be addressed and in this newsletter would like to introduce you to the Senior Leadership Team of the School. Mr Gregory C Mowday M.Ed, B.Ed, DipT Campus Principal Mdm Thum Lin Chee BA (Ed) Deputy Head Sri Tenby Mr Cheah Sin Hock BSc (Hons), DipEd Head of Sri Tenby Ms Marian Bartlett B.Arts (Hons), PGCE, NPQH Head of TIPS Mr Richard Lukats B.Arts, PGCE, NPQH Acting Head of TISS Ms Shirley Tang B.BusAdmin (Hons), Dip ACC School Bursar The people in this group are responsible for whole-school and individual-school decision-making, and the formulation of policies and procedures under which our school operates. Under most circumstances, other members of the school staff are consulted, and in some circumstances, comment and input is invited from the student body and the wider Tenby community. In subsequent Newsletters, other members of the staff will be introduced to the community by the school in which they teach and by the additional responsibilities, if any, that they have. 2
Tenby Schools Music Festival Last weekend (Friday 31 st January to Sunday 2 nd October) saw the staging of the much anticipated Tenby School s Inaugural National Music Festival 2015, and what a fantastic weekend it was too. Sixteen excited students boarded the bus to Ipoh on Friday afternoon to be greeted a couple of hours later by the friendly smiling faces of students from five other Tenby Schools including Ipoh, Setia Eco Park, Setia Eco Gardens, and Miri. After freshening up at our hotel, we were then treated to an evening of musical entertainment which included a number of performances by Tenby (Ipoh) students, followed by a fantastic concert by the Kinta Valley Wind Orchestra, conducted by Eugene Pook. Saturday was a long tiring day, but one filled with lots of fun, excitement, and achievement. All students spent most of the day practicing and rehearsing with their chosen workshop group that included African Drumming, Songs from Musicals and Pop, Secrets of Improvising, and Rock and Pop Ensemble. During this time, final rehearsals were also conducted for the Grand National Final of Tenby s Got Talent across all five schools. Despite the tiredness of students who had just Penang team at Ipoh School spent the last 7 8 hours rehearsing, they enthusiastically got ready for the evening concert and gave some awe-inspiring performances from their respective workshops. A particularly proud moment for Tenby (Penang) was seen when the three Penang Tenby s Got Talent finalists took to the stage in the National competition against thirteen other acts from the four other Tenby Schools. Kai Stewart, The Swaggy Potatoes, and the In Choons gave absolutely blinding performances, but there could only be three overall winners. A massive cheer was heard when the In Choons (Sean, Aimee and Anne-Marie Choon) were announced as second overall prize winners! Well done! After the initial stress of finding out someone had stolen the battery from our coach, Sunday was a much more relaxing day that consisted of choir rehearsals and the Tenby Song Competition. Once all the formalities were over, and a tree planted in recognition of this historic first event for Tenby, everyone said their goodbyes to new friends made throughout the weekend. A big thank you to Ms Marian, Ms Jackson, and Mr Gregory for accompanying our students, and huge congratulations goes to all the Tenby (Penang) students who took part in this event. They enthusiastically took on every challenge presented to them, put 100% into every performance, and were perfect ambassadors to Tenby (Penang). A massive thank you also goes to Dr. Jeffrey 3
Scenes from the Music Festival 4
Sri Tenby Secondary School Canon Photomarathon Competition Andy Tan Liang Sam of Form 4S, from Sri Tenby Secondary School Penang was awarded the Grand prize in the Canon Photomarathon Malaysia Photo Contest 2014 (Junior Category). He won a Canon DSLR Camera and prizes worth RM3,000.00 Andy started picking up photography as a hobby in 2012 when he was in Form 2 after much encouragement from his father Mr. Steven Tan, a professional photographer. He is also the student photographer for Sri Tenby Secondary School and is responsible for taking photographs at all school events, such as, Graduation dinner, Teachers day and festive celebrations. Andy enjoys taking photographs at places of interest all over Malaysia. He wishes to make his name in photography in the future. 5
Sri Tenby Secondary School Larian Perpaduan (Run for Unity) 2015 Sri Tenby Secondary School students participated in the Unity Run, organised jointly by the Penang Education Department and the Penang Sports Council, on 8 February. Students from Sri Tenby took part in the under 15 category. They were flagged off from the Westlands Sports Complex at 7.30 in the morning. They completed the 6.5km run and were awarded certificates. The students had an enjoyable time, and as the name of the run suggests, there was much goodwill as the students mingled with participants from many other schools. Finally, we did it. Yeah! Certificate given by Mdm Thum and Mr. Tan during the Assembly 6
Tenby International Primary School Head of School s Letter to Parents Dear Parents, Thank you to everyone who was able to join us at our first Open Afternoon on Friday it was lovely to see the children so positive about sharing their learning experiences with you all. On Friday children may come to school dressed in traditional Chinese outfits as part of our Chinese New Year Celebrations. We will be joining in a whole Tenby school assembly where our children from Year 1 6 will be singing Chinese songs. The children below, Maddie & Morgan from Year 6 along with Julie from Year 5 will be representing TIPS in a swimming competition this week, they will be competing alongside Secondary students - we wish them well in all of their races. We also wish Good Luck to our boys and girls football teams that are competing in a tournament at home today. Regards Ms Marian Head of TIPs Julie (Y5), Morgan (Y6) and Maddie (Y6) 7
Tenby International Primary School Parent s Open Afternoon 8
Tenby International Primary Year 2 & 3 visiting Penang Japanese School Year 2 & 3 were made very welcome during our visit to Penang Japanese School last week. The children made lots of new friends and joined together in a wide variety of traditional games and musical activities. The morning ended with the Japanese School performing a traditional Japanese dance followed by our school singing one of our favourite songs. The finale was both our schools joining together to sing Rasa Saying a Malaysian song. It was a very fitting end to a morning of collaboration and friendship. Everyone had a wonderful time and currently the children are preparing to write their thank you letters. We look forward to another exchange next year. Special greeting from students of Japanese School Penang. Arrived at Japanese School Penang My new friend 9
Stars of the Week Year 6 Year 5 Year 4 26th - 30th Jan 2015 Well Done! Year 3 Year 2 Year 1 Nursery Reception 10
Stars of the Week Year 6 Year 5 Year 4 2nd to 6th Feb 2015 Well Done! Year 3 Year 2 Year 1 Nursery Reception 11
Congratulations! Well done to all the children shown below who have received their Bronze merit certificate in assembly this week. Keep up the hard work and I am sure you will all soon be heading for your silver award. 12