ISSUE # 06

SY 20152016

MIDDLE SCHOOL
WEEK OF:
SEP 14 TO SEP 18

Friday Bulletin

Weekly Publication for Middle School Parents

Inside this issue:

Dear Parents,
This week ISM hosted Freedom from Chemical Dependency (FCD) week. FCDs mission is to work with schools and other organizations across the United States and
around the world to provide students with the knowledge, understanding and skills
they need to make intelligent, healthy choices about alcohol and other drug
use. FCD incorporate effective strategies to shape healthy student attitudes and
behavior. Through their sessions, the FCD counselors educate students about false
normative beliefs, the importance of delaying first use, provide accurate and developmentally appropriate information, help students to become aware of the consequences of use, teach students how to intervene, encourage students to identify
pro-social goals, facilitate discussions that foster self-analysis, and address known
risk factors and protective factors.

Service Learning

Parent Coffee: Bilingualism

Learning 2.0 @ ISM

Athletics & Activities

Admissions & Advancement

Throughout the course of the week, the FCD team has held small class sessions with
ISM Upcoming Events
students in G8 and facilitated two different assemblies - one with the students in
G7 and G8 and a separate assembly for students in G5 and G6. The FCD counselors
MS Upcoming
hosted a Parent Coffee, met with school leaders and counselors and consulted with
the wellness team. By facilitating sessions with key stakeholders, we feel the ISM
community will be better placed to support and guide our students as they navigate SEPTEMBER
our ever-changing world.
On Tuesday, September 15th from 7:45 - 09:00, Kim Guiry and the ESL team will be
hosting a parent coffee in the Little Theater. Interested parents can come and learn
more about the language acquisition process and how to support their child.
On Wednesday, September 16th, Students
in G6, 7 and 8 will have
the opportunity to meet
Kiera Cass - author of
The Selection Series. Students will
attend an assembly during the first block on
Wednesday from 08:30
- 09:40, in the
FAT. This is a wonderful opportunity for our
students and we are
sure they will enjoy
learning more about Keiras inspirations and her writing process.

Events:

PARENT COFFEE: BILINGUALISM

Tuesday, September 15
Time: 07:45 - 09:00
Venue: Little Theater

CLASSROOM WITHOUT WALLS

(CWW)
Thursday, September 17 and
Friday, September 18
Locations:
Grade 5: Amazing Race (on campus)
Grade 6: Island Cove (off campus)
Grade 7: Balai Isabel (off campus)
Grade 8: Caliraya (off campus)

NO CLASSES (Faculty In-Service)

Thursday, September 24
NO CLASSES
Friday, September 25
MAP TESTING
September 28 to October 22

On Thursday and Friday all grade levels will be involved in

the CWW events/trips. G5 students remain on campus
and have an action packed two days awaiting
them. Students in G6, G7 and G8 visit different locations
for an overnight experience, where the emphasis is on
team-building skills and making peer group connections.

Grade 7:
Students report to Advisory at 7:30 a.m. for roll call.
At 7:35 a.m. the parents of students who are not at
school will be called to determine their estimated
time of arrival.
From 7:45 - 7:55 a.m. students will board the buses.
At 8:00 a.m. the buses will depart.

Due to the upcoming CWW trips, please note that there

will be no Middle School ATAC or Middle school AFAC on Grade 8:
Thursday, September 17th and Friday, September
Students report to MS Plaza at 6:45 a.m. for roll call.
18th. This information has been shared with all students
At 6:50 a.m. students who are not at school will be
through our Advisory program. This includes the G5 activicalled to determine their estimated time of arrival.
ties!
From 6:50 - 7:00 a.m. students will board the buses:
At 7:00 a.m. the buses will depart.
By now all parents should have signed and returned the
required permission slips. If you have not returned the
The CWW buses travel in convoy as per school protopermission slip, please do so immediately. Teachers will
cols. The departure times have been carefully coordinatbe following up with parents whose child/children are
ed to try and avoid traffic and facilitate a smooth start to
missing slips so no child is disappointed on Thursday!
everyones day. Parents are respectfully requested to plan
ahead so that students arrive at school in a timely fashion.
In order to make sure that the G6 - G8 CWW departure
plans do not interfere with the start of the school day in
As requested in last weeks Parent Bulletin, please make
the ES and HS, we would like to remind all parents about sure your childs vaccinations are up to date - especially
the arrival plan and strict departure time for each of these for tetanus.
trips.
We appreciate that residential trips can lead to increased
Grade 6:
levels of anxiety among parents. Please know that the MS
Students report to G6 classrooms at 6:45 for roll call. office will receive periodic updates from the Site Coordina At 6:50 a.m. the parents of students who are not at tors and the office will disseminate updates to parents via
school will be called to determine their estimated
email.
time of arrival.
From 6:50 - 7:00 a.m. students will board the buses. Kind regards,
At 7:00 a.m. the buses will depart.
Rachel Harrington, Middle School Principal
Amanda Pekin, Assistant Middle School Principal

For more information,

contact Kim Guiry
(guiryk@ismanila.org)

Dear ISM parents,

You may have heard that ISM will be hosting one of the world's leading technology conferences, Learning 2.0, from October 1-3. You may not know that we are involving students from Manila area schools
to give their voice to the many innovations we will be considering at this conference. In addition, and
for the first time, we would like to invite members of the ISM parent community to take part in this
conference. Having the voice of the parent community can give the thinkers in this conference valuable
insights into the lives of our young learners and how we can best support them with technology as we
progress through the 21st Century.
With this in mind, please read
the announcement below and
visit theLearning 2.015 Website to find out more and register for the conference. ISM parents can receive a 20% discount
off the registration by entering
the following promotional
code: "ISMParents".
When selecting your Cohort,
please select the "Int'l School
Manila Parents Cohort".
If you have any questions
please contact the ISM Learning
Office
at learning@ismanila.org.
We hope to see you at the conference!
Kind regards,
ISM Learning Office

Tomorrow is the third of the RIFA ES/MS soccer festivals.

See links at the ES/MS festival pages for venues and
times. Venue information is also posted on ES/MS notice
boards. Please check carefully and If you are in doubt
about whether the event will go ahead due to heavy rain
or extreme weather please follow the procedure at this
link. http://atac.ism-online.org/manila-weather-forecast/
atac-event-cancelation-extreme-weather/

Upcoming events:
Sept 11 HS Volleyball teams away at Brent
Sept 11th Midgets A1/Asp vs DLSZ from 3:30pm/
VBoys at 5:30pm
Sept 12th Rifa Soccer Festivals ES/MS teams
Sept 12 Rifa MS Girls Festival 1pm at ISM
Sept 12th Cross Country meet at Faith 8am start
Sept 12th HS Soccer teams away at Faith
Sept 18-20 Pre- IASAS exchange at KL(V'ball/XC
ES RIFA festivals information and MS Rifa festivals inforteams) and Singapore(soccer teams)
mation
Sept 19 Swim meet at Brent.
Sept 21- PRFU/CBRE Rugby clinic #2 with former All
Housing needed for IASAS soccer Oct 7-11. ISM proudly
Black Geoff Alley5:15-7pm @ HS Field ISM rugby
hosts IASAS Soccer this year and it is going to be a fantasplayers welcome.
tic event for our community. In order to host we need to
house 160 athletes from the IASAS schools. Please consid- For our Sailfish swim team program please check the Sailer hosting it is a great experience. ES and MS along with fish blog for information. http://sailfish.ism-online.org/
HS parents can host. Check out the link at IASAS housing
information if you have any questions please contact the Please note the practice times for ATAC programs for SY
ATAC office. Forms can be printed and turned in to ATAC 15-16 are as follows: ATAC all year round teams- 3:15office or emailed to pekinm@ismanila.org. We currently 4:30. See schedule for our All year round
need to house 75 more athletes!
teams program here...
This coming October break ISM will be hosting a Fall Basketball Camp run by Filipino Basketball Academy
FBA. See FBA flyer for details. Flyer is also posted on notice boards around school. Sign up quick as places will go
fast.
Well done to our ISM Bearcats Climbing team and coaches who participated in the 2nd round of the local wall
climbing series at PowerUP last Saturday. Out of 40 entrants in 3 categories ISM girls and boys won 2 gold
(Emma and Leopold), 2 silvers (Patrick and Ruitong) and
2 bronze (Jacob and Gabie) 14 ISM climbers took part and
all but 2 made it into the final round. Well done Bearcats
Climbing team and coaches.
Well done to our XC team who competed at Brent last
Saturday. Race results can be found here Brent meet results.

All HS seasonal teams practice from 3:05- 4:50pm each

day. MS seasonal teams practice 3:10-4:40pm. In order to
clear the campus prior to 5pm all after school programs
will conclude by 4:50pm or earlier. The last bus
is4:55pm this is due to the ever increasing traffic concerns in our area.
Parents and students please take some time to peruse
the ATAC blog it has a wide variety of information and
links to our sports and activities program. If you have any
questions regarding the competitive program of sports at
ISM after reading the information on the blog please send
an email to pekinm@ismanila.org and I will endeavor to
assist you as best I can.
Bearcat Den- drop by our fantastic spirit store. There is a
new school year sale on at the moment and a range of
new products and items to purchase including items from
our service partners. Bearcat Den hours of operation-7am
-4pm Mon-Fri.

Next weekend our Varsity Volleyball and Cross teams

travel to Kuala Lumpur for their exchange weekend and
our Varsity soccer teams travel to Singapore. Good luck to GO BEARCATS!
all players and coaches, this is great preparation for the
IASAS S1 championships in October.
Best Regards,
Mark Pekin
Director of Athletics and Activities

SAVE THE DATE!

Join us in support of the
Vicky SyCip Philippine Scholarship
Program on November 13th, 2015 in
the Little Theater. Rock through the
ages with live music provided by our
very own Faculty Band, The MamSirs.
Early Bird tickets will go on sale
soon!
All proceeds of the event support the
Philippine Scholarship for a truly deserving Filipino student to attend ISM.
For more information on the Philippine Scholarship please visit this LINK.

10