ISSUE #1

SY 2020-2021
Secon

WEEK OF:
Friday Bulletin Weekly PUblication for Middle School
ParentS
JANUARY 11 TO 15

Inside this issue:

Parent Community
Association 2
Dear Middle School Parents,
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Happy New Year, and all the best for 2016 to you and your families. It has been enter- Guidance Office
taining and enlightening to have so many conversations with students and teachers
this week hearing about everyone's travel adventures or time together connecting
with family and friends during our end of semester break. It seems we have covered After-School Activities 3
the globe over the recent break and many also enjoyed time exploring our host coun-
try.
Athletics and Activities 4
We welcome our new families that have come for the start of second semester.

NEED TO KNOW: 5
Operations & Security

Teachers are now in the process of finalizing report card achievement and learning
ISM Upcoming Events 7
habit levels along with writing report card comments. Semester one report cards will
be available for parents on January 20th, 2016 - you will be able to access a pdf copy
of the report card through the online parent portal and power school, in advance of MS Upcoming Events:
this we will send out a guide with screen shots for how to access your child's report
cards. We will not be sending out hard copies of the report card. If you have any JANUARY - FEBRUARY:
questions please contact the Middle School Office.
PARENT COFFEE - ALEX LONDON
We will have a Middle School new parent coffee on Thursday morning from 7:45 -
Monday, January 11
9:00 in the Little Theater. We will share with you some information about Middle
School and provide the opportunity to meet other new parents and members of the
MS NEW PARENT COFFEE
PCA.
Thursday, January 14
NICE TO KNOW:
MS PLAY
January 29 - 30

G4-5 PARENT TRANSITION MEETING

Next week January 11-15th PCA Author in Residence, NY times bestseller, Alex Lon- Wednesday, February 3
don, will be at ISM. The week kicks off with a Parent coffee in the Little Theater at
8am. All welcome. NATIONAL HOLIDAY
Monday, February 8
Towards the end of the month January 29th and 30th at 6pm is our annual Middle
school play. The performance this year of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' will be out- CLASSROOM WITHOUT WALLS
side in the High school courtyard. The weather this time of year is perfect for an out- February 15 - 19
door performance and we hope that many students and families are able to join us.
PARENT COFFEE - LITERACY
School photos ordered and taken from last semester are due to arrive this month and
Tuesday, February 23
will be distributed to students through their Advisory classes. Parents will be informed
of the distribution date through a future parent bulletin.
NATIONAL HOLIDAY
Thursday, February 25
As we begin second semester we would like to share with parents that over the past couple of years in Elementary and Middle
School a group of parents have come together to organize after school lessons for students to further develop and support
Mother Tongue language development. This has been parent driven with the hiring of instructors in the language and these
have taken place in Chinese, Dutch, French, Hindi, German, Spanish, and Russian. If you would like to find out more
information about what classes are being offered this year or how to set up a course please contact Mei Dacer our after
school activities secretary (AFAC -afac@ismanila.org) who is located in the ES office area and she

can put parents in touch with the other parent liaisons for the different languages. We are looking forward to a great second

semester ahead!
Yours in Education,
Rachel Harrington, Middle School Principal
Amanda Pekin, Middle School Assistant Principal

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Dear Middle School Parents,
The After-school Activities Program for Middle School (MS AFAC) Season 1 and 2 will end January 29th. We will
be done with tryouts and CWW first after Season 2 finishes that is why Season 3 will start later in February.
For Season 3 and 4 activities, please see dates below:
Season 3: February 22 to March 22, 2016
Season 4: April 4 to June 3, 2016
For more info on activities and relevant information on sign ups, activity offerings, AFAC guidelines, dates and
seasons, please visit: http://ms-activities.ism-online.org/
The REGISTRATION FORM is filled-in online (first come, first served) which will go live on the blog address
above on January 11th, 4:00 pm.
ONLINE SIGN-UP DATES:
January 11 to 15, 2016 for 3rd & 4th Season Activities
All students still need to sign up again if they wish to continue on the year-round activities, first come, first
served.
Thanks,
AFAC Office
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Happy New Year Bearcats and welcome back to school for
2016.
The S2 practice schedule which runs until the end of Janu-
ary is posted on notice boards around school and on the
ATAC blog schedules page.
Season 3 (S3) tryouts will begin first week of Feb, an-
nouncements will be posted on notice boards after the
break. ATAC S3 sports for MS are Badminton,
Track&Field, Mixed Touch and Co-ed Softball. For HS S3
sports are Golf, Track&Field, Softball and Badminton.
Upcoming events:
 Jan 8 HS Basketball teams at Faith
 Jan 9 Varsity touch at Faith (am games)
 Jan 9 Varsity tennis at CSA/MS tennis at ISM
 Jan 15 HS Basketball at Brent
 Jan 16 Puma Touch League Finals at Brent (all teams)
 Jan 16 ISM HS swim invitational
 Jan 20 IASAS Send off assembly/send off lunch.
 Jan 27-31 IASAS Rugby/Touch at JIS, Tennis at ISB,
Swimming at SAS, Basketball at ISKL
 Feb 1-5 S3 tryouts week for MS/HS teams
 Feb 11 S2 HS sports awards night
ISM Robotics Results. Congratulations to ISM Robotics
team members who participated in the Vex champion-
ships at Taipei American School just prior to the semester
break. The ISM freshman team was part of an alliance
that won tournament champion. The sophomore team
won the 'Amaze Award' and as our strongest team was
chosen to represent ISM at the World Championships in
Kentucky, USA in April. See full results at- blog post of the
results here.
Freshman team (tourney champs): Mack Crowe, David
Zhang, Jericho Bantigue, and Yupang Yuan. Sophomore
Team (winners of Amaze award and World Champ
spot): Ashish Tutakne, Ishan Pradhan, Aayush Gupta,
Abhinav Bathula.
Well done to our ISM Table Tennis juniors and midgets
teams who won the silver and champion titles at the local
PRADA Table Tennis tournament for 2015-16 before the
holiday break. Champion Team members- Joshua G, Alex-
is B, Takao S, Apoorv P, Sirpi, and Shamir.
Silver Team members - Johsua T, Iasson.B, Tigha. M,
Charles. T, Chris T, Ashwin B.
For our Sailfish swim team program please check the Sail-
fish blog for information. http://sailfish.ism-online.org/
Please note the practice times for ATAC programs for SY
15-16 are as follows: ATAC all year round teams- 3:15-
4:30. See schedule for our All year round
teams program here...
All HS seasonal teams practice from 3:05- 4:50pm each
day. MS seasonal teams practice 3:15-4:45pm. In order to
clear the campus prior to 5pm all after school programs
will conclude by 4:50pm or earlier. The last bus is
4:55pm 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.
The ATAC game schedule pdf which is updated regularly
by Triz Gonzalez (ATAC Athletics Coordinator) gives the
most up to date information on where/when and who
our Bearcat teams will be playing throughout the school
year. Access to the game schedule is now via the ISM par-
ent portal not via power school as in the past. A naviga-
tion guide is available here. ATAC Game Schedule Users
Guide. Access the parent portal via this link, log in with
your user name/password and then look for the ATAC
Game Schedule tab under the left side quick links. Don't
forget to refresh the pdf page each time it opens so you
access the most current schedule. Please note this sched-
ule does change often and at short notice due to involve-
ment with many local schools and organizations. Check it
regularly for the most up to date information. For security
purposes....access to the ATAC game schedule pdf must
be linked via the secure parent portal and details should
not be shared with non ISM community members.
Bearcat Den- drop by our fantastic spirit store. Bearcat
Den hours of operation- 7am-4pm Mon-Fri.
Best Regards,
Mark Pekin
Director of Athletics and Activities
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A few reminders from Operations and Security

Access and parking within the campus are im- Due to parking restrictions, and in the interests of
portant security and safety issues. For the well- security, it will not be open in the afternoon for
being of all members of the ISM community, those pick-ups. During the time it is open, it will be un-
entering the school campus are requested to take der the supervision of members of the ISM Guard
note of the information and procedures outlined Force.
below.
Drivers should stop adjacent to the paved area and
Vehicular Access students should alight from the right side of their
During drop-off and pick-up times, vehicles may vehicle. The driver should then move off, clearing
enter the campus through Gates 2 and 3. Those the space for other vehicles dropping off students.
entering through Gate 2 should proceed to the Under no circumstances should a student be
drop off area and, once the student has alighted or dropped off from the middle lane. This is danger-
boarded, they should exit via Gate 1. Those vehi- ous as the student would need to walk in front of
cles entering through Gate 3 must turn into the another vehicle. Drivers are reminded that traffic
covered parking area and use the designated drop- regulations forbid parking on the roads around
off areas. All vehicles must exit through Gate 1. ISM. Therefore, vehicles should only be stopping
for the brief time it takes for a student to alight.
Please note that Gate 2 may only be used by those Drivers must not wait for anybody to return to the
drivers and passengers who have an ISM ID card vehicle.
and who are in a vehicle displaying a valid ISM ve-
hicle sticker. ID Cards
Alternatively, vehicles entering through Gate 3 may ID cards should be worn at all times while on cam-
park in the covered car park. The spaces reserved pus. If you have not been issued an ID card, or you
for parent-driven cars should only be used by those have lost it, you should obtain one by visiting the
vehicles which are driven by parents themselves. security office and completing the appropriate ap-
Vehicles in which parents are traveling, but which plication form.
are driven by a driver, should not use these spaces.
Rather, they should park elsewhere in the covered Vehicle Checks
car park or make use of the outside spaces next to The practice of inspecting vehicles will continue.
the power center. During off-peak hours, all vehicles will be checked
before they are allowed to enter the campus.
Visitors to ISM must enter through Gate 3. There is
an area for short-stay visitor parking near Gate 1. During peak hours (drop off and pick-up times), all
vehicles without valid stickers and randomly select-
The Pedestrian Gate ed vehicles with stickers will be asked to undergo
The pedestrian gate is located in the perimeter an examination.
fence mid-way between Gate 1 and Gate 2. There Whether an examination is conducted or not, it is
is a paved area between the road and the perime- important that the security staff at the gates are
ter fence, allowing easy access to the gate. The able to identify the occupants of vehicles entering
pedestrian gate is solely for the entry of members the campus; therefore IDs must be clearly dis-
of the ISM Community at the beginning of the played. Vehicles with tinted windows must roll
school day. It will only be open between 7:00 am down windows to allow a clear view of the interior
and 7:45 am (8:00 am to 8:45 am on Wednesdays). of the vehicle.
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 Drivers, Helpers and Bodyguards Security Staf f Directions
Drivers, helpers and bodyguards should not wait Our security team is endeavoring to make the
on campus for students throughout the school school as safe and secure an environment as possi-
day. After dropping off students they should exit ble for all members of our community.
the school grounds and not return earlier than 30
minutes before dismissal time. Those who repeat- We ask that everybody cooperate with us in this
edly fail to comply with the regulation will have important task. In particular, all those entering our
their access privilege suspended. campus are requested to comply with any direc-
tions given to them by members of our guard
Only those vehicles carrying parents or other peo- force.
ple with business within the school will be allowed
to return to the campus before the scheduled pick-
up time. If you are confused or unclear as to the purpose of
such instructions, please seek clarification from the
There are designated areas for unaccompanied security office. Please note that it is the parents’
drivers, yayas, helpers and security escorts to wait responsibility to advise their staff accordingly.
for parents and students. Unless specifically au-
thorized, they may not enter any other area. In the Thank you for your cooperation. We are looking
interest of security, and to prevent congestion at forward to another great year at International
the pedestrian entrances to the covered parking School Manila.
area, parents are requested to emphasize to their
employees the importance of cooperating with the
security staff and remaining in the appropriate are- Best wishes,
as. MIKE FLYNN
Director
Termination of Employment Operations & Security
In the event of the termination of service of a fami-
ly employee, parents are asked to secure the for-
mer employee’s ISM ID card and return it to the
Security office. If this is not possible, it is im-
portant that the Security Office is still informed of
the change of circumstances.

Firearms
All members of the ISM community are reminded
that it is strictly forbidden for firearms to be
brought onto the campus. This includes concealed
weapons carried by bodyguards for close protec-
tion. Any person arriving at the school with a fire-
arm should inform the gate guard, and arrange-
ments will be made for the weapon to be safely
and securely stored during the visitor’s stay.

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Dear ISM Parents,

New York Times bestselling au-

thor, Alex London, will be at ISM
January 11-15, 2016, kindly
sponsored by the ISM PCA.

He will be working with grades 3

-12 during his week with us. He
has written numerous titles for
elementary, middle, and high
school students, both fiction
and nonfiction.

Please join us for a Parent

Coffee on Monday, January 11th
at 8am, to hear Alex give an
overview of his books,
purchase titles, and have a
chance to have them signed for
you or your students.

REGISTRATION LINK
You don't want to miss this
event!

Kind regards,
ISM Professional Learn-
ing Office

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