The first meeting of the new PTA of XLIS was successfully held last Friday, February 18th, 2022. This official meeting welcomed all members since the new PTA structure was announced during the XLIS Christmas Concert, last December. Dr. Liu, the Head of School and Hulbert Zhang, Chairperson of the new PTA team, gave a welcome speech to all the new members. After a long quarantine period during the winter holiday, this first interaction between the school and the PTA in the new semester will lay a solid foundation for further family-school communication and cooperation to occur in the future.
During the meeting, Brian Lalor, the Primary Principal and Daun Yorke, the Secondary Principal shared teaching plans for the PYP, MYP and DP respectively and emphatically introduced the upcoming relevant accreditation visits that XLIS will have this year. As a three-program International Baccalaureate (IB) school, we have had our authorization visits and five-year evaluation visits in our MYP and PYP. In 2022, we will have our 5-year evaluation visit for the DP programme from March 9th to 11th and our WASC (Western Association of Schools and Colleges) initial accreditation visit from April 24th to 28th.
There is no doubt that the PTA plays an important role communicating with the school. Only with an in-depth understanding of classroom teaching, student activities, and school facilities can the PTA take on the role to bridge the school and our parent community, as well as assist and supervise the school’s work. After the welcome meeting, the PTA members were divided into two groups and led by our senior leadership team to conduct a campus tour. The first group was led by Dr. Liu, Daun Yorke and Alex Rambaud, the Vice Principal, to inspect the classroom teaching and learning environment, from the PYP to the DP. Meanwhile, Brian Lalor, together with Echo Zhao, the Head of Brand Development, and Kriss Parker, the Head of Logistics, led the other group to the cafeteria, kitchen, monitoring room, big gym and Black Box theater for further inspection. During the tour, our senior leaders answered different questions raised by the PTA members in detail.
After the campus tour, Mr. Hulbert Zhang, Chairperson of the new PTA team, led all the members to further discuss the PTA positions and their responsibilities. In addition, all the PTA members spoke out freely and made suggestions and comments in the meeting, mainly focusing on how to efficiently carry out PTA work to better promote family and school cooperation.
Although it took quite sometime and dedication to build the new PTA team, we are excited that in the following two years, our new PTA will be working hand in hand with XLIS and meet with our senior leadership team to supervise the teaching and learning as well as the daily operation of the school. We firmly believe that helping parents understand the educational concept and activities of our school, while delivering parents’ recommendations back to school is a task well suited for our PTA. With the help of the PTA, we will boost school-community cohesion and create a better, more diversified, and inclusive international community while focusing on a student-centered approach.
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Author:
Fancy Fan (Student & Parent Center Officer)
