The Week Ahead 5 January 2017

Dear Parents,

A warm welcome back to the new Lent Term from me and my colleagues and we hope you all enjoyed an excellent and refreshing break. We are all looking forward to a busy and productive term ahead.

We are also delighted to share with you the news, received during the holiday from the Council of International Schools (CIS), that the College is now awarded full Membership status of CIS. This news came together with our receipt of our CIS Accreditation Visit Report, following the CIS Team visit to the College in October. This is a milestone achievement for the College, following months and years of preparations and school development. The CIS Report is both an authoritative external evaluation by very experienced educationalists, and also constitutes a detailed, wide-ranging assessment of the College according to the highest international standards of academic and pastoral performance.

Our CIS Report details a number of concluding ‘Major Commendations’, including our:

• School Mission and Vision Statements
• Detailed School Development Plans
• Improved Governance communication across the College
• Proactive adoption of a rigorous Child Protection and Safeguarding Policy and Practices
• The College vision for EAL, successful implementation of EAL initiatives, and increased EAL staffing provision
• Transformation of school spaces into effective learning environments, with informative displays of student learning
• Development of a magnificent range of activities in the ASA programme
• A warm and supportive school culture

Recommendations for improvement include:

• Developing further the College’s definitions of internationalism and interculturalism, as appropriate to our community
• Mapping the Wellington Values more explicitly within the curriculum
• Increasing links between different year groups
• Further improving Special Needs provision
• Improving some non-academic operational systems

We are naturally very keen to take these recommendations on board; indeed they already form part of our school development plans, following our School Self-Evaluation for the CIS Visit. We are equally committed to consulting fully with pupils, parents and staff concerning the next phase of our development, as the Second Master explains in detail in his article in today’s Week Ahead.

We much look forward to welcoming many of you in College to our upcoming events this term, so with this in mind we do encourage you to keep an eye on the School calendar.

With every good wish for an excellent 2017 to all our Wellington families.

Michael Higgins,
Master