The Week Ahead 08 January 2021

Dear parents

It has been so good to see your children, our pupils, start the new term so purposefully. The Lent term, despite its relatively short duration, is often a pivotal time in a school year. It is particularly important for senior pupils as they ready themselves for the public examination season by finalising their schemes of work and starting a comprehensive revision programme.

It is not normally my habit to write a purely informational Week Ahead. I find that this column affords me a great chance to reach out to parents and the wider community with some thoughts about the education on offer here at Wellington. This week, though, I felt it more important to offer some clarity on a number of imminent issues in and around the school.
 

Parents will be well aware of the recent outbreaks of the Covid-19 virus across China. Whilst the overall message is of course very positive, and the country as a whole is safe, we have to be extra vigilant in school in order to protect our community. As a result, I wanted to share with you our travel advice for the coming weeks, and the Chinese New Year break in particular.

The core message is that we strongly discourage travel outside Tianjin over the holiday period. This advice is aligned with that of the rest of the WCC group of schools.

Those families do need to travel will need to comply with the following:

Common symptoms of the coronavirus infection include:

Please bear in mind that areas can quickly become medium or high-risk zones. Families should not travel to an area under such designation (there are around 40 across China at the time of writing, including Shunyi and Chaoyang in Beijing). The list of places on the medium/high risk list will be updated regularly in the coming days and weeks.
 

Whilst the city is still largely free of Covid-19 incidents, and the school remains fully open, parents can be assured that a full e-learning programme, for all year groups, is ready to be unveiled in the event of an enforced school closure. The lessons of 2020 have been taken on board and pupils and families alike should find the new e-learning provision accessible, engaging and wholly supportive of our pupils’ learning and wellbeing.
 

The United Kingdom has just gone back into a full state of lockdown and schools will remain closed until at least the middle of February. As a result, some GCSE and A Level examinations will not operate at all, and others will be assessed differently as a result of this disruption. At present, though, CIE and Edexcel IGCSE – the boards we use most frequently here at school – have said that they will continue to run exams in the summer as usual. This means that our pupils in years 11-13 need to keep focused and keep working on their study and revision programmes. The situation is fluid, given the rapid resurgence of the virus in some countries across the globe, so this situation may change, but in the meantime, please be assured that we are doing all we can to prepare pupils for these important examinations.   

 

Parents should have received details of the 2021 Annual Review survey, via T-chat and e-mail. The results of the survey give us a real insight into parental impressions of the school, and we use the results to drive further improvements in the education of your child. The survey closes at 1700hrs on Friday 15th January, so I would urge all parents to complete the questionnaire as soon as possible. It is, of course, available in three languages (English, Chinese and Korean) and should take around 20 minutes to complete.

Best wishes

Julian Jeffrey
MASTER

Online
1400hrs-1500hrs, Thursday
14th January

This week’s Meet the Master slot is open to parents of pupils in years 7 to 11. If you would like to attend, please confirm via email with Ms Emma Shi (emma.shi@wellingtoncollege.cn) by Wednesday 13th January.

We are excited to unveil our newly redesigned Wellington College Tianjin websites. They go live tonight, and the new website URL domains are:

These new versions are a much-anticipated update from our original websites. They promise to be simpler, neater and have a more contemporary layout. For your convenience, we have also added a new Parent Resources section, where you can find all the information you need about school services, upcoming events and the latest Wellington news. Please be sure to bookmark the new URL in your browser.

Junior School: parent's evening window
Online
11th-22nd January

The Junior School parent evenings with our teachers can be booked during the two-week window between the 11th and 22nd at a mutually convenient time. The focus for the child will be the progress made over the Michaelmas term; please make sure you have accessed your child’s report on the parent portal before the meeting. If you have any problems doing this, please contact Mrs Cissy Zhao via email: cissy.zhao@wellingtoncollege.cn. If you need a translator, please try and bring a friend or relative, as translators cannot always be guaranteed. 

STEM Challenge
1300hrs-1600hrs, Friday
15th January

Next Friday afternoon, the Junior School will be hosting a series of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) based challenges. Pupils will be working together in groups to solve problems which will force them to use collaborative processes, interdependent thinking, creative thinking, critical reflection and iterative processes. One of the best things about working collaboratively with other pupils who bring different skill sets and backgrounds to the table is the learning they experience from the challenges and from each other. We also intend this experience to highlight the power of a positive mindset, the spirit of collaboration and the Wellington College values in solving complex challenges.

USAD Parent Briefing
Online
1730hrs-1800hrs, Tuesday
12th January

This year’s USAD competition will be taking place online. The detailed schedule and study plan will be shared in the parents’ briefing on Tuesday 12th January. The meeting will start from 1730hrs on our 2020-2021 USAD Teams.  

Mathematics Competitions - AMC 10 and AMC 12 (Version A)

I am pleased to announce that we have paired up with ASDAN China to be able to host Version A of the AMC 10 and 12 this year. The competitions are run on Friday 5th February, in school. The AMC 10 is open to pupils in years 11 or below, and the AMC 12 is open to year 13 and below. To register for these competitions please go to:

http://www.seedasdan.org/amc10/

http://www.seedasdan.org/amc12/

Please make sure that you select Wellington College International Tianjin for the school and the Version A for the competition. The entry fee is 120rmb payable online. Closing date for registration is 22nd January.

Any questions please contact me (eamonn.williams@wellingtoncollege.cn) or Polly Zhang (polly.zhang@wellingtoncollege.cn)

Readers of the week

The English department is delighted to announce that the first Readers of the Week for this term are:

Angelina, Mia and Jasmine in year 9, who were all nominated by Ms Chapman for reading two books over the Christmas break and producing detailed book reviews. Some examples include ‘Cirque du Freak’ (Angelina), ‘Anne of Green Gables’ (Jasmine) and ‘Who is Queen Elizabeth’ (Mia).

Nakisha in year 8, who was nominated by Ms Xu for her great effort with holiday reading homework and making a speech on her own reading of ‘The Butterfly Lion’ in front of the class.

A huge well done to Angelina, Mia, Jasmine and Nakisha – what a great start to the new academic term!