December 2022
THE HOUSE
THAT TABITHA
BUILT
page 28
THE POWER
OF DEEP SELF
REFLECTION
page 4
STEPPING STONES
TO THE GREAT
OUTDOORS
page 10
My takeaway from my time in the rainforest restoration project
applies to climate change perfectly. A Chinese idiom states:
十年树木，百年树人—it takes ten years to nurture a tree, but a
hundred years to train a man. Climate change requires a long time
period to change people’s mindsets and for the actions we are
taking right now to actually show their effect … I trust that with
collective effort, we can slowly turn the wheels around for a better
and more sustainable future.”
Lantian Christina ’24, Grade 11, Dover Campus, speaking at the
2022 Caixin Summit Singapore Satellite Event on 18 November
2022 as a representative of the SMART Talks on Climate Change
Programme co-hosted by Caixin Global and Yale Centre Beijing
02
STRATEGIC
PLANNING AND
THE FIRST GIFT
OF TEACHING
A message
from Nick Alchin,
Head of College
04
THE POWER
OF DEEP SELF
REFLECTION
Looking to the past,
planning for the future
06
UWCSEA
COMMUNITY
AGREEMENTS
By the community, for
the community
08
LINGUISTIC
INCLUSION
Creating community
for all learners
10
GETTING BACK
TO OUTDOOR
EDUCATION
Overnight stepping
stones
12
CURRICULUM
IN ACTION
Grade 5 hands-on
learning
14
USING ART
FOR GOOD
Student wins
international film
contest
15
SUPPORTING
STUDENT
INNOVATION
Alumni mentorship
programme
16
CULTURAL
CELEBRATIONS
RETURN
Showcasing UN Night
and CultuRama
18
A NEW PATHWAY
TO LEARNING
UWCSEA Grade 9–10
Programme
20
THE ENERGY OF
AN AUDIENCE
Celebrating poetry
22
SEASAC
Welcoming visiting
senior sports teams
24
NATURE
EXPLORERS
Infant Outdoor
Education
25
MARINE
CONSERVATION
Connecting students
across campus
26
BUILDING
WELLBEING IN
MIDDLE SCHOOL
Learning through the
practice of positive
education
28
THE HOUSE
THAT TABITHA
BUILT
A tribute to our
GC partner
32
TAKING IN THE
GOOD
Meet the new High
School Principal on
Dover Campus
COVER IMAGES
Front: Grade 6
students at Sarimbun
Scout Camp,
Singapore
Back: UWC Day on
East Campus
December 2022
Dunia is published two times a year by UWC South East Asia. Reproduction in any manner in
English or any other language is prohibited without written consent. Please send feedback to
dunia@uwcsea.edu.sg.
Writers: Sarah Begum, Sinéad Collins, Shaiful Rashid, Lucie Snape, Jules Wainwright and
Kate Woodford | Photography: Elena Bell, Janrius Rogers, Joseph Tan, Jules Wainwright and
members of the UWCSEA community | Design: Nandita Gupta and Grace Hong
UWCSEA Dover is registered by the Committee for Private Education (CPE), part of SkillsFuture Singapore (SSG)
CPE Registration No. 197000825H | CPE Registration Period 18 July 2017–17 July 2023 | Charity Registration No. 00142
UWCSEA East is registered by the Committee for Private Education (CPE), part of SkillsFuture Singapore (SSG)
CPE Registration No. 200801795N | CPE Registration Period 10 March 2017–9 March 2023 | Charity Registration No. 002104
Printed on 100% recycled paper with environmentally friendly inks | MCI (P) 033/02/2022 | MKT-2223
Read. Publish. Share. Subscribe.
Visit the newsroom of UWCSEA:
perspectives.uwcsea.edu.sg
OPINION
Strategic planning and the first
By Nick Alchin, Head of College, UWCSEA
As I come to the end of my first term as Head of College, I can safely say that I have
never been on such a steep learning curve. Having known the College since 1995, as
teacher, Principal and Head of East Campus, I had a good insight into its educational
and strategic workings and the special nature of our community. This term I have
also come to see the immense complexity of operational, administrative and
governance work that supports the learning. What’s not surprising, however, is
the dedication of all the teams, who know that the business of educating the next
generation for peace and a sustainable future is a noble goal that provides real
meaning to the everyday tasks we undertake.
This idea of meaningful work is a recurring theme for me. Indeed, providing students
with meaningful work is a common theme in the educational press these days—and
often goes under the term agency. One of the basic ideas here is that we allow
students to make decisions and to get used to thinking and acting for themselves,
rather than just doing what they are told. That is, of course, one of the central goals
of a progressive education.
The pedagogy that supports agency can be deceptively simple—asking students
lots of open questions; giving them time to discuss; asking them to explain ideas in
their own words using their own examples; taking a genuine interest in those ideas;
presenting those ideas to the class for peer feedback; choosing their own areas of
interest to explore and so on. It can also be taken further, and it’s interesting to see
how far we can take this last strategy—which is often called co-constructing the
curriculum with students.
We all know that learning is easier when we are really interested in the material we
are learning, and so adapting the curriculum to suit student interests is appealing.
Where they have flexibility, teachers will to some extent do that naturally; for
example by spending longer in areas that engage students to learn more deeply.
Taken to its extreme, co-construction can mean collaboratively deciding with
classes or individuals the entirety of what they learn. This is a position that finds a
lot of advocacy on social media these days.
So I was interested to read a well-known champion of liberal education, Professor
Gert Biesta, arguing against this position in his 2022 book World-Centred Education.
His starting point is that agency is, in itself, a values-neutral quality. Students—and
adults, as we can see reading world news—can exercise agency to good or bad ends,
and our goal has to be broader than just agency for its own sake.
Biesta’s main point is that as professionals educators have a broader responsibility
than to simply offer students only what they want and what they are interested in (of
course all parents know this!) Biesta talks about the first gift of teaching—being given
what you didn’t ask for and argues that education should give students what they did not
ask for—first and foremost because they didn’t even know that they could ask for it.
This seems to me to be such common sense, and so aligned with the graduating
students who over the years consistently tell us I didn’t see the point of this at first,
but by the end I learnt just how relevant and important it is or the long-graduated
who write, years later, I didn’t know at the time how valuable all those things I learnt
2 | Dunia December 2022
gift of teaching
at school would be. So the extreme of co-construction would impoverish the scope
and breadth of their learning; and a lot of passions would remain dormant because
children never came into contact with, say, theatre, service, hiking, cross-country,
coding, capacitors, or calculus.
But the key idea here is more than merely encountering new ideas, important
though that is. The broader point is that we learn about ourselves, and grow into
ourselves as we encounter and challenge our desires—not just follow them. It is a
deep human truth that we may not need what we desire, and may not desire what
we need—that’s as true for adults as it is for students. Furthermore, the journey of
understanding the difference between our needs and desires unfolds over a lifetime.
It’s worth quoting Biesta at length:
So the slow work of the educator … is to accompany children on this journey,
encouraging them to go on the journey, and helping them to gain insight in their
desires, to gain a perspective on their desires, to come into relationship with their
desires, so as to find out which desires are going to help them with living one’s life well
in the world and which other desires are going to hinder in this task.
One could and should argue that the work of education professionals is not just [to
give] students what they ask for, but it is about engaging with them in the process of
figuring out what it is that they might need …. That makes school, perhaps, a place
of revelation.
This last sentence resonated strongly for me when I read it. Earlier this year, in April,
we held an inspirational two day celebration of 50 years of UWCSEA—our 50th
Anniversary Forum—and some of it felt like a revelation indeed. After a difficult
few pandemic years, thousands in our community came together to honour
our Mission, and commit to the future. It was just what I needed, though in the
intense preparation and run-up it might not have been what I entirely wanted!
At our Forum, we heard the Executive Director of the UWC Movement, Faith
Abiodun, speak about the possibility and promise inherent in the future of the UWC
Movement. He was unquestionably inspirational, but what was most uplifting about
the conference for me was the idea that he awoke precisely those things suppressed
over the pandemic years, and we all knew it as we heard him speak.
For the last few months, UWCSEA has been a revelation to me once more. This has
been nowhere clearer than through the strategic planning process. If the first gift of
teaching is giving our students what they didn’t know they could ask for, then the
first gift of strategic planning is to consult widely and consider many alternatives, so
that we hear the heartfelt needs our community did not know they could ask for.
John Gardner argues that the most gifted leaders understand that the needs of people
cannot be fully plumbed by asking them what they want or why they want it. One of
the deepest of truths about the cry of the human heart is that it is so often muted, so
often a cry that is never uttered. So, as we look through the input to the strategic
plan from students, parents, staff and alumni, we will need to separate wants from
needs, and devise a plan that will help our students and wider community work
towards a more peaceful and sustainable future. There is much meaningful work—
and agency—here.
References
Biesta, G. (2022) World-Centred Education.
Routledge
Gardner, J. (1993) On Leadership. The Free Press
… the first gift of
teaching—being given
what you didn’t ask for
… education should give
students what they did not
ask for—first and foremost
because they didn’t even
know that they could ask
for it.”
Professor Gert Biesta
Author of World-Centred
Education
December 2022 Dunia | 3
The power of deep
self reflection
FEATURE
Looking to the past, planning for the future
Adapted from a reflection by
Andrew Ruane, Head of Grades 9
and 10 Science, Dover Campus
A commonly asked question in
education is “how do schools ensure
they deliver on what they promise?”
It is widely accepted that attainment
data from exams offers only a narrow
view on student achievement. As a
school focused on our Mission, at
UWCSEA we strive to dig deeper and
to understand how we achieve a more
long lasting impact.
One of the ways we do this is via
accreditation. Council of International
Schools (CIS) International
Accreditation recognises a school’s
commitment to student well-being
and high quality teaching and learning,
as well as to global citizenship and
intercultural learning. Accreditation is
achieved through a rigorous and deep
self review, confirmed by external
evaluation led by our peers. UWCSEA
elects to receive joint accreditation
from the Western Association of
Schools and Colleges (WASC).
Dover Campus completed the CIS/
WASC re-accreditation process last
school year; this year East Campus has
begun their 18-month journey.
Andrew Ruane, Head of Grades 9 and
10 Science on Dover Campus, served
as the CIS Accreditation Coordinator.
Working closely with Lizzie Bray, then
Head of Dover Campus who had led
Dover’s previous accreditation, Andrew
led our 18-month Self Study review.
A complex process which involved all
teaching and many non teaching staff,
Andrew reflects on how the Self Study
has direct relevance to the Strategic
Planning process that the College has
embarked on this school year.
Iteration is key
One of the first things I was taught
during my teacher training was to
reflect. My own father often asks
how I will teach the same lesson for
over 30 years. The answer to that
is that I reflect. Every time I teach
the same lesson it is different to the
previous iteration. Not only are the
students different but as teachers we
constantly strive to do things better, for
example by making it more engaging,
using different contexts and case
studies and ensuring what we teach
remains relevant.
Measuring the performance of a school
takes place in much the same way:
by reflecting on the things we do well
and the things we need to improve.
It is clear that the people who know
this best are those who are a part of it.
And so my rationale in taking on the
role of CIS Accreditation Coordinator
was: how do we ensure that we reflect
authentically on the entire operation
of one of the largest schools in the
world, celebrating our successes and
looking for those areas in which we can
do better? The answer was quite clear:
involve everyone.
Connecting across the College
This served a second purpose too. In
any large organisation, it can be easy
to remain in our area of expertise and
not see how other areas work. Not only
can this lead to missed connections that
may strengthen our shared purpose,
but it can also lead to people feeling
disconnected, or worse, not valued.
4 | Dunia December 2022
This was particularly evident during the
pandemic where many teams began
working remotely. CIS Accreditation
served as an important opportunity to
bring the community together again.
Accreditation is achieved by evaluating
ourselves against a number of CIS
Standards1, in what is called a Self
Study. These Standards are set in a
framework of nine Domains that cover
all areas of school operation:
• Domain A: Purpose and direction
• Domain B: Governance and leadership
• Domain C: The curriculum
• Domain D: Teaching and assessing for
learning
• Domain E: Well-being
• Domain F: Staffing
• Domain G: Premises, facilities,
technology systems and auxiliary
services
• Domain H: Community and home
partnerships
• Domain I: Residential services,
boarding and/or homestay
Initially, the leadership team submitted
a Preparatory Report with input from
many others in the community. This
was followed by a Preparatory Visit
in September 2020; pandemic travel
restrictions meant the two senior
evaluators visited us virtually. By using
the report and evidence obtained from
meetings, interviews and observations
during this visit, the evaluators helped
us identify areas to focus on during the
Self Study.
Holding ourselves to account
To begin the Self Study, all staff were
invited to nominate themselves to
contribute to a Domain Committee.
Whilst some chose to review their area
of working in school, adding the needed
expertise, a number elected to work on
areas other than their own; their fresh
sets of eyes were a useful way for us to
gain new perspectives.
Over 350 staff participated on the
committees. The leadership team did
not join specific committees or provide
direction in this process, a testament
to their belief in the College and its
staff, and the value they place in the
accreditation process.
Committees began by unpacking the
Standards within their Domain, deciding
on how best to respond to them
within the context of Dover Campus.
To determine whether we exceeded,
met, partially met or did not meet the
Standard, they then gathered evidence
in one of three forms:
1. Intent: what the College is aiming
to achieve
2. Implementation: how the College
is working to achieve something
3. Impact: the outcome of what has
been achieved
To facilitate evidence gathering, a
Saturday Professional Development day
in January 2021 connected Committee
members with experts from many areas
of the school through a complex series
of Google Meet engagements. We
also invited a number of student and
parent representatives, and members
of the Board, to focus groups. This
complex undertaking meant that
committees were able to build a deep
understanding and begin responding to
their Domain standards.
Outcomes and actions
The 18 month Self Study allowed us
time to identify issues and begin to
take action to address them. In all,
the Domain Committees made 103
assessments which we submitted to
CIS and WASC. A 13-person Evaluation
Team joined us (virtually) in February
2022 to explore the details, and
respond to the Self Study, including
a recommendation on awarding CIS/
WASC re-accreditation.
In June 2022 we were delighted
that re-accreditation was awarded
to Dover Campus with immediate
effect. We were immensely proud to
be commended in many areas, most
particularly: our purpose and direction,
curriculum planning, teaching,
conceptual learning, assessment
and reporting across all levels of the
school as well as Outdoor Education,
Service, wellbeing, Diversity, Equity and
Inclusion work, and Boarding.
The team also identified areas for
continued growth, including the need
to clarify the College organisational
structures, roles and responsibilities
and to communicate clearly regarding
strategic initiatives. Because the Self
Study had already identified these
areas of focus we had already begun to
address these, and evidence gathered by
the East Campus in some of these areas
in the Preliminary Report phase (which
they are currently in) reflects some of
the progress we have already made.
United in purpose
The process to achieve re-accreditation
involves an incredible amount of work
from a large number of people. For
mission-led schools like UWCSEA, this
is where the true value of accreditation
lies—in the authenticity of the report
combined with the chance for all staff
to reflect, and to learn more about their
campus and the College.
As the College continues to develop
its strategic vision for the years ahead,
the Self Study reports serve as a
chance to recognise and celebrate
the achievements of the 2018–2023
UWCSEA Strategy. Importantly, they
will also provide us with signposts as we
plan and reprioritise, ensuring UWCSEA
continues to be a mission-focused
school whose students and graduates
are equipped to create a peaceful,
sustainable future.
Footnote
[1] CIS/WASC standards provide detailed
descriptions of how candidate schools are
asked to measure their attainment in key
areas identified in each Domain.
December 2022 Dunia | 5
FEATURE
Anyone involved in the development of our Community
Agreements from the beginning, undoubtedly had
moments of wondering if they would ever be finished.
From the start of the Values in Action process to the
announcement of the Community Agreements in October
2022 was two full school cycles. Viewed today, with their
few simple words and visuals, it is hard to believe that
they required so much time to produce.
In a community with such a strong bias for action, why did
it take so long for us to come up with these statements?
Well, the answer is in their name. Agreements emerge
from a consensus-driven process to identify what every
person in the group needs from each other. Other schools
have codes of conduct, ‘norms of behaviour’ or contracts
for parents. We wanted agreements. Not just because
‘norms’ makes assumptions about what is appropriate or
acceptable and begs the question of whose ‘normal’ we
are referring to, but because the process of constructing
the agreements was as important as the outcome. We
wanted it to be consensus-driven, collaborative and
values-based, and we wanted the outcome to be relevant
to everyone in our community—staff, students and
parents alike.
Nick Alchin, Head of College, in his letter to the
community launching the agreements said, “It is a
fundamental belief of mine, borne from experience in
many schools, that the way we interact with each other as
UWCSEA
COMMUNITY
AGREEMENTS
By the community,
for the community
6 | Dunia December 2022
adults will be how we interact with our students”. Building
agreement on the link between our values (what we
expect from ourselves and each other) and the behaviours
(actions) that demonstrate them needed to be thoughtful
and driven by our belief in the importance of how we are
in relationship with one another.
The many consultations with stakeholder groups,
synthesis, testing with groups, further feedback,
adjustments, final versions (which took three attempts
to really be final!), design, translations and the launch
needed a whole community of stakeholders. In this the
Parents’ Associations on both campuses were invaluable
partners and champions. They challenged assumptions,
helped to test concepts and language across cultures and
guided us in our process and our communication. They
were quickly onboard with the idea that belonging for
everyone in our community would be an outcome of our
individual and collective behaviours, and, along with the
wider parent and staff community, drove us to examine
each word carefully and through various cultural lenses.
The translations were a wonderful project in themselves,
as we understood that it was less about translation and
more about interpretation, as our language experts
translated the words not just for their meaning but for
their cultural value. We worked through the complexity to
reach simplicity, and everyone involved is justifiably proud
of the results.
There are inevitably challenges when imperfect people
with diverse backgrounds build community together.
These Community Agreements help us to navigate those
challenges. They are living statements, and we expect
them to evolve and change alongside our community.
They help to build our community culture and our
community culture is the basic root that not only gives
our students, staff and parents their daily experience at
school, but is an important determining factor for how
our community grows. With our UWCSEA Community
Agreements as a basis, the future looks bright.
Scan the QR code to view these
agreements in multiple languages:
December 2022 Dunia | 7
The most successful multilingual communities are those
who create opportunities for the entire community to hear
and see different languages in use every day, by creating
space and opportunities for visual and aural reminders of our
linguistic differences.
This is not to say that we shouldn’t have a lingua franca—but
to create an inclusive community in line with our values
we acknowledge that while English is our main language of
instruction, it is simply one of many in regular use across
our community.
Ellie Alchin, Director of Teaching and Learning at Dover
Campus has led a multi-year strategy for linguistic inclusion,
citing benefits for students in both wellbeing and learning. “A
growing body of research shows that bi- and multilingualism
bring cognitive, linguistic, socio-cultural and emotional benefits
and that all members of a community benefit from being
in a multilingual environment because it provides increased
opportunities to develop intercultural understanding.”
“All languages are valuable,” Alchin notes, “and multilingual
people have great advantages over monolinguals
intellectually and socially. Multilingualism not only builds
language skills, research shows that it also flexes conceptual
learning and critical thinking in ways that build more complex
neural pathways in the brain. This is one of the reasons that
we aim to develop bilingualism for all our students, regardless
of how many languages they speak at home.”
This year, nearly 50% of our community has a home language
other than English, and we are continually looking for ways
to acknowledge and harness the linguistic diversity of our
classrooms and campuses to enhance teaching and learning.
Examples of this are heard and seen in classrooms with
translanguaging strategies being used widely by teachers,
Linguistic inclusion
Creating community for all learners
50.8% English
Others 10.3%
(69 languages)
Dutch 1%
Tamil 1%
Spanish 1.2%
German 1.6%
French 1.9%
Korean 3.9%
Japanese 4.5%
14.9%
Chinese (Mandarin)
Hindi 8.9%
79
First languages
spoken at
College
supported by posters in different languages and growing
library collections. There are also a growing number of
murals, posters and signs displayed around our campuses,
and recently our UWCSEA Community Agreements were
translated into the 17 most frequently used languages in
our community.
Alchin highlights that all of these elements contribute to the
College’s Strategy to develop an inclusive community. “The
aim is to equalise the status of all languages as equal, and
usualise the use of first languages for our community. This
enhances belonging, and encourages students to use their
first language to support their learning more generally.”
UWCSEA First Languages profile
8 | Dunia December 2022
Case study 1 | Finding a common language
UWCSEA’s K–12 English as an Additional Language (EAL)
programme supports students whose home language is
not English to develop English language skills to support
their participation in the learning programme, and to create
connection and belonging within their UWCSEA community.
However, there are benefits to all students, says Nina-Noelle
Hall, Head of High School EAL on Dover Campus, “The EAL
programme helps with the obvious in that it teaches skills and
supports acquisition of academic and personal vocabulary
for students in the EAL programme. However, working with
our teachers on strategies that make our learning spaces
more equitable for EAL learners, such as explicit and focused
vocabulary expansion, has highlighted that this supports
learning for all students by creating shared definitions and
understandings for everyone in the group. For example,
High School teachers are experts in their own fields, who are
sometimes teaching teenagers who may never have heard of
‘apartheid’ or the word ‘ameliorate’. This collaboration and
coaching approach to creating shared understanding creates a
positive impact for everyone in the group.”
A post-pandemic initiative to promote multilingualism is
the Grade 11 English B students reading with Infant School
students. This is a wonderful way for our English B students to
practise their English pronunciation in a different setting and
context. And so in the David Watson Primary Library on Dover
Campus, K2 students gather around their Grade 11 student
readers every month. Hunched together in corners, they are
mesmerised by the power of the words in their books.
“Young children have no filter, which means they are
comfortable telling our Grade 11s that their pronunciation is
wrong. It’s excellent learning all around! We’re also planning
for our Grade 11s to read in their home languages to students
who share their home language, and to continue their
support of the Home Language lessons,” says Hall. “This is a
beautiful way to build relationships across the school.”
Case study 2 | Translanguaging in action and on stage
Translanguaging is an intentional strategy that teachers
draw on when needed to personalise the classroom
experience for each student, by encouraging and supporting
them to access and process their learning using their home
language. This enhances their conceptual understanding of
the subject, whilst helping them maintain and develop their
academic knowledge in, and of, their home language. The
approach is successful for students of all ages, and can be
applied creatively in many settings.
“An example of a teaching strategy that promotes inclusion
and the use of first languages to support student learning, is
simply for teachers to ask students how to say a vocabulary
word they are learning in their home language. This
highlights the skill of the multilingual student to their peers,
and can lead to interesting discussions as meaning and
intent are clarified. It also provides the teacher a way to role
model curiosity and language learning,” says Nina-Noelle
Hall, Head of High School EAL on Dover Campus. “Learning
from our mistakes can be a humbling experience; I can’t
tell you how many times classes have laughed about my
pronunciation of a word in Chinese or Hindi, for example.
But we laugh together and I try again, and in the process we
become closer as a community.”
In Term 3 last year, the Dover Campus Grade 9 and
10 Drama production Dunsinane explored language
as an element that allowed students to shape their
own interpretation. The play, written by David Greig,
is an allegory for the British intervention in Iraq and
Afghanistan, and tackles notions of colonialism and modern
interventionism. Picking up from the end of William
Shakespeare’s Macbeth, the narrative follows a group of
English soldiers in the aftermath of the Battle of Dunsinane.
The play twists and turns as several internal factions try
to fill the power vacuum. Meanwhile, the foreign forces
who intervened in the civil war under the guise of being
liberators, slowly see themselves become the oppressors.
“Parts of the original script are performed in Gaelic, and Grieg
offers no translations or phonetic pronunciations. The Gaelic
is used to demonstrate the displacement of the English troops
and how ill-equipped they were to be in a foreign land dealing
with a conflict that wasn’t theirs. We made the creative choice
to use the cast’s home languages as a substitute for Gaelic.
The students created their own translations, and often a
character spoke the lines in one language and was replied to
in another. It turned out all of the home languages spoken
in our production were from nations and cultures that were
historically occupied, invaded or colonised by the British
Empire; Tamil, Bengali, Hindi, Mandarin, German and Korean,”
explains Jay Douglass, Middle School Drama Curriculum Leader.
As a company, we purposefully offered no help in translation
to the audience, so depending on the observer you were
either lost with the English soldier as to what the Scots were
discussing, or you were able to catch the subterfuge and
resistance of the oppressed.
“The play was a timely choice, closely aligned with
UWCSEA’s values in creating interpersonal and intercultural
understanding, as well as our aspiration to be inclusive
linguistically,” Douglass reflects. “While there were many
difficult topics explored in this project, challenging both our
students and the audience, it also gave students a unique
opportunity to bring their home language to life on stage in
a very relevant context.”
FEATURE
December 2022 Dunia | 9
Camilla grabs the rope firmly with
both hands. She closes her eyes, takes
a deep breath and launches herself off
the platform. Swinging forward, she
just misses the landing pad, and quickly
starts spinning backwards. Just in time,
a flurry of hands reach out and halt her
momentum, helping her balance and
stay on target.
Camilla launches off the platform
alone, but she lands with the help of
five classmates.
Camilla is an East Campus Grade 6
student participating in the Sarimbun
Scout Camp overnight, part of the
first set of overnight trips run by
the UWCSEA Outdoor Education
Department (OED) since the start of
the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. After
having missed out on overnight trips
the past few years, she says she felt
anxious about overnighting, but she was
embracing the challenge.
“It’s a really good experience to get
back in camp,” she says. “You get closer
to your classmates. It’s a fun experience.
If you’ve never gone camping, I think
it’s just a great experience for everyone
to get outside and do a bunch of fun
activities together.”
Singapore’s loosening of COVID-19
restrictions has signalled a return to
normalcy to many aspects of life at
UWCSEA. Nowhere has that change
been felt more than in the OED, which
had seen much of its critical activity,
like international expeditions, put on
hold. But rather than merely a return to
business as usual, the overnight trips at
Sarimbun represent more of a new way
forward, combining best pre-pandemic
practices with lessons learned from
operating through two years of circuit-
breaker lockdowns and other restrictions.
From international to
hyper-local
When the pandemic disrupted
travel from February 2020, the OED
quickly pivoted, creating a ‘hyper-
local’ programme. This saw students
engaged in specially-designed on
campus itineraries that created
learning opportunities while respecting
COVID-19 health advisories. By pivoting
like this, UWCSEA was the only school
programme in Singapore able to
operate Outdoor Education consistently
throughout the pandemic.
“The COVID-era undoubtedly posed a
significant challenge as we had to reign in
on what we had previously been doing,”
says East Campus Head of Outdoor
Education, Chris Newman. “However it
has also been an opportunity to adapt
by utilising the best of what we could
control and access, on the campuses and
in Singapore.”
“This was only possible due to the
emphasis placed on the holistic whole
child development view that exists
at UWCSEA,” Newman says. “The
grounding and resources were already
in place to get creative and problem
solve an existing Outdoor Education
programme from 80% overseas
overnight expeditions to an initially
100% campus based and then to a
hybrid campus and local programme.”
With a newfound focus on keeping
things local, the OED was able to turn
the inability to travel from a daunting
challenge into a real opportunity—one
whose benefits will continue to be felt
as the programme moves forward.
“One of the things about these trips
is taking advantage of the local
opportunities that we’ve got here,”
says Dover Campus Head of Outdoor
Education, Oli Sampson. “Singapore’s
got a lot to offer and the students can
learn a lot just by being here. Having
that local experience, extending it a bit
further with the overnight component,
gives classes an opportunity to come
together at the beginning of the year.
Then they are more prepared for later in
the year when that extends to a longer
trip, further afield.”
“I think it’s combining the best of
something new and the best of
something old,” says Sampson. “What
we’ll do in the next couple of years is try
and find the balance of what’s been great
about what we’ve done over the past
UWCSEA’s Outdoor Education
programme gets back on track
Stepping
stones to the
great outdoors
FEATURE
10 | Dunia December 2022
couple of years and what’s been great
about what we’ve done historically. If
we don’t learn from the last three years,
with the things we’ve done in Singapore,
that would be a real shame.”
Stepping stones
For students like Camilla—as well as
parents and teachers—overnight trips
like Sarimbun are an important stage in
their Outdoor Education journey.
“These overnight trips are a really big
stepping stone for several reasons,”
says Sampson. “First, the students are
having an experience they haven’t had
for the past two years. For many of
them that’s quite a big deal. And it’s a
fundamental warm up to the next trip,
which is going overseas.
Second, it’s a big step for parents as well.
Parents haven’t let their children go for
a few years, and that’s a really big deal
and we recognise that. So giving the
opportunity for them to practise that,
that’s an important step for them as well.
Finally, it’s important for our instructors
and teachers, who haven’t had the
opportunity to really engage with
that pastoral care in the way that a
residential experience allows.”
From overnights to expeditions
The resumption of overnight trips at
the Sarimbun Scout Camp is a shift
towards the re-establishment of the
expeditionary trips and the powerful
outdoor education experiences that
are essential to UWCSEA’s OED
programme. Similar to longer trips in
Malaysia or further afield, overnights
at Sarimbun are designed to challenge
students, facilitate learning with others,
develop expedition skills and connect
to nature. The camp’s rustic facilities
provide the perfect escape from the
city, with ropes courses, campfires,
and simple cabins. A nearby overnight
here helps prepare students, carefully
building up experiences that have been
missed over the past few years.
As one of the core elements of our
holistic learning programme, the OED
is always striving to create a rigorous,
experiential and more sustainable
programme. A balance of local and
international trips can help to achieve
this, combining the lower impact
of local experiences with the full
expeditionary experience that only
international travel can provide.
With that in mind, the first multi-day
international expeditionary trips are
scheduled for Gopeng and Tioman,
Malaysia starting January 2023. But just
as important as the question of when
will expeditions return, is what they will
look like when they do.
“Despite the success of our adaptations,
we see our students have missed
many of the fundamental experiences
that have made UWCSEA what it
is,” says Sampson. “For many, those
expeditions and trips are a cornerstone
of a UWCSEA experience. As we are
emerging from covid restrictions we are
busy exploring and planning for next
year’s programmes and what Outdoor
Education will look like into the future.”
“The College has undertaken a review
of the sustainability of our expeditions
and trips,” says Newman. “This is to
ensure that trips are filtered through
a sustainability lens. Each trip and
expedition is planned with sustainability
built into the process, reducing our
impact on the environment and
building in decisions and habits to
support sustainable practice. Aligned
with this we will continue to ensure
that the connection to nature further
fosters environmental stewardship and
support students to be ambassadors for
a sustainable future.”
For Camilla and her classmates, that
experience on the Sarimbun scout
camp may have just seemed like a fun
experience shared with friends. But
for UWCSEA, it represents a vital step
towards rebuilding, and reshaping our
Outdoor Education programme for a
more sustainable future.
December 2022 Dunia | 11
By Andrea Strachan, Primary School Curriculum
Coordinator and Tamsin Armstrong, Primary School
Environmental Stewardship Coordinator, Dover Campus
UWCSEA is one of 18 United World Colleges (UWC) around
the world, with a shared mission of making education a
force to unite people, nations and cultures for peace and
a sustainable future. On Wednesday, 21 September we
celebrated UWC Day. This year’s theme was, ‘Peace Begins
With Us.’
Peace is one of the “Five P’s” that the United Nations
(UN) uses to conceptualise Sustainable Development,
together with People, Planet, Prosperity and Partnership.
Peace education is built into our Service Curriculum, and
is anywhere students learn about Sustainability. In 2019,
UWCSEA named Sustainable Development as one of the five
Mission Competencies which the College aims to develop in
students through our holistic learning programme.
But what does learning about Peace and Sustainability look
like in our Primary School context? We can explore answers
to this question by looking more closely at our Grade 5
programme, the culminating year of Primary School.
In Grade 5, Systems Thinking and concepts connected to
Sustainability are woven throughout the curriculum. The
year begins with a Unit of Study titled, ‘What If I Were You?’
Explorations of personal identity are incorporated into
class discussions and learning engagements, and students
consider the ways in which people around the world are able
to meet their basic human and emotional needs depending
on the resources they have access to. Students learn about
organisations working to support prosperity in places where
people struggle to access what they need to flourish and lead
fulfilling lives.
Mid year, students engage in a Unit of Study focused on
conflict transformation and peace, using case studies that
FEATURE
Concept-based
curriculum in action
Grade 5 hands-on learning
for peace and a sustainable future
12 | Dunia December 2022
emerge from both students’ lived experiences, and local
and global events. They learn about the difference between
positive and negative peace, and how peace is so much more
than simply the absence of war. They learn that peace begins
with personal peace, extending outward to interpersonal
peace and global peace.
Our Grade 5 programme culminates with a student Expo,
where learners inquire deeply into an environmental issue
connected to the UN Sustainable Development Goals, and
action we must take to protect our planet’s climate and
natural resources in partnership with others.
All five of the P’s in our Sustainable Development
framework—people, prosperity, peace, planet and partnership
—are found within our Service Programme. Service is one
of the core elements of a fully articulated K–12 curriculum
designed to shape students who self-identify as capable
global citizens, who have a sense of agency and understanding
of their individual ability to enact meaningful positive
change in the world. Service is more than just an individual
endeavour, and is not about simply doing “for” others. Rather,
it is about standing alongside one another, and collective
efficacy. Quite simply put, it is understanding that together
we can achieve more. In our Primary School, we use UWC Day
as the launch of our Service Programme.
For Grade 5s, leading a Primary School composting initiative
connected to our College-wide commitment to sustainability
is a core component of their Service Programme. This
service initiative is connected to another Grade 5 Unit of
Study, called ‘Web of Life’ that looks at biodiversity, and
the importance of caring for the natural environment as all
living things are interconnected. Grade 5 students begin by
working together to communicate information to the rest
of the Primary School community about the importance of
composting, and distribute composting containers to different
parts of the school. Classes take turns each week collecting
the waste materials, and delivering them to the college
composting area.
On UWC Day this year, Grade 5 students had the opportunity
to take usable compost, the product of the College’s
composting initiative, and work with our facilities team to
help spread it in our gardens. Students were able to see the
full impact of their service initiative, and the ways in which
small individual changes can lead to a larger, positive impact
on our environment.
This Grade 5 service initiative is an excellent example of
the ways in which we use our campus as a classroom to
support place-based Sustainability Learning. We call these
Campus Case Studies, where students and teachers work
in collaboration with our Facilities and Operations team to
provide opportunities for real-world, hands-on learning.
At the end of the year in Grade 5, before embarking on
their Expo, students are invited to pause and reflect on their
learning experiences throughout the Primary School. Learners
are able to see connections between their previous learning
and all of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Through
student-driven learning opportunities such as the Expo and
our Service Programme, students are able to identify specific
ways in which they have had, and will continue to have, an
impact on the world around them. This focus on Sustainable
Development in our Grade 5 programme is an example of our
UWCSEA concept-based curriculum in action, emphasising
transferable learning to real world contexts.
Scan the QR code to read UWCSEA’s
White Papers on Peace and Sustainable
Development:
December 2022 Dunia | 13
USING ART FOR GOOD
East Campus student wins international film contest raising environmental awareness
Grade 11 student HaoMing recently won
Grand Prize in the 2022 Sony World
Photography Organisation Picture This
short film contest. HaoMing’s entry,
‘The Longer We Wait, The More it
Takes,’ is a stop motion film that he
made in June 2022.
Picture This is a global competition
that supports the United Nations
Sustainable Development Goals
(UNSDGs). The contest aims to help
amplify the voices of filmmakers, while
also raising awareness and inspire
action for the planet.
The theme of the 2022 contest was
‘The Time to Act is Now!’ HaoMing’s
entry was quite literally a home-made
film, made with his mobile phone in
his bedroom. Although simple in its
execution, it tells an impactful story, and
shows how one doesn’t need expensive
equipment, institutional support or a big
budget to create a powerful message.
All you need is a vision and a story to
tell—and maybe a little nudge from your
University Advisor.
“Since I’m focused on art, my university
guidance counsellor told me about the
competition and advised me to enter,”
says HaoMing. “When I found out that
the topic was climate change I was
excited because that was something
I’ve always been passionate about.
Ever since I was in Middle School I’ve
been learning about the UNSDGs, and
the idea of being able to take action
on climate change combined with my
passion for art was really exciting.”
After originally planning on a more
complex live-action film with his
friends, scheduling conflicts, and
COVID-19 forced HaoMing to rethink
his approach. Realising he would have to
create something on his own at home,
he decided on stop-motion.
“I used clay that I bought and trash that
I collected from my family over a few
weeks and put together an ad about the
effects of ocean pollution,” says HaoMing.
“I wanted to focus on ocean pollution
because it is something that I have taken
action on for school and services.”
Winning the global arts competition
has affected HaoMing in several ways,
as he makes his plans for life after
UWCSEA. Because Sony flew HaoMing
to the UK for the awards ceremony, he
was able to visit several schools there to
check in on their Fine Art programmes
in person, something he may not have
been able to do otherwise.
More importantly, winning the
competition has boosted his confidence
and opened his eyes to the potential
of working as an artist to promote
environmental awareness.
“After this competition, I realise that
I can combine my passion for the
environment with my passion for
art, that there’s a way of working
as an environmental artist,” he
says. “That’s not something I ever
considered before now. Before I might
just paint pretty landscapes, but
now I realise the potential for using
art to spread awareness, to fight for
the environment.“
“I learnt that it is as important to spread
awareness as to take action,” says
HaoMing. “So this was a good chance
for me to spread awareness while
exploring my creativity.”
COMMUNITY NEWS
14 | Dunia December 2022
Putting the spotlight on student innovation
and the Alumni Mentorship Programme
Adapted from a report by Vedant,
Grade 12, Dover Campus
In a world where change is more the
norm than the exception, an ‘outside the
box’ approach to problem solving is high
on the list of priorities for organisations
seeking to recruit the best young talent
in the market. At UWCSEA our learning
programme is built to equip students
with the necessary skills and qualities to
meet the fluid needs and challenges of
the future world of work and our Alumni
mentor programme is helping them to
pair and shape these skills and creativity
with current world experiences.
Vedant, a Grade 12 student on Dover
Campus, shares his story about using
innovative thinking to meet an important
need, and how he is tapping into the
UWCSEA Alumni mentor programme for
the support he needs to scale his idea.
The need
Through observations of and
conversations with friends and student
groups, I noted that there is a lack of
options for students to showcase their
work. Some students were posting on
Instagram, some on Medium, some
made physical magazines, and some
were simply unable to share it at all. I
wanted to create a single platform—a
positive, interactive and collaborative
space for student work.
The idea
Introducing, Lumenol—an online hub
for sharing and celebrating student-led
innovation. Students, or student groups,
can post creative work and others on
the platform can like and comment
on the work, creating a positive and
encouraging community around
student innovation and ideas.
The customisable profile pages also serve
as a personalised mini-website/portfolio
page for students which they could send
as part of their university application,
internship application, or job CV.
My vision is that Lumenol becomes a
one-stop-shop for all students to share,
inspire and engage with student created
projects and content.
The journey so far
My journey has been a non-linear
trail of discovery, pivoting and
problem solving.
I spent over a year understanding
the problem, and designing, building
and coding Lumenol from scratch.
My developing skills gained through
hackathons and projects at the UWCSEA
IDEAS Hub proved useful, but still, I had
never taken on a project of this scale. I
had to design and build with the future
in mind and anticipate challenges that
come with scale. I researched as much as
I could, tried and failed numerous times,
and learnt through the experience.
After finalising the initial designs, I
collaborated with friends to name the
platform. We decided on a variation on
Luminol, a chemical used by many IB
Chemistry students. Luminol creates
a beautiful blue glow and Lumenol
is designed to put the spotlight on
student creativity.
The growth of Lumenol has been a
journey of twists and turns, failing and
learning. It continues to evolve, helped
by the feedback and creative input
from students and mentors around
me. It’s this collaborative approach
instilled by UWCSEA that has made
Lumenol possible. It was a jump into the
unknown and I am glad I took it.
The next steps with UWCSEA’s
Alumni Mentorship Programme
I’m now looking to leverage UWCSEA’s
incredible network of alumni to help
guide me through Lumenol’s future as
COMMUNITY NEWS
Scan the QR code
to view the Lumenol
prototype:
an official platform with students from
all over the world.
There are about 14,000 UWCSEA
Alumni globally, all with an amazing
array of skills and real-world experience.
The UWCSEA Alumni Relations team
has been extremely helpful, connecting
me with UWCSEA Alumni through their
mentorship programme. These mentors
will help and guide me with important
next steps to launching Lumenol. This
is one of the things that makes our
UWCSEA community so special, our
Alumni remain connected and give back
through programmes and opportunities
such as this. I’ll be an alumnus soon and
I hope to be able to do the same.
I hope to officially launch Lumenol soon
and I can’t wait to see the positive impact
it has on showcasing student innovation.
To find out more about the UWCSEA
Alumni Mentorship Programme, please
contact alumni@uwcsea.edu.sg
Vedant ’23 and Spencer Ansley ’95
December 2022 Dunia | 15
COMMUNITY NEWS
300
Student
performers
30
Countries
represented
UN NIGHT
UN Night is one of the most memorable and beloved annual events at Dover
Campus, with a longstanding tradition that began in 1979, just eight years
after the College was founded! The festival transforms our Tent Plaza into an
exciting international food fair, sharing a vibrant mix of cuisines along with
Global Concerns (GC) merchandise in support of our GC project partners,
in particular, the sale of our very own yearly Global Concerns calendar.
On top of that, the evening includes a spectacular showcase of creativity
and innovation by 300 students representing 30 countries through dance
performances. UN Night is the culmination of months of hard work and
dedication by hundreds of contributors, celebrating the diversity, unity and
generosity of our UWCSEA community!
COMMUNITY NEWS
16 | Dunia December 2022
CULTURAMA
Celebrating it’s tenth year anniversary in 2022, CultuRama is the annual
High School dance showcase at UWCSEA East that celebrates the diversity
in our community through a colourful showcase of different cultures. Since
its inception, it has blossomed into an exploration of cultures and national
identities through various art forms. Over 200 students were involved this
year, including performers, committee members and cultural ambassadors
from High School. Committee members worked behind the scenes in roles
such as marketing, music, photography and lighting coordinators to provide
support for two live shows. Cultural ambassadors were on hand to guide
performers and ensure that all performances were respectful to the various
cultures. It was a thrilling evening to mark the return of a live audience.
222
Student
performers
Countries
represented
December 2022 Dunia | 17
A new pathway to learning
A look at the new UWCSEA Grade 9 and 10 Academic Programme
After years of careful planning and
preparation, 2022/2023 marks the
first school year that East Campus is
offering its bespoke UWCSEA academic
programme in both Grades 9 and 10 as an
alternative to the International General
Certificate of Secondary Education
(IGCSE).
With the new programme, Grade 9
students embark on a learning journey
consisting of UWCSEA designed and
assessed courses, set within the holistic
UWCSEA learning programme. Like the
IGCSE, the Grade 9 and 10 Programme
is academically rigorous, yet is designed
to allow more flexibility for students to
pursue individual interests while engaging
in the transdisciplinary conceptual
learning that is core to UWCSEA’s
guiding statements.
Both pathways prepare Grade 9 and
10 students for the International
Baccalaureate Diploma Programme
(IBDP) in Grades 11 and 12. This year,
55% of East Campus Grade 9 students
opted for the new UWCSEA Programme.
On Dover Campus, plans to introduce the
new Grade 9 and 10 options have taken a
slightly different timeline, with the focus
on developing a First Language course to
replace IGCSE certificates that were no
longer available for students. In tandem
with this a UWCSEA “Narratives of our
World” English Language and Literature
course was launched for all students,
and plans are well underway for a more
extensive programme to be available on
Dover Campus from next August.
The new Grade 9 and 10 programme
builds on decades of experience in
developing and delivering a successful
specialised programme for students
entering in Grade 10, which was
previously called the Foundation IB. The
development of the new programme
now opens more academic options for
incoming Grade 10 students.
FEATURE
What is the IGCSE?
The IGCSE consists of standardised two-year courses offered to international
schools in over 150 countries by Cambridge International Examinations. Normally,
UWCSEA students enter IGCSE examinations in eight subjects: English Language
and Literature (two courses taught together), another Language, Coordinated
Science (double award), Mathematics, Humanities and a Creative Arts or
Practical subject.
IGCSE courses are assessed on a combination of coursework, a practical or oral
component, and final examinations. Although assessments differ slightly from
subject to subject, all IGCSE subjects have a series of external exams, which
students take over the course of six weeks at the end of Grade 10.
Why a new programme?
1. Alignment with UWCSEA mission and curriculum
“We wanted to launch this programme for several reasons,” says High School
Principal East Campus Damian Bacchoo. “First, we wanted to have more
mission alignment, with much more focus on the interconnected global issues
shaping our world.”
Whereas the IGCSE is a globally-standardised course, the UWCSEA Programme
is purpose-built to align more closely with the College’s mission and values.
For example, the UWCSEA programme intentionally includes concepts
like global peace and sustainability. The programme also follows the same
concept-based approach to curriculum design which has been applied in K–8,
which embraces interdisciplinary, transferable learning and allows students to
collaborate and think across different disciplines and courses.
“The new programme is an exciting opportunity for us,” says East Campus Head
of IB Mathematics Andrew Mollitt. “It allows us to dig deeper into concepts.
Students are really enjoying the freedom to work on project-based activities,
and linking mathematics to other areas of the curriculum that they’re studying.”
18 | Dunia December 2022