Not sure if my last email was received…

Flying… Not-So-Solo 

This project was liberating because students had a say in:

  • what their project was based off
  • who they work with
  • pace they work at 

Before this project, I was nervous because this project had a much bigger outreach than anything we’ve done in the past. The scale of the project all of a sudden became so much bigger than just “This is my individual project”.

3 other people were factored in, and with them, their schedules, opinions, and lives.

It suddenly wasn’t a just a project about making a movie, it was about how to communicate with others and putting your trust in others.

via GIPHY


Yu (and) mi

My partner ended up being Yumi which was good because we worked well together! I had a really positive experience working with her because we were friends, but at the same time, we respected each other by splitting work and keeping each others’ needs (work for other classes, daily schedules) in mind.

  1. First, we created a schedule in order to meet the deadlines. That was helpful for us to always stay on the same page. 
  2. From then on, we just used our class-time efficiently to divide and conquer.
  3. As soon as we finished a task, we would just discuss the next step, then set a date for us to complete it.
  4. Most of the time, we finished our work early because we did a majority of it in class, where we were able to help each other develop ideas and give feedback.

via GIPHY

TALK TO MEEEEE

Before the project started, I was worried because I didn’t know anything about my BMSA partners! I was extremely concerned about communication because often times, between cultures, there’s a difference in communication etiquette. 

Those worries  intensified as they were the type of partners to reply back slowly. Often we would not hear from them for days. Important opportunities for communication (feedback) were not received, so I had to just keep going.

It felt like I was the only one making an effort to reach out, but every time I did, conversation was short and forced. However, I learned that sometimes you don’t always have to constantly communicate in order to complete a goal.

  • When we talked, we would cut straight to the chase and talk about the project.
  • I was grateful that they didn’t waste time on small talk.
  • I could utilize my independent time and do things at my own pace.

via GIPHY


How to be a Screenplay Hipster

Learning how to write a script was confusing because similar to how different writers have their different writing styles, different script writers also have their different styles.

I used Screenplays For You as a reference because the best way for me to learn is to follow an example. I looked at a couple of screenplays before I chose to use American Hustle as my guide. I liked the style of the author’s writing because they clearly separate the background information (camera angles, sound effects, etc) from dialogue. I wanted my script to have the same clarity so my partners could read it quickly so filming would be more efficient.

To Kill a Mockingbird Script: 

We ended up tweaking the information in the book to fit modern times and to make filming more efficient. We weren’t aiming to recreate the book scene by scene (there’s already a movie for that), but instead, we wanted to use it as a stimulus.

This was only possible because scriptwriting is not confined to a specific thing I have to do.

It’s just a way of writing to help me communicate my thoughts in the most efficient manner.


Looking Good 😎😎😎

Storyboarding was very intimidating because I’m not very good at drawing, so I wasn’t sure what direction to take my storyboard in.

  • Should I add shading?
  • Should I draw in 2D or 3D?
  • Should I try to make my characters look realistic?

These were all questions I had.

I felt a little better after looking at some websites that taught me how to storyboard. The one that I found to be the most influential in helping me complete my own was Drawing for Visual Storytelling. 

I liked this website because it just had a lot of examples. That seemed very smart for a storyboard website because why would you explain how to draw with words when you can just show people how to draw?!

To Kill A Mockingbird Storyboard:

I came to realize that my drawings didn’t have to be perfect in order to be understandable.

I spent so much time in the first page just trying to make everything look realistic that whenever I would make a mistake, I couldn’t bare to erase it. It made me spend less time on the notes, which were as helpful for the director as the drawings.


Movie


Conclusion

With Yumi, I think we were able to work well together because we communicated about what we wanted to do and when we wanted to do it before we even started.

That way, we were both working towards a clear goal even though our process was different from each other. We would also talk to each other if we need more time to complete a task, so we always knew if one of us was going to be late.

 

Honestly, working with my BMSA partners was not the best experience, but I did learn to trust.

I really thought that this project would turn out well because there were so many platforms we could talk on; email, instagram, etc. However, I severely overestimated the power of the internet in communication.

How do you communicate with someone who doesn’t want to talk to you? I can’t force them to talk to me because I don’t see them everyday and I can’t reach over the screen.

They taught me how to put trust in others because the only thing I could really do was to trust that they will eventually get back to me, and they came through at the end!

via GIPHY

I think by giving students choice and freedom, they will be more likely to take responsibility for their work because you’re letting them be independent and letting them work at a pace that works best for them.

My partners and I had the same end goal – a completed movie – but how each person got there is drastically different.

I know that they’re only words

It Takes Confidence to Love Pop

I think often times, pop music gets a lot of hate that it doesn’t necessarily deserve. Musicians, the general public, and the pretentious music connoisseurs (who are actually just people that think they’re knowledgable on music after listening to Mozart once) all like to complain about how over-generalized and copy-paste the pop industry has become. It always boils down to this:

1. No one who sings pop music has any musical talent

2. Every song sounds the same. 

3. There is no depth to the lyrics


Radio Killed The Pop Star

Personally, I feel it’s ignorant to say that pop music takes no talent, because many of these artists are skilled, but their choice of genre (pop) restricts them from breaking out of people’s preconceived image of ‘pop stars’ and becoming something more. You see, the problem with pop music isn’t the people, it’s the fact that it has become a “hit-making machine.” Artists understand that the songs that become popular are the songs that are the most catchy. This has led to an industry filled with the same artists trying to release radio-topping singles all with the same ear worm tune that gets stuck in people’s heads, making them want to keep hearing it.

Artists now believe the only way to earn exposure is by having constant Number 1 hits, prioritizing quantity over quality. When their sole aim is to become famous through radio directed hits, their intentions for being a musician no longer is to produce music for themselves, but for fame.

“Who Do You Play For” ; Paula

Black and white image of man with guitar on desert via Visual Hunt // CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication

Pop music is widely hated because it’s created for mass appeal, not bothering to take risks with its musical direction. Pop doesn’t lack quality, it just does not strive to be more than a straightforward tune with catchy lyrics.


Like Broken Record(s)

However, the same artists that are now considered revolutionary and have produced classic hits once started as pop artists too. In actuality, pop music doesn’t lack talented singers or people with the ‘it’ factor. When examined, these ‘timeless artists’ started with pop and were regarded as pop artists until they broke out of the mold.

1. Legendary boy group The Beatles, who broke numerous charts and records were also a pop group until they expanded to songs with more instrumental influence and serious lyrics. “Love Me Do” (one of their earlier songs) is clearly not on the same lyrical level as “Tomorrow Never Knows” (came out 3 years later). 

“Defining a Generation” ; Paula

The Beatles, John Lennon, Paul Mccartney by skeeze via Visual Hunt // CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication

2. Alanis Morisette debuted with her hit song, “Too Hot”. Like most of today’s pop songs, “Too Hot” is a catchy tune with that features surface level lyrics. Eventually, Alanis Morisette became the household name that she is when she transitioned from pop to grunge with classic songs like “You Oughta Know”.

These artists didn’t get magically better out of nowhere, but it was a matter of them gaining more credibility as an artist as their material became more serious. Perhaps when the older generation reminisce about “classic artists” like The Beatles, they only remember these people through rose tinted glasses and sing their praises like a broken record. The same things they complain about now are the things their parents complained about when they were younger and listening to the younger versions of classic artists. 


“Modernity Has Failed Us”

The lyrics of pop songs sound very superficial and lazily written because pop music is overgeneralized and because the lyrics are played over simple, radio-directed tracks. The song lyrics to certain popular songs especially proves that musicians (like The 1975) can produce deep and meaningful song lyrics.

Take their recent hit song. “Love It If We Made It“:

You want deep song lyrics? The 1975 will hit you with a whole song about everything wrong with our world.

Every sentence is loaded with cultural references. Even if it’s not heard in the song, it’s shown in the video.

Everything from selling melanin to Eric Garner to our flawed the prison system. The 1975 was not afraid to lay out humanity’s wrongdoings plain and simple in the form of a 4:25 minute song.

“Selling melanin and then suffocate the black men
Start with misdemeanours and we’ll make a business out of them”

Melanin: Matty (lead singer) references to “selling melanin” – a recent phenomenon that ironically sees the rich and white purchasing melanin to purposefully make their skin darker. It exposes the irony and hypocrisy that is white people darkening their skin, amidst ongoing racism.

Eric Garner: The second reference “…and then suffocate the black men,” follows up white people’s idolisation of darker skin, with the phone-shot video of the death of Eric Garner, a African American man choked to death in New York by a police officer. The killing broke NYPD codes of conduct, which sparked nationwide protests, but also goes to show how ironic it is that white people somewhat fetishize the idea of darker skin when, for centuries, it has been the target of racism and discrimination.

Prison: In “Start with misdemeanours and we’ll make a business out of them,” Matty references to the increasing privatisation of the prison system, which had controversy not properly rehabilitating the prisoners, but instead, was a way for the rich to get richer off the private sectors.

These 3 topics alone were covered all in a 9 second span of time from 0:34-0:43, but is only a brief microcosm of the whole song.

Funny how a call to action for the world to admit its wrongs is being delivered in the form of a 4 minute pop song when the president of a first world country doesn’t even recognize global warming…And pop songs are the ones usually being trashed


Love It If We Made It” is a song about finding hope in the hopeless world.

In a sense, that’s what lyrics are for; Giving you hope when you’ve lost yours.

Like the song says: “Modernity has failed us, and I’d love it if we made itthe lyrics symbolize  the hope we hold in our society and as individuals that we will be able to learn from our mistakes and continue to live.

I know lyrics are just words, but words are power.

Music is about changing society by inspiring individuals – Matty Healy (The Guardian, 2018).


MLA Citations:

– The 1975. “Modernity Has Failed Us.” Genius, Genius Media Group Inc., 19 July 2018, genius.com/15014723.
– Connick, Tom. “A State-of-the-Planet Address: Every Reference in The 1975’s Powerful ‘Love It If We Made It’ Video.” NME, NME, 16 Oct. 2018, www.nme.com/blogs/nme-blogs/1975-love-it-if-we-made-it-video-explained-2390473.
– Theodosion, Constantine. “Why does pop music get so much hate?” Quora. 2 Aug. 2017, https://www.quora.com/Why-does-pop-music-get-so-much-hate 

–  Snapes, Laura. “Matt Healy of the 1975: ‘I’m Not Scared of Myself Any More’.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 20 July 2018, www.theguardian.com/music/2018/jul/20/matt-healy-of-the-1975-im-not-scared-of-myself-any-more.

I thought we were friends :(

You probably don’t think it’s THAT important to credit other people for their work do you?

Or maybe you know it’s important, but you still don’t give credit to other people because you think no one will ever find out you stole.

No you didn’t steal their pen or their notebook.

Oh no, it’s much worse.

You stole their work.

And it doesn’t matter that you stole…until that person finds out. Dun dun dun.

Here is a dramatic reenactment (it probably happened somewhere sometime throughout history and then they probably never spoke again because humans are petty like that) of a friendship falling apart due to one friend’s ignorance to the importance of giving credit;

A friendship ended over something petty.

Welp, nothing new, sounds like humanity alright. 🤧🤧🤧✊✊✊

Just because you’re friends doesn’t mean you can steal things.


Video tips: When making this video, I found that it’s much easier to plan out your videos before you make them because then you can visually see all that you have to do, which makes organising your time easier. Here’s our “storyboard” that I roughly drew up before we filmed the video:

Cred-ez: Also, something new that I learned is that when choosing what videos and background music to use, you can type in “no copyright” or sometimes, certain creators put in the description that it’s free to use as long as you give them credit. They don’t even give a specific way that people have to give credit, it’s just as long as you recognise the creator of the original song/video. This makes giving credit much simpler, which I think is cool because I think it pushes people to be more compelled to actually credit others. People are usually deterred by the different formats (APA, MLA…) that they just don’t want to give credit, but with something as simple as saying “Credit to blah blah blah”, I think it will push more people to credit.

Overcoming Audio Problems: The actual editing of the video went a lot smoother than I expected, because since we had already planned everything out, the only thing left to do was to put all the clips together and voice over. Adjusting the volume of the video gave us some trouble because it sounded kind of fake (love ahahaha, get it?; A/N: that’s the title of the background music) due to the sudden change from muffled (original) to clear (voiced-over) audio. However, in the end, I think it was incorporated well into the video because it makes the viewers feel as though they’re part of the conversation.


Credit to GZBKarma for BTS fancam video Link to Original Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdnwR…

Background Music from Kpop NoCopyright Link to Original Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOkeR…

It’s Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas

“Light-hearted Spirits” ; Paula/Janet

Christmas tree lights by Shandi-lee via Visualhunt / CC BY-NC-ND

Paula & Janet

“Maybe Christmas, the Grinch thought, doesn’t come from a store.” – Dr. Seuss

So many things come into mind when it’s Christmas, but all too many times, it’s centered around the act of giving and receiving….presents. However, what people should focus on in the holiday spirit is looking forward to is the 💖 heartwarming 💖 time spent with family and friends.

There are so many ways that one can get away from the commercialism and stress that surrounds the idea of having to exchange presents 🎁🎁🎁🎁. Don’t be dragged down by the thought of finding a ‘perfect gift’ because Christmas is supposed to be a light and joyful time. Because in the end, the true meaning of Christmas is love. Presents can be a way of showing love to the people you see once or twice a year, but a better present you could give them is time spent together.

There are so many ways you could take the opportunity to partake in the cheerful festivities of Christmas; hang lights with your family 👪, make gingerbread 🍞 houses with them, bake cookies 🍪 with awful looking Santa frosting designs on top, go pick out a fir tree 🎄 that you’ll struggle carrying through the doorway. Maybe the tree or lights or the cookies won’t last long, but the memories will. It’s okay to want to buy presents for your family, but like Christmas lights, the holidays are about lighting up those around you and surrounding something to make it better.

“Silent But Bustling Night”; Paula/Janet

Mariazell, Christmas Fair By Rinaldo W. via Visual hunt / CC BY

Paula & Janet

“All is calm and all is bright…sleep in heaven, heavenly peace” – Joseph Mohr

During Christmas, when snow is falling gently outside the window ❄️❄️❄️ and the crackling sound of the fire 🔥🔥🔥 can be heard over the CD playing Christmas songs, the world seems to finally be at peace. Kids in pajamas and adults gathered around a table drinking hot chocolate, it’s then that the true meaning of Christmas can be felt. The frozen stillness of the outside contrasts the joyful atmosphere of the house, but as the snowflakes keep falling and the children keep laughing, everything becomes softer and more beautiful.

And as you look outside your window, you realise that in the midst of being blanketed by the snow around you, you’re not cold because you can feel the warmth of not only the fire, but your family. Maybe it’s the ‘snow’-tinted glasses making you sentimental, or maybe it’s the song in the background that’s gotten stuck in your head, but you think that Christmas is “the most beautiful time of the year”.

 

“The Warmest Time Of All”

Two snowmen in garden by klimkin via Visual hunt / (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication

Paula & Janet

As you wake up the next morning, the sight of a snowman is the first thing you see. With its carrot-orange nose and it’s Abraham Lincoln top hat, for a split second you think it’s Frosty ☃️. Who can blame you? The two look iden-cicle.

You bundle up and run outside to play with the snowman, whom, despite being made of snow, give you flashbacks to your childhood that makes your heart warm 💓.

But as you learned from the past 2 days, maybe someone can decorate all they want in preparation for Christmas. Maybe no matter how many Christmas lights you hang, or how many classic hits you sing while the snow falls, or even how close your snowman is to becoming Frosty, maybe none of it has meaning without family.

A family gives joy.

A family cares.

A family loves.


“It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas…Right within your heart” – Johnny Mathis

In this assignment, it was fun to choose what 3 pictures to put, but hard to make captions and think of a good theme that I wanted to write about. As it was getting close to Christmas, I thought it would be reasonable to talk about what everyone seems to have forgotten; what Christmas truly means. It’s not about about the presents or the traveling, it’s about being with family and enjoying the time you have together. So we decided to choose 3 things that symbolically have represented Christmas over the years and help the readers look perspectively look deeper into what the picture shows through the use of caption. Throughout writing this blog post, I learned that choosing the correct caption can provoke the audience to subconsciously try and find a connection between the caption and the picture, forcing them to explore the greater, overall theme.

The parts of the blog post that was easy for me was weaving the individual stories of the 3 pictures together, and giving attributions for the pictures. Since “It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas” and along with the holiday season, it also brings along lots of heartwarming emotions for everyone, I thought I should remind everyone that Christmas isn’t about material possession. What made this easy was that I could change the picture if it didn’t fit with my theme since I didn’t have to worry about having to keep making new MLA citations for each photo I change. The attributions are made easy by creative commons since it allows me to give credit to the author, but it doesn’t make it excessively hard to do so.

 

Everything Wrong With Our Education System

Are Kids Just Lazy…?

Do kids cheat because they didn’t study before a test? Or maybe they just don’t have the time to write their own research paper? Perhaps they were ambushed by a surprise pop quiz? Well, 60-70% of high school students have cheated before and 90% have copied another’s homework. Is this because kids are lazy and don’t want to do their work…or is it due to another factor?


Maybe It’s The School’s Fault?

“Teachers should be focused on encouraging mastery rather than performance on assessments” (Lahey,  “A Classroom Where No One Cheats”).

Jessica Lahey wrote an article discussing the how the class environment encourages the students to cheat. By assigning numbers to the student’s level of understanding, they are lured into thinking that grades are the end-all be-all. Grades are making students believe that it’s more important to get a good grade than to take the time to fully understand the concept.  According to that article, these are the main contributors for why kids cheat:

Higher stakes: Getting a good score on a test versus failing a test have started to become sort of a life or death situation for students where if they do not earn a “good” score, they feel as if they have ruined the rest of their lives. It’s natural for students to want to be seen as smart, but when their belief is that the result of one test decides whether they will graduation or flip burgers at McDonalds, the risk of failure pushes students to cheat despite their better judgement.

“The more pressure you load onto an exam or assessment of any kind, the more you are likely to have students who respond to that pressure with academically dishonest measures” (THNK, “3 Reasons Grades Are Bad for Education”).

Self-efficacy: This is when students have a “belief in their own ability to succeed” or basically, confidence in their abilities. Students with low self-efficacy have a higher probability to cheat, meaning that the influence a teacher has on the student plays a big role in their success. Students want to feel that someone believes they will succeed and when they have the belief that they have the knowledge and skillset to complete the task, it will give them the effort to learn, but more importantly, try.

The end goal: Grades were originally intended as a means of measuring learning, but have gradually turned into a goal itself. Giving assessments and putting a “grade” on learning essentially forces students to memorize only the necessary materials to pass a test, whilst not making sure the student understands the topic thoroughly. The student’s pursuit of knowledge put on a back burner, eclipsed by the significance that we ourselves have appointed with grades.

If we wanted kids to stop being academically dishonest, then maybe we have to start by changing the way our grading system works.


Does KAS Properly Deal With Academic Dishonesty?

“Furthermore, when students and teachers maintain academic honesty, trust is nurtured and culture of learning is strengthened” (High School Handbook 2018-2019 Kaohsiung American School, 32).  

KAS takes academic honesty seriously and judging from their handbook, it seems as if the school understands the importance academic honesty plays in furthering the student’s understanding and individual growth. Along with taking academic honesty seriously, that means there are consequences such as no credit, conferences, etc, but nothing quite like the consequences for dishonesty in college.

As my group found out when we did research for our presentation, the consequences for academic dishonesty in colleges can include getting kicked out, which is kind of ironic when the source of their dishonesty stemmed from wanting to attend a good college in the first place.  Other consequences can be found in the presentation below –>


The More the Merrier…Or Not

Group work allowed us to be able to come up with a lot of unique examples because each person talked about an example that they were passionate or interested in, which added more depth to the topic of academic (dis)honesty. Through the different examples, we were able to explore how something that seems so insignificant in high school can lead to disastrous results in different universities and colleges.

However, group work made the organization of the presentation hard to arrange, which limited the amount of information we had. There were certainly a lot more colleges or a lot more examples of consequences that could have been included, but in a group, everyone has different visions of what the presentation should look like. Eventually, the flow


MLA Citations:

– Lahey, Jessica. “A Classroom Where No One Cheats.” The Atlantic, Atlantic Media Company, 16 Dec. 2013, www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2013/12/a-classroom-where-no-one-cheats/282254/. Accessed 19 Nov 2018.
– “3 Reasons Grades Are Bad for Education” THNK, 22 June 2018, www.thnk.org/blog/3-reasons-grades-bad-education/. Accessed 19 Nov 2018.
– Lahey, Jessica. “’I Cheated All Throughout High School’.” The Atlantic, Atlantic Media Company, 26 Dec. 2013, www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2013/12/i-cheated-all-throughout-high-school/282566/. Accessed 20 Nov 2018.

– “Section 14: Academy Honesty Policy.” High School Handbook 2018-2019 Kaohsiung American School. 2018.

The Internet is Ruining Our Lives

Click here to win a trip to Europe!

And if you just clicked…you got rickrolled.

This is a problem that not only plagues you, but most of those who access the internet. Well, not rick rolling in particular, but getting tricked by whatever they see online.

This is happening because the people who post these kinds of links  are not thinking about their digital citizenship. Sure, rickrolling is just harmless fun, but as more and more people are venturing into deeper and deeper depths of the internet, soon these fake links will no longer just take you to Rick Astley’s 1987 single “Never Going to Give You Up”, but instead, to things that are much worse. The fake links are more than just rick rolling, scammers also trick people by impersonation, using fake  anti-virus pop ups, email phishing, etc.

This is part of the reason why it’s important for all generations to take control of their digital citizenship, and with that, their digital safety as well. First off, we have to define digital citizenship, which is hard, considering that it’s such a broad topic that covers a multitude of other issues.

Digital Citizenship mainly boils down to 2 points:

– Represent yourself

– Protect your safety and privacy


Represent Yourself:

Ever wonder why all your friends are always on vacation or eating at the newest restaurants? Nowadays on social media, we often see people projecting exaggerated images of themselves or only specifically choosing to show the good things that happen to them. This happens on instagram, twitter, snapchat, basically every social media platform available. Why wouldn’t people want to show the best version of themselves? It’s understandable. However, this is hurting not only yourself, but also the people around you.

When we post about our life accomplishments, goals, or the highlights of our lives, we feel better from the likes and comments from others because it gives us a sense of accomplishment. The more likes we get, the more we strive to get more….and more. The cycle keeps going and you will feel compelled to only post about things that will get you likes or purposefully push yourself to do something worthy of posting everyday. To be a good digital citizen, you have to not only take care of others, but also yourself.

– Make sure what you post is something you want to post for your own sake, not for the entertainment and attention of others.

– Make sure it represents you, because you will take responsibility for everything you post.

– Make sure it represents well on the people and school around you.

 

 

Safety and Privacy:

The younger generation is facing a problem that has worsened as technology is becoming readily available and accessible to kids; they don’t know how to keep themselves safe online. As technology advances and becomes a necessity, that means the internet has become a place for people of all ages, personalities, and ideas. This means it’s important for kids to take responsibility of their digital presence.

Digital footprint is constantly being left whether you know it or not. When you leave comments to your friends, use your email to sign up, upload stories, anything and everything can be leaving your digital footprint. Doing these things is revealing more and more about yourself to anyone who stumbles upon your digital presence. You’re telling them what you like, what you watch, what your social media habits are….

We often believe that whatever we post on social media doesn’t matter because it’s lost in the vastness of the internet, but in actuality, it’s very easy to trace everything someone has ever posted. Even when the post is deleted, it’s never really gone. Even privacy settings do not guarantee that the post will remain “safe”. So it’s important to be mindful of what you post and remember to protect private information about you, your family, and friends.

It’s easy to get caught up in all the lights and glamour of all that the internet has to provide that we don’t realize we’re falling down into the vastness of the online world.


MLA Citation:

– Slavin, Tim. “Online Guidelines for Student Blogging, Commenting, and Personal Safety.” Beanz, 27 Aug. 2013, www.kidscodecs.com/online-guidelines-for-student-blogging/ 

– Borovoy, Amy Erin. “5-Minute Film Festival: Teaching Digital Citizenship.” Edutopia, George Lucas Educational Foundation, 14 Sept. 2012, www.edutopia.org/blog/film-festival-digital-citizenship.

Does Your School Even Care About You?

You can tell a lot about what each school values the most by looking at what they write about. So how do you know if your school values your achievements more than your health and safety?

Do you think that your school cares about you? Well, one way to check may be to take a look at the health and safety regulations at the school. For reference, here are 3 handbooks from different international schools in Asia. Even though they are all international schools and all in Asia, there are still big differences in not only the amount of information they write about student health, but what they thought was the “main point” (what parts they thought were important enough to include).


KAS Handbook

Standards of Safety: 

One thing that is noticed when you open up the KAS handbook is that it places a rather harsh/heavy spotlight on academics and academic honesty that student health and safety sometimes takes a backseat.

Immediately from the table of contents page, academics is seen to be the main topic in multiple sections of the handbook, (sections 3, 5, 12, 14, 16, 17) while safety only gets 1 (section 9). As you flip to section 9, you then notice that the handbook actually only has 1 page documenting the procedures that the school takes in case of an emergency.

Only things like fires, earthquakes, and school cancellations are featured.

Even then, the course of action to be taken for each incident only includes a brief description. For example, the instructions of what to do in case of a emergency reads, “Any Emergency / Safety concerns should be directed immediately to the Superintendent’s office for review and follow up.” If there is an urgent matter that needs to be taken care of, it seems to be a waste of precious time to have to first review and then follow up on the situation before taking action

Physical Health: 

Section 9.2 is the only direct reference to student health and safety, which is disappointing when compared to the fact that the handbook has 21 overall sections. The section basically just says that the school would inform parents in case there are outbreaks of infectious diseases and that parents should not allow their kids to go to school if they so happen to be contagious (with no specified diseases).

NOWHERE in that section does it sound like the school cares for the students as individuals, but instead, they seem to care for the student population as a whole and only as a whole.

NOWHERE in that section does it talk about the health of individual students and where they can seek help from the school.

NOWHERE in that section does it talk about how students can seek guidance or help for physical pain, let alone emotional distress.

In a section about student health and safety, there is nothing on how a student should seek help for their own health and safety.

Mental Health: 

However, since KAS organizes their handbook by section, it’s easy to see in the table of contents that KAS does include some bits and pieces of extra information for how students can take care of their health whether it be physically, like what to do when you contract a disease (section 9.2), or mentally.

Oh look, when you flip to section 16, there’s a nice surprise!

Section 16.1 “Guidance and Counseling”.

Maybe they’ll finally talk about how students can take care of their mental health… But wait! Would you look at that. It’s counseling…for academic needs. Even the first description of what KAS counselors do is academically centered. “Counselors are vital members of the education team. They help all students in the areas of academic achievement…”

Not centered around the mental health of the students.

Clearly KAS’s main priority is not safety. So, what exactly is their main priority then?

Academics: 

Well, by taking a look at the titles of KAS’ academic sections, you get the clear feeling that their main focus isn’t just academics and getting the perfect grades/credits needed for graduation, but instead, their main focus seems to be making sure the student is creating work that is representative of them. In Section 3: Expected Student Learning Outcome, the whole emphasis on academics in the KAS handbook is made clear. There is a reason the school gives so much information about graduation requirements and what IB classes you need to take; it is preparing you for the rest of your life.

The focus on academics at KAS is not to force students to get perfect grades, but to develop them into being independent thinkers. Being an independent thinker includes all the things in Section 3, such as being critical thinkers, active learners, and effective communicators. This is why sections discussing academics like Section 16: Academic Dishonesty (a section that’s somewhat ironically longer than that of student safety) is included in the KAS handbook.

Since KAS wants students to take charge of their own learning and apply those skills beyond high school, it stresses the importance of academics throughout the handbook. The section on student safety and health may be brief and concise (and wayyyyyy shorter than the pages of academic guidelines) because this handbook’s main focus is to emphasize the importance of academics and academic honesty in its students’ futures.


SCIS Handbook

Standards of Safety: 

Similar to KAS, in the SCIS ECE Handbook, the table of contents lays out the information of the handbook in sections, making it easy for the readers to quickly skim through the handbook and find what they’re looking for. One distinct difference between the handbook of SCIS and KAS from the start is that there are significantly less sections for the SCIS handbook (7) compared the KAS (21). They’ve condensed everything they needed to say into 7 sections of importance, one of which includes student safety.

This handbook is by far the most detailed out of the 3 in terms of student health.

Physical Health: 

The school discusses what the school is going to do for both the student and the parent in case their student gets sick or has an illness. There is a detailed course of action and guidelines for what the parents/kids should do which not only shows the school’s concern for the individual students, but for the student population.

The school lists specific illnesses that prohibits specific students to come to school in order to ensure the health of both the individual student and protection of the student body. For example, “Fever: A child with a fever of over 99 F/37.2 C or more will be sent home. The child may return when fever-free for 24 hours without the use of fever reducing medicines.” The way this handbook deals with health by giving the course of action they are going to take makes them appear as to care more about their students as opposed to KAS.

The level of detail and research provided indicates to the readers that the school has actually thought about what will be best for the student’s recovery.

Mental Health: 

There is also a plan for what the school plans to do when kids deal with non-physical issues, such as separation anxiety. Although not a prominent issue, especially with kids in high school, SCIS makes it a point to include that younger kids dealing with separation anxiety will be reassured of their parents’ return and that it is the job of the teacher to ease separation anxiety.

KAS has very little information about what to do in case a student’s physical health deteriorates, let alone have information about what to do when students are dealing with mental or psychological health issues, such as separation anxiety for younger kids.

SCIS puts a lot of focus and care into ensuring that the students of their school are not only physically fit, but also mentally fit to be in school and this is shown through the attention to detail in their handbook.

Academics: 

At SCIS, their dedication to student health can even be seen in their academics section of the handbook. In multiple places, the emphasis is put on making sure the students are not burdened by academics, but instead, developing healthy habits.

This is similar to KAS’ idea of setting students up to become contributing citizens of society. Both schools aim, through academics, to shape inquiring, knowledgeable and caring students who positively contribute to their communities. 


AISHK Handbook

Standards of Safety: 

The AISHK handbook requires people to take a closer look at each part of the book because even though there is a table of contents, the parts are not divided into numbered sections, making it hard to find the parts about student safety and academics. The interesting about the safety section of this handbook is that the content is very different.

KAS and SCIS took the idea of student health and safety as to only attain to keeping students safe from illnesses and what to do in case there is a medical emergency. However, AISHK only provides a generalized plan of what the school will do in the case of an emergency, “Your child will be taken to the nearest public hospital, unless you have instructed us otherwise.”

There is no mention of what kind of emergency or what kind of illnesses will be serious enough to warrant the school to bring the student there.

Instead, they have 2 options; the school nurse or the hospital. 

Food Safety: 

That’s not even the most interesting part. AISHK puts the spotlight on food safety when talking about student health, something neither KAS or SCIS have even touched on. Their section on food allergies and their food catering’s daily hygiene/sanitization is the most detailed out of the 3 handbooks.

Things that have not been mentioned in the other 2 handbooks, such as “Identification of high-risk foods and replacement with other nutritious foods” and  “Awareness of craft materials that can cause risk e.g. egg cartons, milk containers, peanut butter jars” are brought up for the first time and draws attention especially to helping kids with allergies stay away from their triggers. 

Formatting of Safety Section: 

Another unique addition to their safety section is that when they finally do talk about diseases, it is set up in a simple chart that simply states the name of the disease and if/how long the student needs to stay at home. The chart is easily understandable and keeps information concise, unlike KAS and SCIS, who both wrote about diseases in paragraph format, making it harder to parents to find information quickly.

Although the handbook does set rules in place for the teachers to impose less than a certain amount of homework in order to avoid stressing the students, it seems as if the main focus of this school is letting kids explore their passions.

Sports and Activities: 

In their handbook, unlike KAS and SCIS, AISHK has a lot more information about sports and extracurricular activities for the students, encouraging them to become involved in what interests them. There is not such an emphasis on building character through academic learning, but instead, they focus on building character through the sportsmanship and sense of team that comes along with sports.

We expect every person representing AISHK to be excellent ambassadors for our school.”

AISHK wants the students to be good people that set a good reputation for the morals that the school teaches, whether it be building character through academics or building character through sports.


Takeaway From All Handbooks

Perhaps what each school values the most, whether it be academics, art, or athletics, affects how much the school writes about safety in their annual handbook.

Perhaps the school expects you to know how to take good care of yourself that rules for safety should be common sense.

Perhaps these schools just want you to focus on being a independent thinker instead of being constantly worried over if you’re following safety guidelines.

 

However boring you may think student handbooks are to read, they are still able to provide a lot of information that not only ensures that students are becoming good citizens, but also that they are remaining safe while doing so. Schools want you to be the best person you can be, but the way they aim to achieve that and the lengths they will go to bring out the best version of you, that is what differs so greatly between schools.

And that is why different handbooks exist; to fit what each school expects from their students.