Principal’s Address to the Annual Award Ceremony - 15.09.2017

Annual Awards Ceremony

September 2017

Principal’s Address

Our Guest of Honour, Mr Paul Davis, Senior Colleagues, Faculty, Parents, Students and, of course, Award Winners,  Good morning.

It is my great pleasure to welcome you to the British School in Colombo Awards ceremony for 2017, once again held in this magnificent auditorium. Parents who were here last year will know that the purpose of using this special venue is so that our whole school community, all senior school students, and families of prize winners, can be together to celebrate the achievements of our students during the last academic year. And the Award ceremony is held in September, rather than June as in earlier years, so that we can give immediate recognition to students for their recent examination results in IGCSE and A levels.  

It is a great honour to have as our Chief Guest, Olympic and World Champion yachtsman, Mr Paul Davis,: thank you most sincerely for finding the time in your very busy schedule to be with us today. I know your presence will be an inspiration and motivation to all our students. Thank you indeed for joining us today.

It is only right that I begin my remarks by congratulating our numerous award winners. This celebration is about recognising the many achievements of our students and I am both delighted and honoured to be able to recognise the exceptional performances of our students.

Our Awards Ceremony recognises achievements in a range of school experiences: academics, obviously, but also sports, music, drama, and community involvement. The Awards reflect the diverse and well-rounded education that is provided at BSC.

Let me begin with academics: once again, this year the British School exam results have been outstanding. We are very proud of this year's A level candidates, who achieved a 98% pass rate, and an astonishing 44% of all grades were A* and A grades. 

If you look through your programme, you will see that BSC graduates have entered some of the finest universities in the world: University of Cambridge (Aerospace Engineering); University of Bristol (Medicine); Birkbeck College University of London (Law) University College London (Economics); Queen Mary University of London (Astrophysics); University of Edinburgh (Economics); University of California – Berkley (Economics) New York University (mathematics); Boston University (Economics) Monash University (psychology) Auckland University of technology – the full list is in your programme and is extremely impressive.

Our IGCSE pass rate was also outstanding, with some excellent individual performances and our exam results place us in the top 5% of UK schools and alongside the very best British International schools around the world. Bearing in mind too that many of our students are not working in English as their first language, these are truly exceptional results.

 Later in this Award ceremony we will be paying tribute to all our outstanding scholars at both A Level and IGCSE.

Academic work is at the heart of what we do but it is certainly not the be all and end all of BSC life. The skills learned and experiences gained outside the classroom on the games field, in music & on the stage, MUN, World Scholars, Debating, and the International Award, all complement and supplement hugely what is going on in the classroom. And at the British School there is tangible excellence and breadth of opportunity in so many areas of the wider curriculum. Whether it is sport, music, drama, debating, MUN, World Scholars, in which ever aspect of wider learning our students participate, they always perform exceedingly well and are outstanding ambassadors for the school.

I am delighted that our students continue to be very active in a range of community projects. The major charity events are organised by our HOPE and Interact Clubs. Other ventures are supported by students in each Key Stage so that students have many opportunities to interact with, appreciate and support the less privileged communities.

The Hope Society collected over 1000 books to establish a reading room in an under privileged school. The project was funded by an NGO called House of Hope where two of our former BSC students (also members of HOPE) are currently employed.

The Society also organised regular bake sales in school to collect funds which were also used to help in the Key Stage 3 book drive.

Our Interactors have also been very busy. The funds were generated by activities at the Christmas carnival, a Valentine’s Day non-uniform day, bake sales, Valentine’s day roses, and our spectacular end of year event, Enliven. To raise over one million rupees is a fabulous achievement and my congratulations go to all our Interactors. In addition, the Interactors are also working on a joint project with Royal College called “Footloose” which will be providing help and assistance to a school in the north.

Students in Key Stage Three carried out a "Book Drive" where students collected stationery to produce and donate stationery packs for less privilege students in the Rajagiriya area for their new academic year.

Students in Key Stage 4 continued their Light a Life project, now in its fourth year. As part of an on-going project, Key Stage 4 raised Rs 160,000 in aid of Katawala  Kansihta Vidyalaya, Kurenegala.

Together, these community projects indicate very clearly that British School students are involved with the world around them. My thanks to all those involved and special thanks to the teachers who provide such outstanding leadership and support.

I am also delighted that BSC is actively involved in the Duke of Edinburgh's International Award as we are the first and only school in Sri Lanka to be an Independent Assessment Centre. Our third year of Awards will be presented today.

In sport, our teams have once again performed extremely well. I try to watch as many of the games as possible and I am always struck by the level of commitment and sportsmanship in our players. In some matches, it hasn’t always been easy: when it is very competitive some teams go one step too far to try to win. I am delighted that our players always conduct themselves properly: I am very proud of them all. Mr Hendry, our Director of Sport, will be presenting a report about sports activities later in this ceremony.

Moving on from sport, I want to praise the choir for a magnificent year:  last year was simply amazing! The school entered an international choir festival in Portugal to give the choir wider experience of singing and singing in a very competitive environment. Never in my wildest dreams did I think that the choir would be crowned the overall champions – but that is exactly what happened. The British School choir were judged to be the best choir in the entire Festival – and yet they were the only school choir taking part. This is a simply wonderful achievement: and all those who were at the airport when the choir returned to Colombo will never forget those happy scenes! The choir went on to win for the second time the international schools choir competition here in Sri Lanka and now they are preparing for the Asian Choir games to be held in Colombo next month. My sincere thanks to Ms Shamistha who has led the choir brilliantly and congratulations to all of the choir members.

I want to return to a theme to which I hinted at the start of my address: what is a world class school?

I was thinking about Mr Davis’ company: North Sails. The company is a world leader in the design and construction of sails for all manner of yachts. When we think of world class in this context I suspect we think that the sails will be the finest possible; that each sail created will be to the highest possible standard. Each sail made will be the best that it can possibly be. The company: it will be focussed and organised to deliver excellence. It will instil the correct attitudes and work practices to ensure the delivery of high quality sails. And of course, the company would want to deliver these things consistently: a sail produced on one day or by one worker should be as good as any other sail. The company must produce world class sails consistently.

And this is exactly what we are trying to do at the British School – not to produce world class sails, of course, but to be develop world class students.

Last year in my Address I spoke about our desire to be world class and throughout last year, the staff focussed on three key elements essential to this vision:

   1. Everyone achieving the highest academic standards

This is ambitious but it is right: we want every child to achieve the highest possible academic standards.

   2. Students equipped with the values, attitudes and attributes that will serve them well later in life

This is important for BSC: it is attitudes and attributes (I talk often about CIE 2R) that will serve our students well later in life long after they have left the school

    3. The school delivering consistently regardless of changes in context or circumstances

It is vital for us that our provision and services are consistent: we want the school to be consistent in what we provide to students and parents.

It is widely acknowledged that schools should be preparing young people for a world which is significantly different to that of twenty years ago. Young people need to perform in a diverse global economy which is typified by technological innovation, which is highly competitive and where entrepreneurism is celebrated. Therefore, world class schools should equip their students with the knowledge, skills and confidence to thrive in a challenging international environment where those who succeed take risks and continually pursue improvement. I believe our students meet these challenges. Students leaving the British School in Colombo will be:

• Advanced Performers – winning places in world class universities

• Global Leaders – responsible, responsive and confident; improving things locally and globally

• Enterprising Learners – creative, innovative and engaged: well placed to enjoy future success.

Today’s Prize Giving is a celebration of achievement and success; a recognition of targets set and goals achieved. I am immensely proud of our students’ achievements and as ever, I am struck by the confident, self-assured young people who graduate from this school.

Of course, the hard work to achieve results must be done by the students themselves, but I am extremely grateful for the dedication and hard work of the teaching staff. It is a common occurrence to see members of staff engrossed in extra lessons or clinics around the school and it would be easy to forget that so much of this time is willingly given above the demands of full teaching timetables to enable the student to grasp the concept, practise another question or unravel the complexities of some theory or argument. To all the staff, without whom the changes, developments and progress over recent academic years would simply not have been possible, I offer my most sincere thanks.

I should also like to thank all our parents who have been incredibly supportive and who always go that extra mile to support their children. Your encouraging support is greatly valued and very much appreciated.

Our PTA continues to be a tower of strength in the school: I thank the Committee of the last two years for their outstanding work in bringing our school community closer together and I offer my full support to the new Committee in all your endeavours. I also want to thank all the other parents who volunteered at any one of the events that took place over the last year: UN Day; Christmas carnival; Avurudu or the summer dance. Thank you!

We are fortunate, too, that BSC is blessed with an outstanding support team: Accounts, Maintenance, Security, School Operations, IT and Secretarial services, all have dedicated, committed and very hard-working staff who are vital members of our school team. Thank you for all that you do.

To my senior colleagues: Mr Harwood and Mr Hester - thank you very much. I am extremely grateful that Mr Harwood and Mr Hester such provide outstanding service to this school. Thank you

Finally, I wish to extend my most heartfelt thanks to our Chairman, Mr Maniku, Director, Mr U Maniku and Managing Director, Mr Hettiaratchi: for their clear vision, friendly guidance and constant support all of which are greatly appreciated. Unfortunately, they could not be with us today but they send their very best wishes to all the award winners and their families.

Once again, my sincere congratulations to all our Award winners today: we are all very proud of you.

Thank you for your support of the British School during the last year and I hope together we have a wonderful year ahead.

Thank you and I hope you enjoy our Awards ceremony.