It is always heart-warming to hear of different individual initiatives to help those in need. Students, parents, faculty and staff of our school community reach out to different individuals, communities, or organizations that they resonate with to offer different kinds of support, ranging from material to the human social-emotional. Where interactions are authentic, they are never a ‘one-way street’ affair; we learn from one another in different contexts of interaction to make a difference locally and eventually, globally.
Sometimes questions arise as to whom to contact in order to elicit help from other members of the ISKL community or seek permission to do fundraising activities. You can start by contacting the Service and Sustainability Coordinators in each school division:
Elementary School:
Jennifer Hardie: [email protected]
Valeria Vieytes: [email protected]
Middle School:
Traci Massey: [email protected]
High School:
Amy Popovich: [email protected]
Chika Kumashiro-Wilms (also CAS in the IB Diploma Program): [email protected]
And do check out the opportunities in our Service Channel. Together, we can work to achieve what one person has initiated. Reach out today to put your ideas into action!
– October 4, 2019
Recycling, Upcycling, and Composting at School and at Home
We are developing habits to lead a sustainable lifestyle! There are many recycling bins on campus, most of them have the instructions for each bin clearly labeled. These are provided by a club called Bye-Bye Plastic Bags KL, an organization started by two sisters in Bali. They visited ISKL to give a talk about their initiative last year.
Then there is uniform upcycling. Some IB Diploma students and Ms. Amy Popovich took on this initiative that saw the old Melawati uniforms turned into smart coin pouches, pencil cases, and toiletries bags. High School Service Council is looking into putting them on sale soon at the International Fest.
Composting is going on school-wide, with all three school divisions and ISKL families, also at home. Some IB Diploma students reached out to the Grade 5 Red Hats/ Social Change Makers for cross-divisional partner work. Last week, High School Earth Club students and Ms. Popovich shared with some U.S. Embassy staff and families the work done by the ISKL community in recycling, upcycling projects using discarded items to create crafts, and our composting program (see the photos).
ISKL Community Recycling takes place once a month on a Saturday morning, so check your calendar and bring your items to the cell phone parking lot. The more often you do these things, the more they become a habit. And they provide socializing opportunities to get to know different people within our school community and beyond. So, continue with your sustainable lifestyle habits or start new ones today!
– October 11, 2019
‘Behind the Scenes’: Community Partnership with Bus Monitors
‘Behind the Scenes’ is a CAS project that has been ongoing for the past few years. The idea is to get to know those who do work behind the scenes to make everyday school operations go smoothly as individuals and forge a lasting partnership in the spirit of an inclusive community. The stakeholders here are mainly in various types of work overseen by the Student Services Department at ISKL, such as catering, cleaning, transportation, security, and safety.
The longest continuing partnership has been with the school bus provider, Pandu Jaya bus company. Each semester, a group of eight bus monitors meet with High School students from 5:00 pm – 6:00 pm for activities to further develop their communication skills in English. Our bus monitors do their best to ensure student safety everyday, being particularly vigilant about students wearing their seatbelts and not bringing food and drinks on the buses. Yet many of us do not know them by their names or some things about them such as what they are interested in, what they like to do during their free time, and so forth. The weekly sessions with High School students, mainly in Grade 11 and 12, have been really helpful for both parties; they have come to know each other’s names, favorite food, hobbies, etc., and this has added to our increased awareness and care for each other, as well as mutual respect for our respective endeavors and lifestyles. Getting to know people by their names and acknowledging each other as individual fellow community partners are vital in opening up our different worlds to identify common vision, aspirations, and goals to further strengthen our collective and individual growth. More on this later at the end of this semester!
– October 25, 2019
