Dear families, agents, friends, colleagues and occasional visitors,

We postponed this moment, waiting for our kids to settle down and adjust to the new environment of the Boarding House but we are glad to say that we have finally got our formal Pastoral Programme started! At this initial stage, the idea is to expose our kids during formal House Assemblies to those values that represent the guiding principals of our School and community.

R I SE – élève-toi

R I S E is our School motto which stands for:

Respect
Internationalism
School Spirit
Excellence

Now, the modern world and its education system seem to be relying upon the idea that life is a fairly easy process to get through. It sounds obvious that it is essential to educate our kids teaching them Mathematics, Science, History, Geography etc but what about life skills? It seems to be that how to live is an obvious thing: how to recognize and deal with emotions, how to overcome recondite fears, how to cope with a life far away from the loving embrace of the family, how to discover your passion and find the job you like so that you can choose to have a meaningful and profound life etc etc It’s seems like you are supposed to know all these stuff, but how?

Well, we do not think these are easy things to attain, and we firmly believe that basic values such as Respect, Tolerance, Honesty, Accountability, Altruism and even how to live a happy and meaningful life can be taught through moment of open discussion, where things are stated explicitly, without assuming that our kids will eventually learn things on their own.

So, the value we started with is Respect! During this first assembly, our kids have been asked to give their views on  “what respect sounds like”. They have written their statements and pasted them on this beautiful, “boys-style”, poster:

Next week topic will be: “what respect looks like”.

We ask any adults involved in the upbringing of our kids to question them about our assemblies, to ask them about these topics so that they feel encouraged and motivated to follow this path. Our hope and our aim is that, soon, with everyone’s help they will feel inspired and determined to learn how to become a good human being.