Service Learning

Service Learning >> Capstone Service Projects at Inter- national Community School Bangkok

By Stephen Ladas, Assistant Headmaster, stephen_l@ics.ac.th International Community School

In 2012, International Community School (ICS) Bangkok’s administration envisioned creating a culminating project for graduating students that would demonstrate the accomplishment of our ICS educational goals – to become lifelong learners, competent communicators, discerning thinkers, quality producers, team players, responsible citizens, and followers of Christ. The Capstone Service Project was the outcome of this vision.

The 2017 graduating class just completed the third annual Capstone Service Project Fair. The overall project took two years to complete. Over 60 students finished individual projects, and this activity stretched every one of them in many ways. It began with students discovering what area they were passionate in serving in. They completed a needs assessment within a given non-government organization (NGO) or mission agency. They then had to research the societal problem they were facing, serve many hours within their chosen organization - helping meet the needs of the people they were serving.

Finally, they brainstormed viable solutions. The culminating piece of the project consisted of them completing an 8-10 page research/ reflective paper and presenting their findings and final product to parents, teachers, board members, and NGO leaders in our annual Capstone Service Project Fair. Their creativity was pushed to the limit this year as they were not given any tables or chairs in their presentation areas, just a space to share and show their findings with the community in an engaging way.

Many of the products put forth were wonderfully innovative. Projects ranged from helping develop clean water systems in up-country areas of Thailand, to doing a sustainable study to determine whether coffee can be planted to help fund an orphanage in Sri Lanka, to creating a small business for an elderly family in need, to forging a relationship with a school in Northern Thailand and maintaining a library of both English and Thai books for them, to working alongside women escaping prostitution and using art therapy to help offer hope and healing to them, to creating a safe place to learn for Pakistani asylum seekers in Bangkok, and many, many more.

The beauty of the Capstone Service Project is that every student has an opportunity to serve and seeing the growth that takes place within each of them through their 2-year long journey. The Capstone Service Fair is definitely one of the “can’t miss” events of the year at ICS Bangkok.

Jade (12) shares on empowering women through education in Sri Lanka.”

Fay Fay’s booth gives us a glimpse into the library he created in a rural school of Northern Thailand.

Service Learning >> Cebu International School’s Coopera- tive of International Service Learning

Cebu International School (CIS) is a small community school located in the heart of the Philippines. Beyond our values as an IB school, our mission seeks to create a collaborative, challenging, and nurturing school environment that involves community members, in order to provide all students with real opportunities to think and contribute to bettering the world. Our guiding statements serve as a the springboard to collaboratively work with different serviceoriented international schools in South East Asia. The CIS’s service learning program is guided by a collaboratively-developed program called the Cooperative of International Service Learning, or CISL. CISL grew over time from 2012 to 2014 to become what it is today. CISL aims to connect various international schools around the world through inter-school collaborative initiatives and sustainable service learning projects. The collaborative projects are carefully planned with, and for, less fortunate communities in the Philippines, particularly in Cebu. CISL continues to partner with various nonprofit organizations and non-governments organizations that have served as our extended arms in making our service learning experiences a success.

Here is a short timeline describing how CISL is gradually developing into an international school movement.

After a year of community soul-searching, in 2013, the entire community responded to a local earthquake and to Typhoon Yolanda. This community-wide effort connected international schools from around the region who wanted to help. Schools in Southeast Asia created fundraisers, concerts, and drives to send funds that we utilized locally, with 100% of the funds going to victims. At the 2014 EARCOS Leadership conference, the idea of CISL was presented, and several schools began to contribute ideas towards its development. All of our service projects are sustained by providing multiple opportunities for students to remain engaged throughout the year. This includes an authentic CAS program, Week Without Walls, and service projects embedded in elementary, middle, and high school units of learning. Our students also provide ideas about projects they would like to contribute to, including Cancer Warriors-Cebu, Lihuk Panaghiusa, Gawad Kalinga, Children of Asia, CURE Foundation, and Yellow Boat of Hope Foundation. Students often attend service activities over weekends or after school to support each other’s initiatives.

Cebu International School remains committed to collaborating and partnering with other international schools in the Philippines and around the globe. This partnership is sustained by our belief that each student must be globally engaged, positive contributors in a competitive, changing world. Our projects are sustainable, and seek to serve the local communities on issues that have global significance. We continue our work with schools and with the Yellow Boat of Hope Foundation, and are also looking at ecological issues related to plastics in our oceans, something very critical to us in an archipelago nation.

We look forward to welcoming schools from around the region this school year, and beyond. If anyone is interested in participating in service work, with your students and teachers working alongside our students and teachers, please contact Mr. Arnulfo “Ace” Pierra, Jr at apierra@cis.edu.ph (CAS Coordinator at CIS).

Together we can all make a positive impact on our changing world.

In the spring of 2015, our first visitors came to CIS to participate in collaborative interschool service work. Students and teachers from the International School of Singapore (ISS) worked alongside CIS students and teachers. This group rebuilt a classroom in Daanbantayan Elementary School, painted a 50-meter mural, painted and repaired the stage of the school, and donated boats to the local fishermen for livelihood through the Yellow Boat of Hope Foundation.

2016: Tohoku International School (Japan) joined a CISL project in Cebu donating soccer shoes to local soccer players. In 2017, students and teachers from Chadwick International School (South Korea) visited CIS, and donated one Yellow School Boat to High School students of Caubian Island through the Yellow Boat of Hope Foundation

Students from Chadwick International School renovating a public school gymnasium and painting playground equipment for a local elementary school.