PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS

Panther Activities

Panther Activities at ISB is a pay-to-play program that complements our academic, athletic, arts, and activities programs at ISB. Classes include everything from baseball, dance, and tennis to music, languages, and new this year, Panther Xtreme, which offered students the opportunity to participate in board sports such as skateboarding, skim-boarding, surf-skating, and wakeboarding. Each of our offerings provides active, creative, diverse, and collaborative opportunities for all students. Panther Activities has something for everyone, with nearly 150 coaches and 4000+ registrations annually.

Panther Activities’ response to the ever-changing COVID-19 regulations this past school year perfectly exemplified adaptability and creativity, two of our ISB Learner Attributes. When the 2021-22 school year started in ISB Virtual School and transitioned to a hybrid model, Panther Activities adapted, got creative, and asked an important question: what can we do instead? Together with ISB Athletics, they collaborated to offer alternative opportunities to students in both virtual and hybrid environments.

Returning to school in a virtual setting, students needed more ways to connect. So Panther Activities shifted how they offered activities to encourage engagement, relationship, participation, and positivity. For example, what previously would have been provided separately as ballet, jazz, and tap became dance with a focus on moving, engaging, relating, and having fun. This shift provided students a social platform to connect and check in with each other, their coaches, and mentors.

When school shifted into the hybrid model, Panther Activities adapted again, offering students an opportunity to do a sport or activity with a smaller diverse group instead of the usual teams and larger groups. While the activities, groups, and sizes may have looked different in the hybrid model, the intent was always the same - to keep kids active and connected. We are grateful for the journey of developing activities for students despite the circumstances brought by the pandemic; a return to normal activities later in the year brought with it elation and perhaps a greater appreciation for what had been missing - active, creative, diverse, and collaborative in-person opportunities for all kids!

Panther Activities offered in the 2021-22 school year included: