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School Happenings Grandparents Day, SFS
Grandparents Day
The SFS Advancement Office hosted a special event to honor the school community’s grandparents and help them become better acquainted with their grandchildren’s international school life. A special reception, student performances, historical picture slide presentation, tours to the grandchildren’s
Stephanie and Kevin Chae Dear our two lovely grandchildren Stephanie Yoonsuh and Kevin Junwoo Chae, Your grandparents always thank God and are very glad that you both are attending SFS so well and have grown big and strong and learning a lot from school. We always wish and pray that you two listen carefully to your teachers and make good relationships and friendships with your classmates. You are our hope and joy. We love you very much. From your grandparents
Grace Park, Anna Park and Amy Kim Dear Grace, Anna & Amy, 모두 건강하게 자라렴. 할비, 할미
classrooms, lunch and a photo opportunity were offered that day. After the event, deeply moved by the Christ-centered vision and mission of SFS, several grandparents contributed generously to the school’s Annual Fund.
Ryan Kim 우리 라이언이 친구들과 잘 지내고 축구도 열심히 해서 신통하고 착하다. 앞으로 학교 생활 재미있게 하고 건강하게 지내! 사랑하는 할머니가
Eric Waligora Eric, We are happy you can attend a wonderful school such as Seoul Foreign School! Keep Pressing On! Love, Harmoni and Haraboji
A group of SFS and Seodaemun-gu District officials at the Mayoral Award ceremony. From left to right: Ye Hwan Jun (ESWS General Secretary), Andy Lee, Jang Soon Choi (Seodaemun-gu District Welfare Dept. Lead), Yoojin Um, Dawn M. Stark, Won-soon Park (Seoul City Mayor), Colm Flanagan, Sinead Flanagan, Mi Sook Hong (Seodaemun-gu District Welfare Dept. staff), Grace Song, Jin Sook Kim (ESWS President), Jean Kim
SFS Receives Mayoral Award for Community Service
Seoul Foreign School’s ongoing endeavors to foster community engagement and service were given official recognition in November, with Head of School Colm Flanagan joining eighteen foreign residents from fourteen countries in being officially designated an Honorary Citizen of Seoul by city mayor Park, Won-soon. Mr. Flanagan proudly accepted the award on behalf of all the SFS students who actively participated in various community outreach programs throughout the surrounding Seodaemun-gu District in recent years.
Reflecting the school’s strong commitment to community, kindness and giving, the programs have included contributing canned goods, rice and clothing to Seodaemun’s food markets; “adopting” underprivileged local families by providing long-term financial support; and a special Mini Olympics event for orphans at Seodaemun-gu District Disabled Welfare. Additional programs have seen students engage in tree-planting efforts, trash pickup and a variety of other social welfare activities for disadvantaged youths in the district.
Addressing the school following his acceptance of the award, Mr. Flanagan expressed his thanks to “all students, staff, faculty and parents who have helped us focus our attention in recent years on being a more relevant and positive presence in our community.
“It is through projects of this nature that we help fulfill the mission of our school and help develop lifetime habits of service in our students,” he added. Mr. Flanagan went on to thank Jean Kim of Christian Missionaries for spearheading SFS’ collaborative efforts with Seodaemun-gu.
SFS congratulates Mr. Flanagan, Seoul’s newest Honorary Citizen, and would like to thank participating SFS students and families for their ongoing kindness and hard work that have continued to reflect the strong core values of the school.
DISCOVERY WEEK 2019
Before students embarked on their Discovery Week 2019 trips across Korea and the world—including Ethiopia, Japan and Nepal—Dicovery Week coordinators Heather Adkins and Peter Hutchin asked something of all of the groups that hadn’t been requested before: the development of an inquiry question.
“We’re asking all of our trips to develop some form of inquiry before they go,” Adkins says. “What it was they wanted to learn, or what were some things they could explore.”
SFS’ annual Discovery Week allows all High School students to participate in life-changing trips and activities. Projects are designed for students to take their education outside of the classroom and bond across age and social groups. Trips should also, according to Hutchin, offer a “real challenge.”
Beyond that, Adkins and Hutchin wanted to ensure that every trip was imbued with a sense of intention and, when the week was over, that all students were given the space to reflect on the learning they had done that week. Thus, the inquiry question and post-trip project, the Gallery Walk exhibition, were born. Students who visited Israel, for instance, asked how other cultures have impacted the daily life in the country. In the evening, after a full day of visits to cultural sites, the group gathered to discuss this framing question with each other. Doing so required a synthesis of information they had already learned in the classroom with all that they were now experiencing in person every day.
Those involved in the Seoul City Guide project asked what were the best ways to de-stress in the city. Students sought out places where Seoulites could nurture their physical, social and emotional well-beings, then developed a website beautifully featuring all that they had found.
Following Discovery Week, groups continued to meet and reflect, maintain the close bonds they had formed, and prepare their booths for the Gallery Walk on February 11. Rainforest to Reef, which took students to Malaysia, featured an underwater virtual tour alongside a display on clearing beaches of plastics. And the long-running Philippines Service Trip (PST) created a cooking station that presented dishes from the country.
Now, planning for Discovery Week 2020 is underway. Teachers from the High School, Adkins and Hutchin excitedly note, are already in the process of developing trips and projects. Students will continue to be offered a wide variety of opportunities and places to go. Regardless of what they choose, students will continue to be challenged to bring their education outside of the classrooms of SFS, learn and grow together and thoughtfully engage with the world.
DW Adventure Korea
London Theatre
Exploring Israel Mongolia Service
Shangri-La and the Tiger Leaping Gorge (China)
Adventure Korea Arduino Engineering Boul - Busan to Seoul Cooking Course Digital Fabrication Discovering Football Jeju Cultural Exploration Lifeguarding Model UN Scents of Service
A Japanese Walkabout
Nepal
Ethiopian Adventure Thailand Adventure Trip Vietnam, Mai Chau
Laos Taiwan Cycling
Compassion Philippines
Rainforest to Reef Ecology (Malaysia)
in numbers SFS DW 2019 (From left to right) DW Nepal student group. Thomas Callaghan and Peter Hutchin during DW Nepal
522
Students Participated
Number of Trips Organized
25
112,571 km Estimated Distance Flown
Countries Visited
14
6
Service-Oriented Trips
Activity-Oriented Trips 7
12
Cultural/Exploration -Oriented Trips
Local Trips 11
The Year 7 WWW group after pulling weeds and raking pine needles at a senior nursing home in Pyeongchang. Ryan Hammerberg (third row, second from the left) remarked on how hard all of the students worked, with some trying to stay behind and pull more weeds even after being told that it was time to leave.
This past November 2019, the British School’s Year 7, 8 and 9 students embarked on life-changing trips for Week Without Walls. During this exciting week, students applied their British School values by collaborating on cultural and service trips outside of the confines of campus.
Early in the Year 7 trip to Pyeongchang, students engaged in a variety of outdoor activities such as hiking, ziplining and caving. “Teachers were impressed with the resilience shown by the students and saw how proud students were after completing the caving challenge,” says Ryan Hammerberg. Later, the group went to a daycare center for the elderly in Pyeongchang where they gardened together and students performed a talent show. On their return to Seodaemun-gu, they helped clean the streets and canal.
The Year 8 students tested their nerve at a rope adventure park in Yangpyeong and also went kayaking, wood rafting and dragon boat racing. The group also went to Soomy Cooperative Farm where students harvested radishes and cabbages, made Week Without Walls
kimchi for the Nanumi homeless shelter and learned, says teacher Kim Stuart, “how a community works together to run a farm, evenly distributing the profit to everyone regardless of their contribution.”
The Year 9 trip took students abroad to Cambodia. There, students worked “extremely hard,” according to teacher Vasile Lozneanu, to mix and lay concrete for a new basketball court for a local school. The students “never once complained about the physical hardship of the task, but rather enjoyed it and saw it as a privilege to help those who desperately needed their help,” says Lozneanu. The students took a number of cultural and historical trips as well, including to Cambodia’s Killing Fields.
Without a doubt, students ended their transformative weeks having grown as people, friends and thoughtful citizens of the world.
Sports Recap
Girls Varsity Basketball - Ben Kask
The 2019-2020 Girls Varsity team had a very successful season despite going through adversity. The team suffered a lot of injuries, but the silver lining was that this allowed us to develop depth. Every single player on the roster was needed to step up and play in the starting lineup at one point or another during the season.
It was disappointing not to play in the last two tournaments due to the COVID-19 cancellations, but the team still managed to play in two finals during this season. We were the champions in the Korea Classic and the runners-up in the prestigious and highly competitive Great Wall Shoot-out (the highest finish for any SFS team in the event). The team finished third in the KAIAC conference behind the very strong Daegu and Humphries teams and ended with an overall 13-5 record.
This was an unforgettable year, and the trials will make us better in the future. SFS Girls Basketball is back on the map!
Boys Varsity Basketball - Paul Rader
The 2019-2020 Boys Varsity started the season on a high note, winning the Korea Classic in an epic final against Seoul International School. SFS pulled it out in the end, winning the overtime game 75-74. Going into the regular season, we played well against all of our opponents, falling only to Humphries and earning us second place overall.
Throughout, our guys showed the character to stay level headed and finish off games. This team developed a really strong chemistry and learned to play unselfishly with each other. If the season had not been ended abruptly by the COVID-19 cancellations, I have no doubt that we would have been in the KAIAC finals and would have made a run at the championship of APAC. Unfortunately, our seniors did not get that opportunity, but I am still very proud of how they led the team and the hard work they put in over the past four seasons. We are now all looking forward to next season with the return of a very solid core of players who will pick up the torch and carry on the legacy of SFS basketball. Varsity Cheer - Stephanie Mitchell
The SFS Cheerleaders were again a very passionate, dedicated and motivated team led by a great group of experienced and hardworking seniors. Both the Junior Varsity and Varsity teams worked hard to learn and develop their cheer, dance, tumbling and stunting skills in preparation for the halftime routines and the end-ofseason KAIAC tournament. The girls were amazing on the sidelines of the basketball games and during halftime, lifting the energy of the gym.
Unfortunately, due to the COVID-19 cancellations, the teams were not able to showcase all the hard work, time and effort they put into their competition routines this year. Everyone is already looking forward to showing what they are capable of accomplishing next year. The creativity and talent of the cheerleaders is really a sight to behold. Be sure to come support them and the basketball teams for exciting games and performances next season.
Swimming - Sean Cary
Our APAC Swim season started off well. A strong showing by seven of our boys who traveled to Singapore for a competition set the tone for what was going to be a fast meet in Manila. Each swimmer had their own detailed plan for success for each event. We were ready to swim well despite the fact that our meet location changed due to a volcano eruption in the Philippines. The new hosts were moving very expeditiously to prepare, but due to COVID-19, that meet was also cancelled.
In place of traveling for APAC, we hosted our own Mini APAC here at SFS. A majority of the team swam best times, with two school records being broken. This demonstrated the team’s readiness for the meet and underscores their potential success. We look forward to next year with great anticipation. Wrestling - Paul Kim
It all started when Brian Choe and Alex Gardner, two new students new to the HS, persistently visited our Director of Sports, asking to launch a wrestling team. Though there were many logistics to figure out, the school decided to honor these students’ passion, and the SFS Wrestling program was created.
With it being our first season ever in such a physical and demanding sport, it was inevitable that our wrestlers experienced wins and losses as they competed with more experienced wrestlers from the military schools. Tears were shed, and some injuries took place, but our wrestlers remembered to focus on themselves and their effort and continued to fight through. Throughout the winter season, it has been amazing to see how close the team bonded and the way each wrestler supported one another to become a better individual and meet personal goals.
Out of the four wrestling teams, SFS finished in third place in our rookie season with some impressive individual moves and wins to remember. We are proud of our two seniors, Sam Cho and Pauline Stehle, for what they have demonstrated and achieved on and off the mat. We would like to thank all the parents, teachers and coaches for their great support in setting a strong foundation for what will become a great legacy in SFS. Track and Field - Cailen McNair
Deciding to restart the track and field program at SFS wasn’t a difficult decision, just a measured one. After coming to SFS in 2018, a few things became apparent to me. One, we have a decently sized high school population compared to other APAC schools; two, we only offer a few spring sports; and three, there is a unique opportunity to develop athletes with the hills and trails that are on campus. Combine this with a supportive Director of Sports and student-athletes willing to learn and work hard, and our program was launched.
With a few weeks of the season under our belt, fifty-two athletes formed the ranks of what would be the biggest team at SFS. Unfortunately, due to the COVID-19 situation, we await what opportunities we will have to compete here in Korea. Regardless, it is clear that this program has the potential to grow into a hugely popular and excellent sport at SFS. We are thankful for the dedication of individuals like Rebecca Emrich, Lindsay Kuhl and Muggs Alexander who rose to the occasion to help train our future track stars. Citius, Altius, Fortius! Faster, Higher, Stronger!
(From left to right) British School Play The Reluctant Dragon, Elementary School Art Display and Middle School Christmas concert.
The “New” Arts Department at Seoul Foreign School
By John Striffler
This has been a very busy year in the Arts Department at
SFS, and one of our biggest changes took place right at the beginning of the school year. We went from being a Performing Arts department to an Arts Department. It has been wonderful to combine the Visual Arts programme with the Performing Arts programme to create one schoolwide Arts Department. One of the first things we worked on as a team was to create a new vision statement for the department. The new vision for the arts at Seoul Foreign School is, “The Arts Department at Seoul Foreign School strives to create well-rounded individuals in the pursuit of artistic expression and cultivates a lifelong appreciation of the arts through creative excellence in an inclusive environment.”
Along with this new vision, we tried to create some new schoolwide Visual Arts events, and we are extremely excited about the creation of schoolwide Visual Arts gallery on the second floor of the Lyso Center. This space will permanently house works of art from all sections of the school throughout the school year. Beginning next school year, we will have two openings a year. We are thrilled to have had this new event as part of the Arts programme here at Seoul Foreign School!
The High School Production Mermaid
By Edie Moon
There are many roads a director can choose to take a cast down when developing a performance. This is the beauty and challenge of the directing experience. This past winter, the High School students were invited to walk a very physical road in order to develop their performance of Polly Teale’s Mermaid, a postmodern adaptation of Hans Christian Anderson’s timeless tale The Little Mermaid.
When we began this journey almost immediately after the completion of the high school musical, Les Miserables, we had no idea the challenges we might face, including the possible cancellation of the play performances due to the outbreak of COVID-19. However, the students and production team persevered, and unlike many of the schoolwide activities which had to be cancelled, the cast was allowed to perform for small audiences in the Black Box Theatre.
Because of the nature of the material and the physicality of the approach, the cast spent hours exploring not only physical theatre
Mermaid, Spring 2020 SFS High School production. Photo by Siwon Lee (G10).
techniques including Laban, Chekhov and LeCoq, but they also experienced hands-on simulations such as movement in the water at the SFS pool, the sensation of sinking in water, floating, and even drowning with heavy clothes on. They also experienced aerial yoga and movement for the first time as a means of exploring an aerial approach to the set.
Workshops were done on identity and physical demands and expectations made on women in Korean and American society. Each rehearsal was dedicated to a deeper understanding of the experiences of the characters, including the fallout of post-traumatic stress disorder for soldiers. Parallels were made between the events of the play and the world today.
Despite a short period of time and several significant roadblocks, students, director and projection team pushed through to the final performance with positive and memorable results represented in the after-show question-and-answer sessions led by the director and the cast.
Aaron Moniz from Inspire Citizens with SFS Middle School students during their “Into the Gu” project.
SFS’ Partnership with Inspire Citizens
Inspire Citizens has been working with educational institutions around the world to bring “empathy to impact.” Co-founder Aaron Moniz shares how the organization is serving young global citizens through the exciting initiatives emerging from its partnership with SFS.
By Aaron Moniz
Inspire Citizens and Seoul Foreign School have embarked on an innovative journey to be one of the first schools internationally to dedicate themselves to academic excellence and having global impact through service learning and global citizenship.
The Global Impact Schools Self-Study is a self-study tool that allows schools to ensure that all of their processes are aligned to help them meet their missions of using education to have a positive impact on students, communities and the world. In accordance with Seoul Foreign School’s mission of being “centered in Christ, inspiring a passion for learning, pursuing academic and creative excellence and being dedicated to the service of others,” the Global Impact Schools Self-Study helps all stakeholders ensure that their approaches to delivering quality education are efficient, consistent and systematically rooted in using education to serve others or have a positive impact on others.
Throughout the 2019-2020 school year, Inspire Citizens has begun working with SFS to organically design units with teachers at almost every grade level around “empathy to impact,” or using the curriculum to have an impact or perform service for others. They have also begun working with student leadership programs, global youth media programs, community wellness initiatives, local and global partners, and have been engaged in a series of professional development opportunities with teachers. In using the 2019-2020 year to personalize to the strengths, history, and context of Seoul Foreign School, we have been shaping the Global Impact Schools Self-Study Tool but also have been preparing to personalize and seamlessly implement these approaches in 2020- 2021.
Seoul Foreign School and Inspire Citizens have come together to co-design this approach and are education innovators, being the first to plan its implementation and conduct action research on how it impacts student learning and their school community. Seoul Foreign School’s innovative character is also exemplified because Seoul Foreign School is trying to use their process of implementing the self-study “in service of others” because as they design approaches, develop units, develop programs and collect action research, they will eventually make this information accessible to other schools. SFS teachers and students will then be empowered to teach other schools how to use their teaching and learning to have a similar positive impact on their schools. So not only does this self-study help to align practices within SFS programs and sections, but it also uses their experience to serve other schools around the world.
Our aim is to position Seoul Foreign School as a global leader in service learning and global competence/global citizenship education. We are currently discussing how to systematize opportunities for other educators to visit SFS, learn from our community and use SFS as a center for service learning and global citizenship excellence internationally.
Magpie Awarded
In February, the High School’s literary magazine The Magpie was awarded the highest rank of First Class in the 2019 Recognizing Excellence in Art and Literary Magazines (REALM) Program. Run by the National Council of Teachers of English, the REALM program recognizes student-produced, faculty-supported literary magazines in US-accredited secondary and middle schools across the United States, Canada and the Virgin Islands, as well as from international American schools.
This isn’t, in fact, the first such honor for the magazine. The
The Magpie group.
Magpie, advised by HS teachers Heather Adkins (pictured below, far left) and Susan Guderyon (far right), was previously named one of the best of its kind by the REALM program in February of 2019.
“Working with talented young artists and writers at SFS is an honor and a pleasure,” says Guderyon. “It is exciting to watch the students collaborate to create such a high quality publication.”
For those interested, copies of the award-winning magazine are available in the High School.
