NEWSLETTER

From Dr Tasker: Principal
From the Principal
Dear Parents, Students and Friends of GIS,
With Mr Fraser‟s help, the Prefects hosted a Quiz Night to help raise money to support
GIS students attending the upcoming FOBISSEA Music Festival. I was pleased to see so
many people having fun – parents, teachers and also students. Well done to the Prefects,
they did a wonderful job and around 4,500 baht was raised.
We are extremely proud to be hosting the FOBISSEA Music Festival in November – only 2
weeks away as this Newsletter is being published. We have 15 schools visiting, with 240
students and 32 visiting staff. There will be plenty happening both here at GIS and at
Royal Pala Cliff Beach Resort with the finale being the Gala Concert on Monday
November 18 in our newly-refurbished Main Hall – complete with new tiered seating,
acoustic ceiling, sound and light box and curtaining. We will have about 140 people in the
choir and an orchestra of about 140 too; it will be a wonderful end to the festival.
Over the half-term break I was at the FOBISSEA Heads Conference in Penang, where
amongst the discussion was the excitement amongst the students from other FOBISSEA
schools around the region in anticipation of the festival. Also, which you may find
interesting, FOBISSEA has now officially changed to FOBISIA – the Federation of British
Schools in Asia and there are currently 42 member schools.
As I was at the conference I sadly missed this year‟s Diwali celebrations, which by all
accounts maintained the tradition of GIS producing a stunning evening. See the article in
this Newsletter for more detail.
We were planning to have our Whole School Remembrance Day Assembly on Monday
November 11, however we will now have it on Tuesday November 12 from 10.50am to
11.20am - parents are most welcome to attend.
The reason for the change is that Mr Armstrong will take a group of Year 9 History
students to Kanchanaburi for a memorial service on the actual day – students will report
back at the assembly the next day. Andrea, our Humanities Prefect, is arranging the sale
of poppies, which students can buy from her or other IB students at breaks – parents can
buy them from the Front Office. The cost of the poppy is purely by donation, with proceeds
going to the Royal British Legion for supporting veterans and the families of servicemen. In
Thailand 20% of money collected goes to support Thai military veterans and their families.
Sadly we had another death amongst our parent community this month, Jannie Els, father
of Janine in Year 3 and Jaden in Early Years, passed away suddenly. Our condolences to
the Els family and to Abi who, as well as being a parent, previously worked with us here at
GIS as a TA.