Head of School Corner

Members of our community, faculty, staff, and students, as well as some parents whose last child has now graduated from GJS, will be saying goodbye to each other today; as is the case, the last days of school bring a mix of joy and laughter as well as sadness and tears as the some of the relationships created over this last year, and in many cases, ones curated over the many years before, come to an end.

Thank you to all departing families, students, faculty, and staff for helping GJS retain our strong sense of family and community. We wish that you all take with you fond memories, lasting bonds, and friendships, as well as great learning from your time as a member of our community. Please remember, 'Once a member of the GJS family, always a member of the GJS Family!'

Through our ups, downs, challenges, and conquests, we have recognized that students and faculty can learn well through new and unfamiliar circumstances, such as those presented to all of us over the past 16 months. Our community banded together with a shared purpose and dedication to our students in supporting our efforts to maintain high engagement, support, inquiry, and learning. Throughout the stretch from August to June, you engaged and collaborated with faculty and leadership to provide feedback, help identify areas for improvement, and served to keep your children engaged through shifting program and day-to-day expectations. Your at-home efforts in developing and maintaining learning structures and routines that supported synchronous and asynchronous learner engagements were critical to any success achieved. Your grace and support of our faculty continue to be recognized as a strength of our parent community. GJS management, leadership, and faculty appreciate how all parents have greatly sacrificed in the name of supporting the continued learning of their children.

Proactively, GJS is already on record with local authorities in both South Tangerang and Banten requesting permission to launch small group student engagements from the first day of the next year, leading to Blended Learning on campus. Citing in our request our faculty vaccination rates, parent and community support for students to return to campus, as well as GJS's robust campus health and safety preparations for COVID-19, our spacious classrooms, and adherence to effective mask-wearing, hand-washing, and physical distancing protocols support that we should be able to open safely and effectively to students next year.

As of today, June 10, we expect all of our new faculty to be here on campus for induction on July 19 and all fully vaccinated returning faculty and staff on July 26. All new and returning Primary and Secondary students will begin the school year -- no matter the mode -- on August 2. To assist with your long-range planning, please find the updated GJS Academic Calendar for 2021-2022 school year HERE (as well as viewable below)

Please note that I will send out summer updates via ManageBac, and that our Kontak newsletter will resume in July. Please look for our Return to Campus Plan 2021 to arrive in July to provide updated comprehensive information regarding next year.

I encourage everyone to continue to abide by the recommendations that will help reduce the risk of the spread of COVID-19. On behalf of the Leadership team, all the staff and faculty of GJS, please stay safe, stay healthy, stay well and have a most pleasant summer holiday!

Warm regards,

Cory Carson

Head of Global Jaya School