Welcome to the new academic year! We are so excited to have all the learners back at Nexus after the break. I am sure you will feel welcomed into the Nexus community.

It was a pleasure to meet some of you at the welcome coffee morning on the first day. I hope new parents had the opportunity to mingle with other parents. I know there was lots of interest in the Nexus Parent Group (NPG) who do so much to build the community and support the school. If you wish to get involved, whether you have 5 minutes or 5 hours available, please email npg@nexus.edu.sg and look at the NPG tab in this newsletter to find out more.

I thoroughly enjoyed my first year at Nexus and feel privileged to work with such incredible colleagues. Together, we aim to give every learner the best experience through The Nexus Way. The elements of The Nexus Way were co-constructed last year and our aim is to embed them this year. Check out The Nexus Way and the headlines of The Strategic Plan 2018-19 on the Important Notices tab. The Strategic Plan reflects your feedback given when you came to a feedback morning, or completed the annual survey.

You will hear more at the Welcome Evening on Monday, 20 August at 6pm. For further details click here. I hope to see you there.

We were delighted to receive our best ever results at both IB Diploma (Year 13) and IGCSE (Year 11). The learners worked so hard to achieve some outstanding outcomes. We are so proud of them all and appreciate the hard work of their teachers in supporting them so well throughout. We have already heard some confirmed University Offers from our Year 13 graduates which include: London School of Economics, Singapore Management University, Nanyang Technological University, University of Sydney, University of York, University at Buffalo, Lancaster University, John Molson School of Business and IE University (Madrid), with many more to come!

Meanwhile, our Primary School participated in the ACER International School Assessments (ISA). These externally marked and benchmarked tests are used by most prestigious schools across the world. ACER has gained invaluable experience in developing assessments that are culturally and educationally appropriate for students from many languages and educational backgrounds. The ISA is based on the internationally endorsed frameworks for the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA).

Nexus Reading results for 2017-2018 showed that our learners are achieving significantly higher than other schools, both globally and in SE Asia, with nearly three quarters of our learners achieving above the global average. Our Mathematical Literacy outcomes were also higher than global levels of achievement and comparable to the SE Asia outcomes. This is particularly pleasing since the standard of Maths in this region is very high. The results give us external quality assurance that our curriculum and learning expectations are both appropriate and challenging.

I do hope you enjoy reading all the updates and I hope your sons and daughters enjoyed their first week back,

Best wishes

Judy

The Hub is our Learning Management System. It is used throughout the school to share learning, resources and to allow learners to collaborate with each other. This year, we will be using the platform to communicate key information to parents via dedicated ‘Parent Groups’.

You will have received a ‘Welcome’ email with a link to set your password when you first joined the Nexus community. With the renewed focus on the system for communications, we are resending this ‘Welcome’ email to parents who haven’t accessed the system for six months or more. This email will be sent later today. If you receive this message, please follow the instructions to access your account. As well as new ‘Parent Groups’, which will include ‘Posts’ aimed at giving you an insight into your child’s learning, you will find information on home learning, and in the Secondary school, information about what unit/theme your child is currently engaged in.

The Hub app, which is called ‘Teamie’ on the Apple App Store and Google Play, provides a more convenient way of taking part in your child’s learning. This video shows you how to log in to the app, which uses the same log in details as the web version of the platform.

Next Monday, as part of the Welcome Evening, I will be hosting a series of short workshops aimed at helping parents access and use the app. This link contains further information about the Welcome Evening.

If you have any questions about The Hub or the Teamie App, please feel free to contact me via email, telephone or in person.

Lee Wilson

Director of Learning Technologies

wilson.l@nexus.edu.sg