30 Jun 2017

Newsletter 37/2016-17

Quarry Bay School’s latest newsletter is available to read now. Find out the latest news around the school and upcoming events.

 Principal’s Comments
 End of Year Report Reminder 
 PTA News

Principal’s Comments

Dear Parents,

As the year comes to a close, we’d like to thank all parents for your strong support over this past school year. It has been an eventful end of term, with last Friday’s Celebration of Learning day, along with this week’s Grow Your Mind Day and our Graduation Assembly yesterday again highlighting how much we achieve when we come together.

Grow Your Mind Day

Wednesday’s fantastic ‘Grow Your Mind’ day was all about the importance of trying new things, having fun and learning from our mistakes. Teachers and parent volunteers led a diverse range of sessions, with activities ranging from golfing to yoga, from singing to crochet, and from Scottish dance to origami. Year 6 students showed great responsibility in the way they led their mixed age groups, and the day was very well organised by our Grow Your Mind team. Thank you to the many parents who supported the event. You can see photos from this event on yesterday’s LMT blog on the QBS website.

Graduation Assembly

We are sad to be saying goodbye to our wonderful Year 6 students this week. They have brought many smiles to QBS faces during their six years with us, and we wish them all the best at secondary school and beyond. Thank you to all the parents who joined us yesterday for our Graduation Assembly. It was a very well attended and positive afternoon, with the students celebrating their time at QBS with songs and some of their favourite memories. The videos and photos from the assembly will be sent out to Year 6 parents via email. All the best Year 6!

Educational Assistants

This week it has been possible to confirm which classes our team of Educational Assistants will be supporting next year. Please click here to see an overview of this support.

Crazy Hair Day

Today we have ended the year with our traditional Crazy Hair Day. Students and adults came dressed brightly and enjoyed a fun end to the term. The photos from today will be sent out in a separate email.

Christian Action Visit

On Tuesday a group of Year 6 students visited the Christian Action centre in Kowloon to make our school donation following action taken during the Year 6 Exhibition. The students were interested to visit the offices of this NGO and the staff were very pleased to receive support from QBS. Well done again to all the year 6 students and adults who helped raise this money, and thank you to our delivery group.

Leaving Staff and Students

This time of year is always a strange mixture of excitement for the summer and sadness as we say goodbye to valued colleagues and friends. This year, we are saying goodbye to the following colleagues:

Mr Um has been an amazing caretaker who has been humble, hardworking and supportive over the 18 year at QBS. Although he will not be leaving QBS until early next term he is planning to retire to spend time with his family in Nepal. He will be greatly missed for his calm manner and commitment to ensuring the school is well cared for and the children are safe.

Ah Ching has been a dedicated member of the site staff for 27 years. She is extremely calm and even in her temperament and has given tirelessly of her time over the years. She has always been willing to support the school whenever her help has been required.

Ah Ha will be missed for her smiling face and ready sense of humour. She is a great asset to the site staff having worked at QBS for 27 years. She has always been supportive, kind to the children and fun to have in the school.

Mrs Gilchrist has been a popular and much-loved teacher at QBS for nine years, in her role as teacher librarian, year leader and class teacher. She has influenced many students with her excellent teaching and caring approach. She is taking a year to go travelling with her husband to explore new parts of the world and enjoy her home in the Peak District in the UK. Steph will be greatly missed by all of us, especially the knitting club.

Mrs Williams has been very caring and supportive to the children in her class. The children have enjoyed the activities and relationships they have developed with Janice over the past two years. Janice is is moving to Kiangsu Chekiang School and we wish her all the best for the move.

Mr Glencross has been such an influence on our Year 1 students. The children have loved all the animals and strange creatures Matt has brought in to share with the class. Matt has the ability to engage the children with his witty stories and amazing facts about the environment and science. He has been very supportive of the school and we wish him well.

Mr Whyman has been a popular teacher in Year 4 and has worked hard to be an active member of QBS. The children have been very happy working with James and lots of laughter and music has been heard coming from his room. We wish him well on his move to Shatin Junior School.

Mary Ma has worked at QBS in lots of different roles starting out as a parent helper and leaves now as an Educational Assistant in the Hive. Mary is very resourceful, caring and helpful and has been a real asset at QBS. We will miss her humour and caring attitude to all the staff and children.

Mrs Suduweli has been an Educational Assistant at QBS working across the school. She has contributed much to the day to day running of the class.She has been able to secure another position as an EA at HKIS and will hopefully get time to pursue her love of writing. We wish her well in the future.

Ms Laden will return to the UK with her husband. Jay has been a strong influence on the children that she has supported through the Hive and has made good relationships with staff. We wish her well as she is expecting her first baby and will enjoy the time with her family in the UK.

Wanda Louie has been working at QBS for 7 years, and throughout her time has been organised and very efficient. She has brought her marvellous skills to her role of Educational Assistant and helped everyone across the school. Wanda will be missed by all and we wish happiness in the future.

Mr Hou has worked at QBS for 2 years. In that time he has supported the younger children who have enjoyed their time working with him. Ray is going to the UK to pursue a career in catering and we wish him every success.

Mina – Personal Leave

As you know, Mina has this week taken personal leave due to her daughter being unwell. This has been a very difficult time for the whole family. Her daughter is still in hospital and getting the best possible care from some amazing doctors. During the summer holiday, the family are planning to visit the family farm back home in Australia. The family have been deeply touched by all of the messages of support that they have received both this week and earlier in the term, and want to thank the school community for their support and care.

Next Term

We hope that everyone is able to enjoy a wonderful summer break, and we look forward to seeing everyone again next term. First day for students is Monday 14th August. We look forward to seeing you again then.

Warm regards,

Sue Yee and Michael Dewey

End of Year Report Reminder

The end of year reports are available on the Gateway for download and a signed hard copy has been posted today to the mailing address you specified on the Gateway.

For instructions for accessing the End of Year Report, please follow the steps below:

  • Log in to Gateway.
  • Click on ARR Report.
  • Click on “16/17 QBS End of Year” to download the PDF report, save it to your computer and then open it with Acrobat Reader or Foxit which can be downloaded from the internet if you don’t have it installed already.

If you need assistance with this please email Mr Ken Lee at ken.lee@qbs.edu.hk.

Please be aware that if you are leaving Quarry Bay School, you will need to download all your child’s reports from Gateway by 31st July. After this date you will no longer be able to access the Gateway including your child’s reports.

PTA News

PTA Shop

Shop re-open:

The PTA Shop will open from:

  • 8th August to 11th August 2017: from 9:00am to 12:00noon.
  • 14th August – onwards: Normal shop operating hours will commence.

Feedback or Suggestions

If you have any feedback or suggestions you would like to make for our events or services provided, please email them directly to: ptasuggestions@qbs.edu.hk. Your email will be received directly by our Chairman, who will reply to you at the earliest available moment.

HELP US – IN OUR DRIVE FOR A GREENER ENVIRONMENT

We request all parents to support a greener environment by BYOB “bring your own bag” when you come to purchase items from the shop.

[With immediate effect the PTA Shop will no longer provide any shopping bags].

Please contact us on 2566 4242 (ask to transfer to PTA), or 2887 1004 for further queries, or by email to pta@qbs.edu.hk, during operation hours.

“Click here for PTA Office and Shop Operation”