Francophone Week

The francophone week celebrations culminated on the 19th of March at the Kenya School of Monetary

Studies with various activities. Our school was ably represented by Elma Kemunto and Elsie Bura. Elma pre-

sented a beautiful song in French. There were several presentations from several francophone countries

but the most notable were The Royal Drummers of Burundi. There were speeches from various francophone

leaders including ambassadors. Students show cased their dancing and singing skills in French. Finally, we

enjoyed speaking French the whole day.

Presentation by Grandes Ecoles

On 21st March at 10am, Nairobi Academy played host to three Grandes Ecoles form France: SciencesPo,

ICN Business School and ESSEC Business School. These schools were ably represented by Fabien Albouy,

Stanislas and Doljit Pangging respectively. They engaged our students in a very lively presentation and

question and answer session as they impressed upon them to choose courses offered by their respective

universities. The response was quite positive and most students were impressed to learn that they can actu-

ally pursue a Business course in English in France.

Community service in school is more than an item on a student’s personal statement when applying for

university. It’s an opportunity for a student to give something back to their community and to help others.

We know that our students are extremely busy at school but as part of their activity in school, all year 12

students are expected to take up community service activities every Wednesday for 2hours. With their

busy schedules students have to juggle their time between academics, school activities, and a social life.

This term, year 12 students visited Kuwinda children’s home. Volunteering in the community creates a posi-

tive impact on the little children at Kuwinda because they feel someone out there values them and it also

makes the volunteering student feel good for offering their service to the less fortune in the society. Volun-

teering students learn more about themselves and are able to experience the “Real World” through the

hands-on work they do to the children at Kuwinda. Here are some of the activities they carry out during

their community service time:

BTEC stands for Business and Technical Education Council. It is an international examining body based in

the UK. BTECs are specialist work-related qualifications and they combine practical learning with subject

and theory content. We currently offer BTEC Level 3 Extended Diploma in Enterprise & Entrepreneurship

and BTEC Level 3 Extended Diploma in Sport & Exercise Science. We are soon introducing additional

courses to provide our students with more career progression opportunities. The proposed additional cours-

es are BTEC Level 3 Extended Diploma in Business as well as BTEC Level 3 Extended Diploma in Computer

Science and ICT.

Studying BTEC qualifications is important because it is more vocational-based. A student will study a sub-

ject in relation to how the skills are used in the employment sector. This means that the BTEC course in-

volves coursework based subjects that suit those students who learn best through continuous assessments.

This course offers various opportunities to BTEC students because one can get to university with either a

BTEC or A levels. Moreover, a Level 3 Extended BTEC Diploma carries UCAS points just like A-Levels and

both qualifications are accepted by Universities around the world with up to 420 UCAS points. The BTEC

Extended Diploma takes 2years to complete and depending on the subject studied, a BTEC may be pre-

ferred to A levels as it shows that a student can intensively study one subject over a period of time and

that the student is passionate about and interested in that subject.

Comparing BTEC to A-Levels, the A levels are often academic subjects like Maths, Chemistry or English,

whereas BTECs are often more career-related courses, like Marketing, Business or computing. So, choosing

whether to take A-levels or a BTEC depends a lot on what a student would want to do afterwards. The

BTEC course is much more practical, with a more hands-on approach to learning. It involves plenty of work

experience opportunities as part of the course, giving students direct experience of the industry they want

to work in. Hellen Gechanga, BTEC Coordinator

As we approach the end of the term, we have now started Netball for Girls and Rugby for boys in prepa-

ration for next season. The highlight for last week was the U13 boys hockey match where they beat Rusinga

school 5-0 as the Girls hockey team were held to a barren draw. We also had a very exciting inter-house

Junior matches on Tuesday where Naivasha emerged the winner with 7 points followed closely by Baringo

with 6 points and Magadi were third with 4 points as Turkana became 4 th place. We are looking forward a

competitive fun filled senior Hockey matches this week. The fixture for week 11 will be as follows. Thank you

all for your continued support. T. Mulli

DATE DAY AGE GROUP/SPORT

SCHOOL VENUE DEPARTURE KICK

OFF

21/3 TUE U13 BOYS /GIRLS HOCKEY CAVINA HOME - 2.00

21/3 TUE INTERHOUSE HOCKEY SENIOR

MATCHES

3.30

25/3 SAT REGIONAL SWIMMING

CHAMPIONSHIPS

AGA KHAN

HIGH SCHOOL

25/3 SAT U13 BOYSFOOTBALL LEAGUE BANDA/ BRAESIDE

BANDA 7.30 9.00

Gratitude, hmm what is it?

Well according to Google (a very trust worthy source) says it is the quality of being thankful or the readiness

to show appreciation for an act of kindness. Notice how Gr-attitude has the word attitude in it, interesting

isn’t it? Because you always find the most humble people who show their appreciation to an act of kind-

ness while people with allot of attitude and ego end up being the most unlikely to show any appreciation,

going by this people who express gratitude make good leaders because attitude reflects leadership Grati-

tude is a great human quality to have as our psychology teacher says “it’s cool to be kind!” which I strongly

support. Gratitude strengthens relationships and makes the world a better place as a whole. Now that you

have read this please make it a worthy habit/ priority to say Thank you to anyone who serves you. The year

12 class did a play on Gratitude on 13/03/2017 it was packed with thank you’s! And laughter and spread

the message of practicing gratitude in our everyday lives. Thanks for reading!

Anand Singh Bamrah Year 12

As we approach the end of term, I urge you to spend sometime with your child and encourage

them as they revise for the forthcoming end of term two examinations. Year 9 students will sit a

Check-Point Pre-Trial Assessment in the course of the week to acclimatise them to examination

conditions. Previously, we have sent past papers home for you to help your child access revision

materials in addition to what we have provided here at school. The Art students will start their AS

Controlled Test and IGCSE Art Examinations on Monday 27th March 2017. End of Term two exami-

nations will start on the same day. Kindly challenge your child towards making academic pro-

gress, performing better than last term and attaining grades above their Minimum Target Grades

[MTG]. Each student should attain the minimum number of credits and more so in Mathematics

and English. I wish each student all the best in their examinations. J. Karanja