At 30, one shall stand firm — as initially put by Confucious, this saying signifies a person’s attainment of stability and maturity as he ages.

As Shekou International School (SIS), Shenzhen’s first international school founded in 1988 by a joint venture group of oil companies, celebrates its 35th anniversary this year, its three campuses in the heart of Shekou, its commitment to nurturing globally-minded young talents, and a caring and diverse community forged around its outreach, manifest its current stability and maturity.

On May 13, 2019, SIS held its 30th anniversary ceremony at the G&G Creative Community in Shekou, where members of the school’s Parent Support Association (PSA) presented a “Back to the 80’s” retro gala. The school’s 35th anniversary celebration was held Saturday at its newest Bay Campus in the Prince Bay area, where the school’s student wind band, string ensemble and choir enthralled the audience with their musical flair.

Changing and unchanged

At the ceremony, Harish Kanabar, Head of SIS, provided the audience with an overview of SIS’s 35 years of history by presenting a slideshow. The slideshow began with a bird’s-eye view of Shekou in the 1980s, depicted SIS’s first classes held in a classroom at Yucai Middle School, and concluded with the numerals “35” formed by the school’s 285 staff members.

“SIS is the first international school in Shenzhen started specifically for the expatriate community. When Shenzhen opened up to the world, many people relocated to Shenzhen and needed schools for their children. So this is how SIS began,” Kanabar said. “Since then, SIS has evolved into a school with three campuses, offering the full International Baccalaureate (IB) programme and supporting 1,100 students as of this day today.”

Greg Smith, International School Services (ISS) Vice President for Asia Pacific and a former Head of SIS, stated that he was proud of what the school has done over the past years. ISS is a U.S.-based nonprofit educational organization that has operated SIS since 1988. With more than three decades of development, SIS has become ISS’s flagship school in Asia, according to Smith.

Shekou International School’s (SIS’s) wind band stages a performance at a ceremony celebrating the 35th anniversary of the founding of the school on April 13. Courtesy of SIS

“Back in 2019, when we were celebrating the 30th anniversary, we were still focused on our Campus in Jingshan Villa,” said Smith. “Now we have a new purpose-built secondary campus in Net Valley and this beautiful upper primary campus. One of the things I am most proud of is that our new facilities have allowed a new group of families and children to do amazing things.”

“SIS grows with Shenzhen. When I came to Shekou in 2012, It was a much different place,” said Dale Cox, assistant professor at Utah Valley University in the United States and a former head of SIS from 2012 to 2017, “So much growth and transformation took place over the years. The school has done the same thing. I am pleased that the school has owned the ability to use technology to help students learn at a high level and has moved into larger facilities that make the programmes even better.”

For Kanabar, despite the ever-changing city landscape and community in Shekou, some things have remained unchanged at SIS. “I don’t think SIS has changed as much as the city and its surrounding community have,” he said. “As an international school, our ethos, culture, and mission have remained unchanged.”

3 inspiring programmes

This year also marked the 15th anniversary of SIS’s French International Programme (FIP) launch. Since its inception in 2009, the programme has fostered students with critical thinking skills, internationalism and academic excellence while benefiting from French, English and Chinese.

The school launched a Chinese Bilingual Programme (CBP) in 2022, catering to families seeking a balanced Chinese and English bilingual learning environment.

“We say that we are ‘three inspiring programmes, one caring community,’ which means that we offer the French International Programme, the Chinese Bilingual Programme and the International Programme,” said Kirsty Van Rooyen, SIS’s Primary Years Programme (PYP) Coordinator.

Van Rooyen said that the Grade 5 students will hold an exhibition highlighting an in-depth inquiry that shows collaboration and creativity in solving real issues. The final projects will be showcased this week and are an essential milestone for Grade 5 before they head to middle school.

“We will invite the wider community to witness the exhibition, including representatives from local schools and other institutions in partnership with PYP,” she said.

One caring community

In 2019, four Grade 9 students from South Korea and China launched the “SIS Strings Initiatives.” Together with the school’s instrumental music teacher, Vanessa Coetzee, they volunteered to provide music lessons to children from migrant families at the 4:30 p.m. community school in Nanshan’s Nanyuan Community every Thursday. This is a glimpse of SIS’s efforts to foster a caring community.

According to Sara Hajiyewa, the incoming PSA president at the school’s Net Valley campus, SIS is “an amazing community-oriented school” that is an essential focal point for the local expatriate community in which it is rooted.

“We have our daily lives kind of revolve around this community,” she said. “And beyond the student’s academic needs, I think SIS also provides amazing support for student mental health and development in individual areas of interest.”

Intramurally, efforts have been made to create a learning environment that meets the diverse needs of students. “We have a learning support department to support students with diverse needs such as language learning and more,” said Keren Tian, a staffer from the school’s learning support department. “We have also established a DEIJ (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion & Justice) Committee to promote diversity and inclusion on campus.”

“Learning and education is not just about exams and textbooks. It is about student wellbeing,” said Kanabar. “I think younger parents, particularly nowadays, understand the value of having a holistic and balanced education. Also, our local community is quite integrated into our school life. We want to ensure that the families enrolling in our school understand and support the community. And we want to be here for the next 35 years!”