Journeys and Reflections: past, present, and future

Feb 23, 2024

Welcome back to school and the Year of the Dragon!

I trust that the almost ‘back-to-back’ holidays taken since late December to celebrate festivals spanning the globe have offered a welcome respite from the routines and pressures of work and study for most, if not all of our community! As we resume our journey of learning together for the second half of the 2023-24 Academic Year, my hope is that we do so with soaring spirits and elevated energy levels.

In my absence from Hong Kong during part of January, I invited one of our most outstanding Chinese scholars, Dr. Zhang Yulong, to share his thoughts with the ISF community on the significance of the dragon in Chinese history. I think we are all indebted to Dr. Zhang for his insightful, entertaining, and ultimately educational reflection on the dragon as a significant feature of Chinese culture.

As always, I am grateful to those of you who reached out to me personally during my absence to offer encouragement and support. At this critical juncture in the history of our school, our mission demands much of us. Over the past weeks, I have undertaken three major tasks, all of which have a highly strategic importance for our school. In a sense, these three tasks reflect our past, our present, and our future: our alumni reflect achievements in our recent history; the acquisition of professional talent focuses on the mission-focused task at hand in the present; and our sustained collaborative engagement with leading tertiary institutions has a future focus for graduating classes in the coming years.

It is no easy task to establish and develop an enduring and robust network within the growing ranks of our alumni. This process requires the careful curation of mutually supportive connections between those who remain proud of their school. They form the welcoming and supportive community that members of each successive graduating class will join. I am enormously encouraged by the fact that a member of our first graduating class in 2012 has joined the staff team at ISF to undertake this task. Our mission demands our best efforts to achieve excellence. Acquiring the talent needed to inspire and educate our children demands time and effort. Each year, we search the world looking for the ‘best-fit’ educators to join us in Hong Kong. Looking to the future, creating the links with the world’s foremost institutions of tertiary learning similarly requires dedication, patience, and the personal touch. Reaching out and connecting with admissions staff has been highly effective in building the reputation of ISF and creating opportunities for our graduates to study at highly selective colleges and universities around the world.

Alumni Events

One of the highlights of my recent travels was the series of well-attended alumni events staged in Vancouver, San Francisco, London, Toronto, Boston, and New York. I met with over 100 of our alumni during the six events, a number that represents nearly 20% of our total number of graduates since the Class of 2012. Some of these events stretched over five hours, as our young alumni cherished the opportunity to catch up with each other and to hear more about the most recent developments at ISF in Hong Kong. It was inspiring and humbling to learn of the journeys many of our alumni have taken since graduating from ISF. In fields as diverse as medicine, neuroscience, psychology, performing arts, finance, economics, education, and archaeology, ISF alumni are beginning to make their own unique imprint on the world. It was also gratifying for me personally to note that the ‘life-stages’ represented at these events reflected the growing maturity of our alumni body. From recent graduates managing the challenges of their freshman year, to young professional couples (yes, there are quite a few!) now navigating the obstacles of professional advancement and work-life balance. Some are commencing or have completed doctoral studies. Their aspirations for the future span the globe and the full range of human endeavor. As an educator and a parent, this was a hugely satisfying experience.

Talent Acquisition

Over the past month, I have also attended teacher recruitment events in Melbourne, Bangkok, London, and Boston. While our staff retention remains very high, it is beyond question that our academic excellence and outstanding college and university placement record relies heavily on attracting and retaining the most talented, experienced, and inspiring professional educators. Competition for talent is fierce and those with outstanding professional portfolios are in high demand from the best schools around the world. It is also reassuring to report that we have sustained a remarkable success rate in securing quality teaching staff, even when competing with other notable schools.

A special part of our talent acquisition each year is the recruitment of appointees to the ISF teaching fellowship. Our teaching fellows spend a year living and working at ISF. As individuals with tertiary credentials in a wide range of fields, our teaching fellows are embedded in faculty teams across ISF and make their own distinctive contribution to our learning programs. Collectively, they also form a very special talent pool for future recruiting. Many former teaching fellows are current members of the teaching faculty.

College and University Visitation

When taking a ‘road trip’ to recruit teachers, I also visit strategically selected institutions that are popular choices for members of our current graduating class. While individual advocacy is not typically part of these formal meetings, each visit does provide an opportunity for members of admissions teams to gain a greater understanding of our school and insight into the unique features of an ISF education, including our beloved Shuyuan and Hao Xue programs, both of which attract a great deal of attention, even admiration from admissions staff. During my most recent travels, the following is a list of the institutions visited on behalf of our graduates. Please bear in mind that as our graduating classes become increasingly diverse in talent and aspiration, so to must the list of targeted institutions. In chronological order, I visited the following:

University of British Columbia (Vancouver and Okanagan)

University of Santa Clara

University of Toronto (St George and Scarborough)

Bentley University

Brandeis University

Babson College

Bryn Mawr College

Swarthmore College

Haverford College

University of Pennsylvania

Claremont McKenna College

Harvey Mudd College

Scripps College

Pomona College

University of California Los Angeles

University of Southern California

University of California San Diego

University of California Irvine

Occidental College

These meetings were wonderful opportunities to share current information about ISF, its mission, values, achievements, programs, and students. At the same time, they also offered highly valuable opportunities to gain personal insights into the ever-changing expectations and emerging trends in the world of undergraduate admissions. Demographic changes at key institutions were noted. Some institutions aspire to become more international, others less so. For some institutions, financial pressures have become more prominent in the admissions process. Perceptions concerning the recruitment of students from Hong Kong and the region were also shared. These insights will help enormously as we seek to optimize applications for the future.

Reflecting on my most recent travels, I remain optimistic for the future. Our sustained high ranking among the most successful IB schools in the world serves us well in both attracting professional talent and creating amazing pathways for our graduates to study at the world’s leading tertiary institutions. Our growing alumni body truly reflects the aspirations of our founders in seeking to establish a school that would educate graduates who achieve excellence in all their endeavors. As we welcome the Dragon into our lives for coming next year, I would encourage each of you to join us and support us in our critically important work at ISF.

Dr. Malcolm Pritchard

Head of School