By Teresa Tung, Secondary School Principal
The Shapers network is a year long initiative organised by CATALYST Education Lab with the aims of cultivating leadership in education and fostering professional growth across the whole of the Hong Kong Schools ecosystem. I am privileged to be one of 40 education leaders involved in this project and on Wednesday 8th November was pleased to welcome the Shapers to HKA with the support of colleagues and student representatives.
During their visit, the Shapers visited classrooms, joined our weekly Wednesday Professional Development sessions to observe teacher collaboration, and joined students and faculty in discussing key features of an HKA Secondary School education. Over lunch, the Shapers discussed topics important to HKA:
- Transformation of education through global citizenship
- Nurturing a culture of belonging through an inclusive education and student support
- Inspiring intellectual curiosity through an inquiry and concept based approach to learning and teaching
- Developing intrinsic motivation and self regulation through our advisory and wellbeing programmes
- Creating a holocracy based on the models of Adaptive Schools and Cognitive Coaching
During the wrap up session the Shapers shared their observations and key take-aways from the visit. Broad themes noted included:
- HKA’s enriching, future-focussed approach to learning
- The high quality of collaboration amongst our faculty, rooted in the norms of collaborative work
- HKA’s self-directed students, who spoke to them with confidence and pride, and with a clear sense of their learning goals and intentions
- The purposeful use of space and time to support learning, especially library and arts/design
The Shapers network includes representatives from nonprofits such as the Bei Shan Tang Foundation and Story Jungle, as well as various Hong Kong secondary schools and universities. Through our connections with the Shaper community, HKA students and community members will benefit from future community engagement, idea exchanges, and learning opportunities.
