Location – 60 Sha Tau Kok Road, Shek Chung Au, Sha Tau Kok, New Territories, Hong Kong
Website – https://www.ichk.edu.hk/
Contact – (852) 2655 9018
1. Please mention about the school and its mission/vision and various infrastructural facilities.
ICHK is a school that is student-centered and community-minded. We make children feel welcome, cared for and thoroughly at home.
Our innovative curricula offer students a stimulating and challenging learning journey, and our focus is relentlessly future-orientated. We know that change in the world is constant and accelerating. We know that students need a new and wider set of skills if they are to meet the challenges that await: that, in an information and ideas based economy, it is attitudes and mindsets, no less than qualifications, that will underpin ongoing performance and success. And so we have created – and continually evolve – a school experience that best prepares young people for that future.
Our stunning location provides students with unrivalled opportunities to learn and grow through outdoor experiences. In our uniquely natural environment, students play sport, enjoy after school activities, experience authentic outdoor learning and connect with nature.
2. Kindly mention about the prominent personality of the school and his/her role in the development of the school.
ICHK is a community of innovation, in which all teachers think of themselves as leaders of learning. The Head of School Toby Newton leads the school, and all teachers are encouraged to seek opportunities and programmes to enhance the learning experience for all students. Our leadership team regularly present at education conferences and summits, host workshops and meet with educators who are keen to learn about our approaches.
3. Kindly describe about the various courses offered by the school and their salient features.
We have developed a unique and stimulating curriculum. In Years 7-9 learning is centred on emerging best practices, using insights and innovations from around the world, captured in a combination of courses that either reflect existing national curriculums or that we have designed ourselves, from the ground up. In Years 10-11 students follow IGCSEs and then the IB Diploma Programme (DP) in Years 12-13. Students can begin the journey towards the Mastery Transcript from Year 10, which is an additional qualification to the IB.
We work closely with students to identify their passions and provide them with personalised learning opportunities. Our innovative Free Learning and Enrichment & Flow programmes allow students opportunities to deepen their work in subjects or in areas of interest which are not covered by the mainstream school curriculum. The Free Learning programme introduces our younger students to self-direction and allows them to take more control of their learning, through a varied map of challenges and experiences. Enrichment & Flow is an adjunct to the GCSE programme and offers students the chance to consolidate, extend or innovate the curriculum they follow.
Our unique curriculum initiatives include Human Technologies, outdoor based activities, Big History, Free Learning, Flexible Learning and Deep Learning. These have all been developed to enrich our students’ experience of school and their understanding of themselves as people and learners. The curriculum dimension is supported by our unique 5+1 pastoral Model, which fosters a culture of growth, hard work, acceptance and collaboration.
4. Please mention what steps are you taking beyond the traditional curriculum to ensure overall development of the students?
At ICHK, we believe a dual emphasis on academic qualifications and the personal qualities of character, grit and resilience, are the only way in which to truly prepare students for the accelerating challenges of a changing world.
Our unique 5+1 pastoral model is based on the work of five thinkers in education and beyond, and underpins everything we do at ICHK.
Comprehensive research into what factors lie behind school attainment in the secondary years has prompted this model for fostering and nurturing success in our students. It provides us with guidance how to encourage a growth mindset and how to support students into the “learning zone” through an imaginative, innovative curriculum, experienced in an environment of safety and trust.
In addition an ‘epistemic apprenticeship’ is built into the fabric of our school. The term, coined by the Professor of Psychology and Education Guy Claxton, underscores the ways in which school provides guidance and role modelling for every aspect of students’ performance.
This includes not just academic work but the social, emotional and values-driven dimensions of students’ lives.
Essentially it is about creating an environment and opportunities to serve an apprenticeship in being the best you can be.
All learning and teaching is framed through the Human Technologies lens, offering students a toolkit for becoming better human beings in an ever-changing world.
Our goal is to create and sustain a mental and physical environment in which it makes sense and is possible for students to want to be and to build towards being the best people they can be.
5. What steps does the school take to motivate and develop the students’ interest towards education?
At the heart of ICHK is a fundamental commitment: to provide our students with the very best education we can offer, day in, day out, year on year.
ICHK is a school where all students feel cared for and can flourish in a nurturing environment. Our key aim is to provide a secure, caring environment for students, where they can develop as learners and happy individuals.
Curriculum X encompasses everything that ICHK Secondary offers beyond the traditional curriculum. This framework has been developed and refined for a number of years, through our innovations to timetable, curriculum and pedagogy.
It includes Human Technologies, Free Learning, Deep Learning, Enrichment and Flow and Outdoor Learning, all of which serve to offer our students more choice, more flexibility, different work practices and more opportunities to develop skills and attributes which are not addressed by examinations.
Through the initiatives, we introduce new passions and open students’ eyes to something new.
Through a combination of Curriculum X and traditional school subjects, we are able to value and recognise our students for all their attributes, capabilities, passions, achievements, and interests, not just for their academic abilities.
6. How are you providing financial assistance to the students in need?
ICHK offers a range of scholarships, all closely aligned to the values which underpin our school.
A total of 10% of our annual school fees is awarded in scholarships of one form or another every year, and we seek to exceed that wherever possible, as we strive to make our school’s curricula available to as many students as possible.
With all our awards, we aim to encourage, inspire and reward students for their efforts and contribution to the community,
Our policy has been carefully crafted to align with our core philosophy that all children are worthy and deserving of the best possible education, and young people should be supported in developing their all-round characters.
7. What are the career opportunities available to the students after completion of their courses?
ICHK students achieve outstanding IBDP and IGCSE results, and all secure their first choice university destinations.
We are very proud of our graduates who have secured places at prestigious universities around the world. Many have secured coveted university scholarships and been elected into student leadership roles by their peers.
8. Please enlighten us about the school’s major awards/achievements, its accomplished/renowned alumni, remarkable collaborations, and major accreditations.
ICHK Secondary has been recognised by Cambridge Strategies as one of the top 100 schools in the world for innovation. Profiles of featured schools formed part of the publication ‘Innovation 800’, created to celebrate 800 years of excellence at Cambridge. ICHK was the only school in Hong Kong to be featured, with our innovative curriculum and cutting edge approach to learning winning us a place in the list of pioneering schools.
In 2020 ICHK became the first school in Hong Kong, and one of only five worldwide to graduate students with a Mastery Transcript.
This was a major development, placing ICHK in a global group of progressive, pioneering schools, dedicated to transforming what educational assessment can capture and express, thereby revolutionizing how universities and employers conceive of the secondary phase.
ICHK’s Human Technologies programme is forming the centre of a PhD research project University College London, and our groundbreaking Free Learning programme has been rolled out to a group of trainee teachers at the Education University of Hong Kong.
World renowned educationist Yong Zhao has endorsed ICHK’s innovative Free Learning programme.
Yong Zhao is a Foundation Distinguished Professor in the School of Education at the University of Kansas and a professor in Educational Leadership at the Melbourne Graduate School of Education in Australia.
He has written the foreword for a new book being published this summer on the Free Learning programme and its extension to other education providers.
Free Learning: A Student-Directed Pedagogy in Asia & Beyond will be published by Routledge and has been co-authored by ICHK’s Ross Parker.
9. Kindly elaborate about the future plans of the school in the same. At ICHK, we believe we have developed impactful solutions to some of the most pressing challenges educators face, and are pushing the boundaries and expectations with regards to what secondary education could and should offer young people. Our approach has been to develop and refine for a number of years, through our innovations to timetable, curriculum and pedagogy. These include Free Learning, Human Technologies, Deep Learning and outdoor learning, all of which serve to offer our students more choice, more flexibility, different work practices and more opportunities to develop skills and attributes which are not addressed by examinations. We will continue to consolidate these innovations and build on the Mastery Transcript.