The transition from Primary School to Middle School is an important crossroad, representing a new chapter in a child’s life. Shanghai United International School Qingpu Campus is deeply engaged in the field of bilingual education and works hard to both connect primary school with middle school as well as collaborate with parents. A middle school curriculum lecture was recently held with the theme of “United Education – Brightening Our Future”, aiming at buttoning up the road of children’s development and providing a better future for them.
At the beginning of the presentation, the Assistant Principal and Head of Primary Helen Liu introduced a series of courses and activities for the primary to middle school transition in 2023. At the same time, she also shared about the Singapore study tour course “Witness Growth – Connecting the primary and middle school in a ‘new’ Journey”, a carefully designed programme for children’s promotion stage. The study tour is combined with content from SUIS Qingpu’s literacy course so that students can extend their learning and experience many cultures in the food, accommodation, travel and study!
Next, Co-Principal Sunny Huang, who recently returned from her visit to the UK and France, shared the outcomes of her trip with parents. Our partner school, Pate’s Grammar School, is one of the best public schools in the UK. Both schools have agreed to engage with each other on a deeper level of cooperation and through communication between the headmasters of both schools. We have not only established direct contact with various heads of department and academic leaders of Pate’s Grammar School but have also agreed on a “China-Foreign cooperative education project” between the two schools. We will reach a consensus on a series of cooperative courses that will help students grow and move on to their next stage, enabling them to broaden their global perspectives!
Additionally, Vice-Principal Flora Zhang introduced in detail to parents the educational philosophy of the Middle School. The key point of school education is to educate people rather than merely focus on scores. The SUIS Qingpu curriculum puts an emphasis on holistic education first. She hopes that through our education, students can adopt a global vision and be guided by their own dreams throughout their lives. Students should have the spirit of responsibility in times of crisis, a sense of belonging to the nation, and a sense of responsibility for their country. Academically, SUIS Qingpu’s Middle School is committed to cultivating students with solid basic knowledge, outstanding bilingual ability, and strong critical thinking skills. After working through the challenging middle school curriculum based on SUIS’ characteristic educational concepts including humanities, science, personality development and Chinese-foreign collaboration, students will be able to successfully enter our international high school. Our high school students are very competitive in the Shanghai high school entrance examination.
The leadership team in SUIS Qingpu’s middle school division includes domestic education experts with rich teaching experience who have integrated Chinese and western education in terms of both form and content. Moreover, to enhance middle school students’ independence and cultivate their leadership qualities, we also set up school teams (media, etc.), associations, and student autonomous organizations, to help children develop individuality!
It is due to the foundation laid by the middle school courses that those students who were admitted to our high school have achieved excellent results with university admission offers. Thirty-five graduates (our Class of 2023) have obtained a total of 121 university admissions. Forty of these admission offers are from the top 50 universities in the QS world ranking, while seventy-eight of these are from the top 100. Out of these, one student was offered a place at the University of Cambridge, ranked 2nd in the QS global ranking, and another offered a place at Imperial College London, ranked 6th; two were offered places at University College London (ranked 8th).
The comprehensive, meticulous, and attentive introduction to the primary and middle school transition programme won unanimous praise from parents. The clear transitional path from primary school to middle allows parents to confidently help their children smoothly transition through this important stage towards a better future!