2020-21 Approved Outreach
& Enrichment Projects
Support Student Outreach & Enrichment!
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Made possible in partnership with the Shanghai Education Foundation
Made possible in partnership with our founding organization the LCMS
2020-2021 Concordia Fund Projects
Sharing a Meal with People in Need
Concordia students are addressing a need right here in our community. They have met with and interviewed people in the neighborhood with disabilities and who are homeless.
In response to understanding their situations and needs, every day a student delivers a fresh hot meal to Mr. Li and Mr. and Mrs. Miao.
#outreach #highschool
Famous Storyteller
During his virtual visits with EC and ES students, Stanford educated author Joel Ben Izzy mesmerized students with interesting stories he has gathered on his travels around the world, including a few famous Chinese folktales.
Each story he shared contains a thoughtful moral lesson that Joel asked the students to ponder.
Read more about Joel's visit here.
#enrichment #earlychildhood #elementaryschool
Shining Star Supporters
Shining Star is an organization with a mission to reach out in love and service to children left behind in Guangdong when their parents leave to find better work. Throughout the semester, students have been identifying, collecting, and shipping needed programming supplies such as colored pencils and basketballs until they can meet face to face.
This summer 20 students and teachers will take part in a service trip to Guangzhou to work with the children of Shining Star.
Read about our previous trips to Shining Star here.
#outreach #middleschool #highschool
The Show must go on!
In November the Concordia Fund sponsored a dinner for Concordia students and employees before the fall play, Almost, Maine. Sharing a meal together was a way to encourage attendance and provide a time for our community to be together in a challenging year.
#enrichment #highschool
Big Books Library
Early childhood is a time for students to learn so many things, including strong English listening and speaking skills. To help with this, A BIG BOOK resource library is being created for teachers so students have even more opportunities to hear, see, and engage with language.
#enrichment #earlychildhood
WILL Foundation Service Trips
This summer and fall middle school students volunteered on Saturdays to help at the WILL Foundation on Chongming Island. The Foundation is home to a group of wonderful children with minor disabilities. At WILL, the children learn skills that will help them become self-supporting adults. During their visits, our students learned about the foundation, helped prepare the inn for guests, planted and harvested vegetables in an aquaponic farm, and bonded with the WILL kids. MS trips will resume in the spring.
Read about the trips here.
#outreach #middleschool
Building Libraries for Schools in Need
Reading Hope is working with the Garuna Foundation to bring English books and resources to their eight schools in Cambodia and Thailand. Last year the Concordia Fund enabled a service trip to the Garuna Foundation for Concordia families. Unable to travel this year, the Concordia Reading Hope team catalogued, curated, packed, and shipped eight “libraries”—one for each of Garuna’s schools—that provide free afternoon education for children.
#outreach #highschool
Bringing classroom learning to life with Trevor Lai
Concordia students get up close with Trevor Lai, author-illustrator, founder of UP Studios, and creator of Super BOOMi, a #1 rated show across China. Interviewing, storytelling, brainstorming, and learning about entrepreneurship are just some of the things students explore with Trevor. Through assemblies with elementary, middle, and high school, this stimulating artistic project, brings creative excitement to the corridors and classroom of the school.
#enrichment #earlychildhood #elementaryschool #middleschool #highschool
Deepening opportunities in biochemistry
This project will give students access to new analytical instruments used in biology and chemistry and provide opportunities for connecting conceptual knowledge to the laboratory procedures and tools used to verify our current understanding of natural phenomena. Improved laboratory instrumentation allows for still greater student achievement in primary research of current scientific importance and developing deeper passion for scientific advancement.
The new lab equipment will include a rotary evaporator, 15 motic microscopes, 10 dissecting microscopes, a spectrophotometer made possible by Thermo Fisher, and a HPLC unit— a generous gift from the Cai Family.
#enrichment #highschool
STEM LAb for robotics & programming
Next year MS will add two new STEM electives—robotics and programming. These courses will be supported by a new Robotics and Coding Lab, which will be located next to the HS Makerspace to enable collaboration between MS and HS students and faculty.
#enrichment #middleschool
Skills for Transitioning to College
Transitioning to college can be difficult and transitioning during a global pandemic even more so. In collaboration with alumni relations and the HS counselors, parents of HS seniors had a session with a transition coach and counselor who helped provide guidance as students faced an unprecedented start to college.
#enrichment #highschoolparents
BIG Data Conference
Though unable to attend in person, Concordia students presented their individual research findings via ZOOM for the 2021 4th International Conference on Big Data and Education. Concordia is the only HS invited to attend this event for college and graduate level participants.
Read about their experience here.
Big Data projects have been made possible this year through a generous gift from the Da Family.
#outreach #highschool
Concordia Big Data Workshop
Concordia Big Data students presented on why Big Data matters and led a workshop for MS and HS students to learn how understanding and utilizing big data can help address world problems.
Big Data projects have been made possible this year through a generous gift from the Da Family.
Read more about the Big Data Conference here.
#enrichment #middleschool #highschool
Outdoor Community Space Under the Bridge
This collaborative project between students, parents, and staff aims to create an outdoor communal gathering space under the bridge between the Upper Building and Phoenix Center, complete with seating, greenery, and game tables like fussball and ping pong. This project is made possible by generous support from Yotrio.
Learn more about this student-led project.
#outreach #highschool
Economics Competition
Concordia HS students participated in the China round of the National Economics Challenge, the only economics competition of its kind for high school students. Our team of students competed in several economics-related quiz rounds, including Super Econ! Quiz Bowl and Formal Quiz Bowl. They brought home the award for Critical Thinking Top Team for the Application of Economics event.
#enrichment #highschool
Reducing Food Waste Master Class
Concordia high school students completed the PACE Master Class to learn about becoming part of a ‘circular economy’, “an economy where ‘waste’ is valued and reintegrated into the supply chain.” This is an intense, research-based, knowledge-rich, and inspiring high-level educational program supported by multiple case studies that are tailored to the Concordia community. the course aims to enrich awareness on sustainability and to bring about sustainable change.
Read more about the project here.
#enrichment #highschool
Navigating Cultural Differences
Dr. Josephine Kim, a lecturer on education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, spoke to the parent and student community about navigating the differences between Western and Asian cultural approaches to education and learning. Dr. Kim is widely known in the international school community as an expert on issues of diversity, equity, mental wellness, and family issues.
#enrichment #middleschool
Learning & acting on behalf of Syrian Refugees
Jordan Hattar of Refuges4Refugees has offered interview sessions this year to teams of HS Storytelling Students to assist in their creative projects. Jordan provides contextual information on the nature of thousands of refugees who exited Syria and assimilated into Jordan and neighboring countries over the last decade. Students also had the opportunity to have conversations and build relationships with Syrian University students and families and facilitated the first ever tandem peer review and writing collaboration between HS Concordia students and Syrian refugee students.
#enrichment #highschool
Extra Extra Read All About It!
Designed to provide an authentic journalism learning experience, HS students launched The Concordia Phoenix Post Newsmagazine to provide the Concordia HS community with accurate, interesting and thought-provoking journalism. The newspaper team will produce two issues delivered in a timely fashion with an ever-improving level of quality and depth of coverage.
Read their first issue here.
#enrichment #highschool
EC/ES Library Resources
With the library renovation completed, this year more than 1,000 new books and library resources are being added to the EC/ES collection. New award-winning books, popular series additions, and replacements for well-loved and worn books are coming soon.
Find out how the Concordia Fund is helping promote literacy.
#enrichment #earlychildhood #elementaryschool
Experiencing the stock market first hand!
The Concordia Investment Club hosts a months-long stock market simulation competition designed to teach students the complexities of investing. This year students from across Shanghai have joined in the competition as well. Hadrian Capital sponsors the Concordia Investment Club and makes this real life learning opportunity possible.
The stock market simulation competition is made possible through a generous gift from Hadrian Capital.
#enrichment #highschool
Equipment support for nurse training
New practice materials and health equipment will allow nurses to update their training on campus and also provide some additional health screening for the Concordia community.
Equipment to keep our nurses up to date on their training, including new CPR and safety training equipment are a generous gift from the Tang Family.
#enrichment #earlychildhood #elementaryschool #middleschool #highschool
Concordia Master Classes
This spring we began filming a new series, Concordia Master Class, an educational experience for our parents. The first Master Class features EC/ES librarian Lisa Toner who has also authored more than 40 children's books.
Watch the videos in our Masterclass Series by clicking here.
#enrichment #earlychildhood #elementaryschool #middleschool #highschool
Poetry in Motion
#enrichment #earlychildhood
Students develop Big Data picture book
Utilizing concepts learned in the classroom, Concordia HS students, under the leadership of Dr. Tong, wrote a Big Data picture book to supplement teaching in the EC and ES classrooms. The book will be printed and distributed to students and housed in our libraries.
#enrichment #highschool #elementaryschool #earlychildhood
Guest Poet in High school
Guest anthology poet Mia Cheung, a third culture kid, shared her experiences authoring and publishing TCK inspired poems and provided feedback to our HS students on their work. Students received a copy of Cheung’s anthology.
#enrichment #highschool
Remodel of HS Science Laboratories
Proposed but not yet approved for funding
This project would see four HS science classrooms reconstructed and remodeled to create space and opportunities for additional lab and research time, develop stronger lab skills, and be encouraged to further study STEM subjects.
This remodel has the potential to improve the STEM experience for students at all grade levels in classes that include biology, chemistry, AP Biology, AP Chemistry, Independent Research, and other elective courses.
#enrichment #highschool
JUMP! Foundation DEI Collective Program
Students from Concordia’s GIN Amity club will participate in a JUMP! Collective Program that is focused on Diversity, Equity & Inclusion. The DEI program supports high school student leaders at international schools across Asia spearheading initiatives and conversations that address DE&I-related issues and social impact within their own community.
Bokashi Bin Restart
Bokashi Bin Restart is a student group who has devised a plan to address food waste issues on Concordia’s campus by reimplementing the Bokashi bin composting system. This composting will not only allow Concordia to become more sustainable with reductions in carbon dioxide and methane but will also inspire a more sustainable mindset towards the usage of resources.
Amity Global Summit 2021: Racial Equality
Students from Concordia’s GIN Amity club are organizing a global online conference to discuss racism and injustice. Their hope is to continue addressing these types of issues on our own campus, making things more inclusive and raising awareness with students, teachers and parents.
The conference will take place virtually over the course of two days, June 12th-13th, and feature seven speakers, all of whom come from diverse backgrounds and are advocates of racial equality.
#enrichment #highschool
SCRAP Program
The Sustainable Composting Reformation Adapted for the Planet (SCRAP) project is focused on establishing eco-friendly habits in the early childhood and elementary school divisions. Led by the Global Development Studies and the Global Issues Network Food Waste group, the aim of the project is to engage early childhood students in the school’s organic composting initiative as a mechanism that can aid them in understanding the importance of reducing, reusing, and recycling.
Students from SCRAP will work in conjunction with EC/ES teacher volunteers who will integrate the project into the science and/or social science curriculum.
Hydroponic Gardening Wall
Students in the Applied Learning Global Development Studies class have proposed to build a hydroponic gardening system. Through this project, the students hope to deepen their understanding of urban farming through hands-on experience. Their goal is to enrich the learning experience of students, especially those in classes related to sustainability and environmental science such as Global Development Studies and AP Environmental Science. Not only would a project like this further the students’ knowledge of sustainable agriculture it also lets them better understand their participation in food systems.
High School Student Internships
The Concordia Fund arranged partnerships and will be providing faculty support for HS student groups participating in internships in several fields of industry, including investing, biochemistry, medicine, law, not for profit education in Cambodia, NGO work in China, and information technology.
Find out what students learned from their experiences.
#enrichment #highschool
A number of middle school students have been successfully competing in online math competitions throughout the school year. Having advanced through the necessary rounds, our MS Math teams will now have the opportunity to compete in person at a special math competition to be held here in Shanghai.
#enrichment #middleschool