FRIDAY FLYER-Issue 111

Headmaster's Review

Our week started with a fantastic assembly led by our Business Teacher, Ms Shanthi Pillay, on the theme of Deepavali. Ms Pillay described the customs, practices and values of this international ‘Festival of Lights’. Her closing message was so important and is shown above.

Indeed, in the days since this assembly, the life of the school has followed this theme.

For example, every day one of our Sixth Formers has led a fascinating lunchtime presentation linked to their Extended Project as follows:

Monday, Thayiebah:
To what extent does bipolar disorder affect a teenager’s academic performance?

Tuesday, Catalina:
How has the prevalent use of the word ‘average’ in a school context harmed the self-esteem of generation z?

Wednesday, Hinata:
Are artificial food colourings necessary in modern society?

Thursday, Scott:
Has the management of the water crisis in China over the past 40 years been successful?

Friday, Tyler:
What causes the United States’ gender gay gap? A comparative perspective to Scandinavia.

 

In each presentation we all learned something new – knowledge over ignorance.

On Thursday morning our Assembly for Years 10 to 13 was led by our Student Societies: Teen Tech Awards, Humanities, Music, Sport, Violet, Business, Comfort, Science… Each presenter explained the social, intellectual and wellbeing benefits of attending their sessions – light over darkness.

…And on Friday our Business Society launched their ‘Instant Happiness Cafe’ selling drinks and snacks – with the promise of instant happiness too – is this good over evil?

In addition to students learning from each other, as a school we are so fortunate to have noteworthy guests visit us to share their knowledge and experience. As part of our ‘Epsom Live!’ series, on Thursday afternoon we were joined by Mr. Soo Kim Wai, the Managing Director of the Amcorp Group. We are so grateful that Mr Soo generously gave his time to answer our students’ questions enabling them to learn from his insights into the world of top business leadership.
‘Epsom Live!’ represents a unique and rare opportunity for students to gain first hand experience and direct access to be able to ask questions to prominent and influential Malaysian business leaders.

The ‘Epsom Live!’ series will continue over the coming weeks as we welcome: Lim Beng Choon, Dato’ Aru Suppiah, Ruben Emir Gnanalingam, Dato’ Won Wing Seong and more.

At Epsom we understand that the learning that occurs outside the classroom is equally as important as the learning that takes place within it. Therefore we work hard to provide and support the widest range of learning opportunities to enable our students to become knowledgeable, active, principled and confident young people.

 

 

Best wishes,

Mr Matthew Brown
Headmaster


Crawfurd House

As a chemistry teacher here at Epsom College, I often share with my pupils about Chemistry Nobel prize winners that I admire. Dorothy Hodgkin was a researcher at Oxford University who discovered the 3-D structure of important biological molecules such as insulin and penicillin. She used a method called X-ray crystallography, where she isolated the crystals of molecules and passed X-ray through them. It is extremely delicate and intricate work. The reason I admire her is because, in her mid-20s, quite early on in her career, she developed Arthritis in her fingers. As the years passed, it worsened and her hands started to deform. Yet, this did not stop her from continuing her work. She remained resilient and turned her negatives into positives culminating in important discoveries and the ultimate prize.

I like to use her as a role model for my Crawfurd girls. I remind them of the importance of remaining resilient in the face of adversity, and how we can always choose to turn our negatives into positives. Challenges and difficulties will always be there but we can choose how we respond to them.

It has been an eventful few weeks at Crawfurd House, most notably with the resurgence of social activities and competitions. To kick things off, we held the annual Halloween party. The Heads of Crawfurd team, together with Terry Kim, put together a fun-filled exciting evening for the pupils in Years 7, 8 and 9 in both Carr and Crawfurd. They organised various games and a dressing-up competition and capped it all off with pizza and drinks. It was held in the Sports Hall so we could observe social distancing. It was clear that the pupils were thrilled to finally be able to meet up and socialise after a year of being cooped up indoors. Well done to the Heads of Crawfurd for their hard work and superb organisational skill in managing all the pupils present.

I am also pleased to announce that Crawfurd was the joint winner for the Halloween House decorating competition. The girls made sure we had a colourful, near-spooky menagerie of items to whet the appetite of the judges!

The girls have now started rehearsing and practising for the House Band Competitions, Inter-House badminton and  Cross-country competition. The aim is always to involve as many members of the House as possible. These events will be held in the next two weeks. We hope to see parents at the House Band competition which will be held on the 26th of November in the Theatre. There is also the Pink Day Breast Cancer Awareness pamper session, the KS 3 Debating competition and the Frisbee competition coming up this term.  

The Heads and Deputy Heads of Crawfurd House will now be ably assisted by a school council representative from each year group. These girls will attend weekly meetings with the Heads of College to provide a platform to discuss various matters that pertain to their lives here at the College. The Council representative for each year group is as follow:

Year 7: EeXynn and Shamita
Year 8: ChaeWon and Annie
Year 9: Sarasa and Haneesha
Year 10: Maya and Woorin

These girls were chosen as they showcased a caring attitude towards their fellow students. Congratulations to them!
 
Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter:@CrawfurdEcim

I leave you all now to savour some of the snapshots from our Halloween Party and Ms Masako’s Japanese cooking session in the House kitchen.

 

Ms Denu Sankey

Crawfurd Housemistress


International Prefect

Epsom College in Malaysia is a member of Round Square; a globalised community with more than 200 member schools from over 50 countries. My role as an International Prefect is to ensure that Epsom develops and fosters characteristics and attributes in its student body that relate to the 6 IDEALS upon which the Round Square is built. The core principles are Internationalism, Democracy, Environmentalism, Adventure, Leadership and Service. We already have a number of events happening within the school that are based on these themes. This time I will specifically focus on one of the themes, Service.

Service: Our students are ready and willing to volunteer and be involved where needed, applying and developing skills and understanding in support of individuals and communities both close to home and further afield.

This year, from March to April, selected students from Year 10 to Year 13 participated in the Race4Good competition. The competition engaged students from all over the world to become leaders and solve real-life problems. Team Epsom worked on an issue in Nepal, and our goal was to think of ideas that would allow families in a rural village community to gain sufficient and sustainable income. The hard work of our students, who came up with great ideas together, paid off as we were awarded third place – not bad for our first attempt at this competition with only 1 point between us and 2nd place. Throughout this project, we all learned new skills, since each of us were allocated different tasks (creating videos, calculating budgets, coming up with creative ideas and much more). We are so grateful for this opportunity and we will be participating again this year!!

There will be many more events coming up in Epsom over the term, so please be sure to regularly check our website and social media pages 🙂

 

Hirotsugu Takami,
International Prefect (Round Square)


The Epsom Extra with More Mathematics than most

Mathematics is a core subject that is compulsory among all students up to IGCSE and our Mathematics department has seen students achieve prestigious awards such as Top in the World at IGCSE.
 

We are delighted to welcome two new excellent additions to our team – namely Mr Baloyo and Mr Bevan, who are already having a very positive impact and wh, we do not doubt, will enrich the learning experience of Mathematics students at Epsom.  

Mathematics is one of the most popular subjects at A-level and, as a department, we are ambitious for our students and actively seek out opportunities for them to take their learning further.
 
This week we are delighted to be able to share with you our success in the 2021 Kangaroo Mathematics Challenge of 2021 (KMC 2021).
 
50 Epsom students participated and 6 went on to achieve medals.
 
The annual Kangaroo Maths  Challenge seeks to identify the best mathematicians from across the world. In addition, Malaysia boasts its own Kangaroo Maths group which is linked with the French Association Kangourou Sans Frontiéres (AKSF).
 
We would especially like to celebrate the success of one of our Key stage 4 students, Diana Lee, who won the Gold medal award at junior level – this is one of the more challenging levels.
 

Epsom was extremely proud to achieve awards in the most challenging category. Timothy Chung and Drexel Loh achieved silver medals. We are happy to learn that Drexel has settled in well at Cambridge University and Timothy at Imperial -if they are reading this then – we miss you boys!  Also noteworthy we had 3 Bronze awards.

Students were delighted to receive their certificates this week.

Epsom encourages participation beyond the standard curriculum to stretch and challenge learners and encourage them to apply their prior learning to new scenarios. This is a skill that is required at a university interview. Fostering an interest in mathematics and mathematical excellence are watchwords at Epsom.
 

We are delighted to finally be able to resume physical classes and are excited for the term ahead!

 

Mr. Simon Hose
Head of Mathematics


Music Department

Epsom’s vibrant and established Music Department plays a key role in the delivery of the holistic education that we offer. This term saw the introduction of a new Ukulele Group. This initiative is led by Ms Denise Tan with guidance from one of our Visiting Music Teachers, Ms. Ee Leng Yong. This group offers the perfect opportunity for experienced players, as well as beginners who picked up a ukulele for the first time during lockdown, to practise, play and enjoy making music together.

This Epsom Ukulele Group takes place every Monday. The group enjoys playing fusion pop songs and modern mixes. The ukulele is a very accessible instrument that is easy to pick up, and we want to encourage more people to join in and have fun with us.

We are delighted to share that 2 of our Year 11 GCSE Music students Issa Kon and Lee Yi Shan recently achieved Silver and Bronze Awards respectively having competed in the EuroAsia Piano/Strings Competition. The EuroAsia Piano/Strings competition is an annual event that was established with the aim of providing a platform and an opportunity for aspiring musicians to be exposed to international standards of music competition.

We are delighted to have our students back on site for physical lessons. The Music department is preparing for more exciting Musical events this year. The next exciting event will be the Prep School Christmas Show on the 9 December at 3-4pm and Senior School Christmas Show at 6-7pm on the same day.

Ms Catherine Chin

Music Teacher

Prep Music

Our Music Department is so proud of the achievements of its students – it is wonderful to see them develop into accomplished musicians over the years.

Huge congratulations to Yusi Cheng Year 6 ( 2020/2021) who won the Highly Commended prize in the Lyrical Flute Legends virtual competition, organised by The Young Flute Player, judged by flute masters Sir James Galway and Lady Jeanne Galway.  Yusi’s first flute lesson was in Year 3 at Epsom. Under the guidance of  Ms Ching Ting Yong, he received a distinction in ABRSM Grade 3 flute exam in September 2021. Please Click here to find out the competition song.

We are thrilled to announce that there will be a Prep Christmas Concert on 9th December 2021, 3pm to 4pm. Prep Music is in the midst of preparing the programs. All the students will take part in the performances. Stay Tun

Ms Denise Tan

Music Teacher


Propert House

Our last few weeks have been particularly exciting here at Propert. We have enjoyed many social activities.

The Senior boys have enjoyed the resumption of the various trips to Seremban 2 and also the nearby Mercato shop lots. This has been a welcome change and has been made possible by the relaxation of the COVID19 restrictions which most of us are now enjoying.

Interhouse events have also started to take shape. We are in the midst of the Interhouse Badminton tournaments and there should be more to report in the next Propert flyer; Interhouse Battle of the Bands will also take place later this term. Having had a little check-in this week, we are confident the Propert boys will do us all proud.

Halloween afforded us the opportunity to socialise with all the other houses and the prefects arranged various Halloween activities and a fright-night movie to boot! Our front porch was suitably scary and hopefully was one of the top contenders for the Prep Halloween ‘Scary Porch’ contest.

We were also treated to an Open Mic event this past week and a great time was had by all. There were singers and performers from all the houses and even some staff! Well done to the boys both on stage as performers and behind the scenes, managing the technical requirements. We look forward to more of these events in the future.

October was Breast Cancer Awareness month and this month of November we are mindful of Men’s Prostate Cancer as well as Men’s Mental Health. As a house full of young men, we will be initiating the Propert Movember to Remember movement. Through the prefects, fake stick-on moustaches will be sold for charity and these can be worn stapled to their masks on ‘Pink’ Day on 22 November 2021 where an assembly will be held and both causes celebrated. We look forward to sharing some pictures with you in the next edition.

We are looking forward to the end of the year too where there will be a Christmas party of sorts as well as decorations and ‘Secret Santa’ for the boys.

 

Mr Ian Schoeman
Propert Housemaster


The Sixth Form
A vibrant community of future leaders

‘Education is the Kindling of a Flame’

 

At Epsom, we are building a strong community of curious and inquisitive learners. At Key Stage 4 and Key Stage 5, we want our students to develop a passion for learning and flourish as confident and driven individuals who can adapt to a constantly evolving world. We believe that, in this sense, what is happening outside the classroom is equally important as what is happening during lessons.

This term, our students have enjoyed a wide range of enrichment activities. These take place at different times during the day and encourage our students to develop key skills, such as problem-solving,  debating, researching and presenting. We strive to provide as many opportunities as possible for learners to bloom within the Epsom community. We are particularly proud to see how our students support each other and collaborate in the diverse projects that have been introduced across the school.

Our students have been afforded multiple opportunities to lead enrichment activities. Some of them have involved academic societies. These represent excellent forums for our students to meet and discuss ideas and engage in academic discourse on a variety of stimulating and engaging topics. Epsom has more than a dozen societies where students meet weekly to discuss current affairs, share research findings or collaborate on projects. These events represent an excellent complement to our academic programme and help our students explore beyond the curriculum. For example, this month the Medical Review Society invited Dr Diana Mohd Shah to discuss organ donation, the Business Society interviewed the director of one of the largest banks in Malaysia, the Humanities Society debated politics and philosophy, the Environment Society explored the future of our planet and the Science Society explored the impact of plastic on the ocean.

This week the Sixth Form is also hosting a range of EPQ presentations. The Extended Project Qualification allows students to choose an area of particular personal interest and carry out a plan, complete research, write an essay, and deliver a presentation. These presentations have been well attended by our student and staff body. They are an excellent platform for our students to showcase their research and a perfect addition to their university application. A few examples include Taranie sharing her findings on parabens in cosmetics, Hinata exploring the dangers of colour additives in food, and Scott the challenges of natural resources management in China.

It is very pleasing to see our students enjoying their study time at Epsom and taking full ownership of their learning through the vast academic enrichment programme that our school and Sixth Form offers.

Mr Phil Pedro
Head of Key Stage 4 & 5

 

Mr Ian Schoeman
Propert Housemaster


Epsom College in Malaysia Running Club

Any keen runners out there will understand that there is a core of (strange?!) people in the world who dream of running shoes, think that paying more for shorter shorts is a good idea and understand the adage that ‘a run only counts if it is on Strava’. I would suggest that cyclists may be the only subset that would be even more obsessive than your average runner.

We have a developing number of these ‘strange’ individuals at our College, the ranks are definitely growing. Running is one of the sports that we have managed to maintain  during the pandemic and we now have a strong core of 20 members of our Strava club. (For the obsessives out there Strava collects all the data you need to be able to evaluate your run.)

Each Saturday, in a bid to beat the heat, a small group of avid staff and student runners get together for a weekly longer run. Of course this only counts if it is recorded on Strava so the evidence is provided in this article. This Saturday we enjoyed a steady 11km starting at 7.13 am and Zi Ming achieved an all important PB for 10k. Well done to the group who see running as a better alternative to their beds!

We also run sessions throughout the week. During these sessions we do not run as far, but look for alternatives. For instance after warming up the group finds a big hill and runs up it and back down again. ‘Normal’ people may wish to stop at this point. However, not this group, they set their goal and keep going. Upon completion, they smile with satisfaction and then check Strava!

We very much look forward to the end of the pandemic so we can test all of this training in official races. Hopefully there are some PBs to come at the end of 2021 and into 2022.

Mr Ian Squires (running geek)

 

Mr Ian Schoeman
Propert Housemaster


Open Mic

On Friday 5th of November, we were so excited to be able to finally host the first Open Mic session of the new academic year. This special event was held outdoors at our Container Cafe (an outdoor cafe at the school where students are able to purchase refreshments). As pupils enjoyed the musical performances of their peers, they genuinely appreciated being able to mingle with their friends over some light snacks provided by the cafe.  

The night enabled students, and teachers alike, to showcase their musical talents on the guitar, drums, harp and more. We even welcomed some confident singers and dancers onto the stage! The show greeted a wide variety of performers, ranging from our regulars such as Keia (Y12) and Diana (Y11), to talented newcomers like Kaith (Y10), Mille (Y8), Josh (Y7), and even Mr Brown!

A huge round of applause to everyone who helped provide such high-quality and entertaining performances. We hope that everyone had a great evening and we are looking forward to future events where we can celebrate our time together as a school community. We will never take our time together for granted again thanks to COVID!

Raihana Remee and Yi Chen Lee
Social Prefects