We Are Ready to Open on September 1st! | 我们已为9月1日开学做好准备！

The first day of school is fast approaching for the first group of students who will start school on September 1st after the summer holiday and 3 exciting weeks of summer camp. The school’s administrative division has been working tirelessly throughout the entire summer to ensure the smooth running of the school operations and prepare for the new academic year.

With technology taking centre stage in the previous months of eLearning, our IT Department has been working around the clock to ensure the best eLearning experience for not only students but teachers and parents as well. A set of new servers and storage have been set up, with network device adjustments taking place to ensure stability in the work environment and the optimum performance of all devices on campus. According to Jenny Zhang, Head of IT, maintenance work is ongoing on all peripheral application systems, like CCTV, PA and UPS, printing etc.; the round check takes place three or four times a year.

“What we are doing – maintaining the multi-media devices in Learning Communities and updating the student iPads is what we would do every summer, and despite the special situation this year, we still do this to guarantee a conducive classroom environment for the next school year” Ms Zhang explained.

The work does not end there for Ms Zhang and her team but they also have to ensure the new cohort of staff is prepared for. “We are in the process of setting up and maintaining email accounts and all other IT environment related functionalities for teachers and students” she added.

With the summer programme currently online, the IT team has also been on standby online to assist teachers and parents with any technical challenges they may be coming across on platforms such as Teams, Seesaw and Zoom.

Now that the school start dates have been officially announced and students will be back on campus from September 1st, the SMD Department’s main tasks have been to organize and upgrade the physical space students and teachers will be utilizing for the new academic year. Delia Wang, Head of SMD shared with us that renovations included the School’s most popular area, Playground A, where students spend a lot of their time doing PE and playing with friends during break time. In addition, other areas were remodelled while classrooms and other public areas repainted.

Playground A

Although during renovations, a lot of attention is paid to the School’s physical space, necessary to create the dynamic, organized and engaging learning environment we want for our students, their health and safety continued to be of utmost importance this summer.  “Before the epidemic ends completely, we will continue to do what we did last semester.”  Ms Wang stated. “Before entering the school, we will ask the staff about their physical health, have their body temperature checked twice, and disinfect their hands and soles at the same time, to ensure that all the teachers and students are healthy, and entering the school with normal body temperature.” she added.

This COVID-19 epidemic prevention, also included the thorough cleaning and disinfecting of all school buses, Learning Communities, campus facilities and equipment, while also maintaining the supply of epidemic prevention material such as alcohol-based hand sanitizers, N95 masks, temperature measuring tents, signage and cleaning material.

With staff members scheduled to return to China, some in time for the start of the school year, we are looking to forward to having life back to normal again!

在结束了暑假和为期三周暑期课程后，第一批学生将于9月1日开学。整个暑假，学校行政部门都在孜孜不倦地工作，以确保学校顺利运作，并为新学年做准备。

在前几个月的在线学习中，科技占据了中心位置，我们的IT部门夜以继日地工作，以确保不仅为学生，也为老师和家长提供最好的在线学习体验。我们已安装了一套新的服务器和存储设备，并对网络设备进行了调适，以确保工作环境的网络稳定性和校园内所有设备的最佳性能。IT部主管张宁女士表示，所有外围应用系统的维护工作也都在进行中，如CCTV、PA和UPS、打印等。这些应用系统每年都要进行三到四次全面检查。

 “我们正在做的是——维护学习社区的多媒体设备并升级学生的iPad，这是我们每年夏天都会做的事情。尽管今年情况特殊，但我们仍在这样做，以确保下一学年的教学应用软件的使用。”张女士说道。

对张女士和她的团队来说，工作不止于此，他们还必须为新员工做好准备。她补充说: “我们仍然需要为老师和学生建立和维护电子邮件账户。”

随着暑期课程的上线，IT团队也一直在线待命，帮助老师和家长解决他们在Teams、Seesaw和Zoom等平台上遇到的技术难题。

现在学校的开学日期已经正式公布，9月1日起，学生们将陆续重返校园。校务部的主要任务就是维护和升级新学年师生们将使用的学校空间。校务部主管王京洁女士告诉我们，他们翻修了学校最受欢迎的A操场，学生们会在这里花很多时间做体育运动，在休息时间和朋友们一起玩。此外，其他区域也进行了改造，教室和其他公共区域也重新进行了粉刷。

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尽管在翻修期间，学校的物理空间受到了很大的关注，这是我们想为学生创造的动态的、有组织的、有吸引力的学习环境所必需的，但他们的健康和安全在今年夏天仍然是最重要的。“在疫情完全结束之前，我们将继续上学期的做法。”王女士表示。“在进入学校之前，我们会询问工作人员的身体健康情况，并对他们进行两次体温检测，对他们的手和鞋底进行消毒，确保所有师生身体健康，以正常的体温进入学校。”她补充道。

新冠肺炎疫情防控工作还包括对所有校车、学习社区、校园设施和设备进行彻底清洁和消毒，同时保持包括酒精洗手液、N95口罩、测温帐篷、标牌和清洁材料等防疫物品的供应。

随着教职工陆续返回中国，我们期待着重新回到校园的生活!