SEV Connect - Kış 2018

CONNECT KIŞ 71 Department welcoming some of my former students into the department. It was easy for me to have them as colleagues. They understood the ethos of the school and what was expected of an ACI English teacher. What was not so easy for these ex-students was to call me by the right name – not ‘Mrs Özbay’ their teacher, but ‘Helen’, their fellow professional. Once they could do that, I knew all would be well! It is with pleasure that I see graduates taking on roles of responsibility in their own school. I was very fortunate to lead a team of hardworking, creative teachers in the English Department. Everything we achieved, every success, was because of our shared passion to give the students the best education possible, whether we were Turkish, American, Canadian, British, South African, or Australian. We went beyond the traditional lecture style of lessons and developed projects that reinforced not just students’ English skills but their teamwork, their creativity, their critical thinking and their problem-solving ability. These are all proficiencies that are now at the top of the list of ‘Future Skills’ for young people. We took students outside the school walls for debate in the Odeon at Ephesus, Romeo and Juliet in the ancient Agora, an Arts and Literature festival and a Poetry License day at Erythria, Myths and Legends at Metropolis and Teos, Oedipus Uncensored in Ephesus. No ancient site within an hour’s drive of Izmir was safe from our performances! There were other teaching miracles, too. Imagine every Prep student busy writing down sights and sounds in the crowded Kemeraltı Bazaar, every Lise 1 enjoying ensemble work with their Artist in Residence, every Lise 2 student coming to school in the evening to celebrate Shakespeare Night, every Lise 3 student performing an original reinterpretation of Macbeth, every senior student working on their film for the ACI Film Festival, and every student reading the same novel during our community-wide reading weeks. The first book the whole school read together was by Agatha Christie and the prize for solving our own ‘Murder in the Library’ mystery was afternoon tea for the winning students at the Pera Palace Hotel! And then there were the weeks when we dressed as characters from our reading books or made literary scarecrows that peered out of bushes, dangled from trees and surveyed us from rooftops all over the campus. Great teamwork and great memories for everyone. We also took the school motto “Enter to learn; depart to serve” and made it part of our activities. Whether it was raising money for schools, hospitals, earthquake disasters, funding disabled athletes or student-designed micro-projects in the local community, we found ways to make a difference. One social service project that we repeated several times was inspired by a visit to a children’s hospital where the nurses told me that the children needed soft toys. A teacher designed a simple pattern for a doll and armed with material and stuffing, needle and thread and a novel the students began. Sewing the material to create the doll was the easy part of the challenge, making the doll look like a character from literature was a little harder! Over the years we gave away 2,000 dolls to children in hospital. An achievement to be proud of! Again my kaleidoscope of memories revolves and takes me back to the early eighties when I was one of the teachers taking our graduating students (and my six-month old baby) to the east of Turkey. It was a true learning experience for us all. We visited towns and villages like Kars and Ani, Van and Akdamar Island, Diyarbakır and its famous walls - sites that in those days rarely saw tourists. Another memory skips me back into this century and the delight of hosting the first group of students from our sister school in Athens, Pierce College, for a theatre festival. The kaleidoscope of colours shift again and I see movement and music and characters on screen – so many clever, unforgettable films created by senior students who were also busy studying for their university exams. My first question nowadays, to reconnect with a graduate from a few years ago, is ‘Which filmwere you in?’ Their answer always brings back shared memories. A friend once pointed out that it would be impossible for me to leave Izmir secretly as every plane I board, every passenger lounge I sit in, or baggage carousel I wait at also has a graduate or two to greet me! I am always delighted to learn that these graduates are now doctors, film producers, professors, heads of NGOs, artists, architects, engineers, entrepreneurs, web designers…a myriad of careers and success stories. Now that I am not tied to a daily work schedule, I have the luxury of time. I can visit my family and friends in Istanbul, London, Paris, Amsterdam, and San Francisco or explore further afield. I can spend all day reading a novel or concentrate on writing my next book. I’ve already co-authored a travel memoir - not yet available in Turkish, unfortunately - about the surprising and humorous events I experienced keeping horses and riding around the countryside near Izmir. Now I’m ready to write again, so I’m busy looking for a few more adventures!