2017 CIPTC Annual Review Meeting and Award Ceremony

Updated 2017-12-24 (Read full article)


A Day in the life of Mr. Higgins – Mr. Liam Higgins is a Foreign Teacher at Xin’anhu Primary School. He felt good today because he got the successful teaching progress email telling him he was upgraded to Level II last night. He was very happy after getting this e-mail and decided to celebrate immediately, but he didn’t know that there were more surprises waiting for him.

On December 22, about 300 Foreign Teachers from different districts came together to attend the CIPTC Annual Review Meeting. Today’s meeting was hosted by Ray from Human Resources Team. His relaxed and humorous hosting made filled the meeting with a pleasant atmosphere. Liang Zhaowu, the director of CIPTC, made an annual report. He recalled the history of the development of CIPTC. From 2012 to 2017, CIPTC kept making progress by establishing teaching areas in the Futian, Luohu, Longgang, Yantian, and Bao’an Districts. Whether it was the cooperation in international curricula or the international exchange, CIPTC continued to expand its business, going forward continually. Even though Mr. Higgins learned some Chinese, understanding such an annual report was still a bit difficult for him. But don’t worry, because Bill Lee, who is in charge of Teaching Quality Management, translated the Chinese words to English for the Foreign Teachers. Well done, Bill!

After the Annual Business Report, came the Award Ceremony. First, it was the Special Contribution Awards, which was presented to eleven Mentors from the CIPTC. The Mentor Program is one of the education and teaching systems created by CIPTC. This system guarantees that a new teacher will not be overwhelmed by the lesson planning and teaching responsibilities when they first come to China to work for CIPTC’s clients. These mentors have expert teaching experience who will lead them continuously. Mentors review Mentee lesson plan, observe and assess their mentees’ classes and continuously give feedback. The existence of mentor system is ultimately to improve the teaching quality of Foreign Teachers in CIPTC and has done very well in meeting this goal. As expected, Mr. Higgins’s mentor, Amanda Beepath, won one of these awards.

After the Special Contribution Award, the next was Star Teacher Award. The Star Teacher Award is based on the recommendation of the school and other comprehensive considerations, including teaching skills, school’s feedback etc. Last night, Mr. Higgins knew he was already a Level II Teacher, but he did not expect he would get the Star Teachers Award. In fact, this was the third time that his school to recommended him as a Star Teacher. However, because of the fierce competition, he did not get the award previously. This time, after careful consideration, Mr. Higgins finally got this award. Including Mr. Higgins, Mr. Ruddock from JingTian Primary School, Ms. Lesperance from Xianyi Foreign Language School and Mr. Palmer from Tianjian Primary School also received Star Teachers Awards. Congratulations, Star Teachers!

We praised the excellent job of these outstanding Foreign Teachers and at the same time, we also gave Loyalty Awards to the Foreign Teachers who have worked at CIPTC for many years. CIPTC gave a bonus of 10,000 yuan for each teacher who worked here more than five years, 8000 yuan for more than four years, and so on. This year,CIPTC took out 500,000 yuan to reward Foreign Teachers who have been loyally working here for a long time.

After the Loyalty Award, it was the Level Certificate, which Mr. Higgins was expecting. Successfully, Mr. Higgins got his Level II certificate and is now on his way to becoming a valued Level III teacher. Good job, Mr. Higgins!

However, for Mr. Higgins, the surprise was not over. Other than the Star Teacher and the Level II certificates, this year, CIPTC awarded the “Buddy Program Volunteer” Certificate. The “Buddy” Program was also created by CIPTC. If the mentor system is to help the new teachers in teaching, the Buddy Program is designed to help the new recruits adjust to their daily life in Shenzhen. Being a member of the Buddy Program, Mr. Higgins, again, was asked to come to the stage to receive another certificate. This was the third time for Mr. Liam Higgins got a certificate! Definitely, he was the MVP in that room.

It was easy to find Mr. Higgins in that room that day, but in fact, Mr. Higgins’s school is very hard to find because his school is in a community. However, there is an old saying in China: Good wine can be found even in a hidden alley. Mr. Higgins received three certificates at the annual meeting, which was inseparable from his own efforts. Liam loves teaching, is always full of enthusiasm, communicates with the mentors to constantly improve his teaching skills, participates in training activities, and is open to helping others. Mr. Higgins is a new teacher here, but he is also a fine representative of the Guo Pei Ren (CIPTC People). As the pioneer in the field of service to Foreign Teachers, CIPTC does not seek to be young forever, but CIPTC will be always full of enthusiasm.

After the annual meeting, the Winter Holiday Party began. This was a long-awaited event for Foreign Teachers. They enjoyed eating, dancing, singing and more at the party. In the middle of the festivities, two students dressed in school uniforms, came to the stage joining them in the fun. One of the Foreign Teachers picked up the Microphone pointing at the kids and said to everyone: “They are the reason why we came here!”

Thanks for the hard work to all of the Foreign Teachers and all of the staff at CIPTC. The title of “CIPTC” brought us all together. In the new year, Guo Pei Ren (CIPTC Family) will continue to overcome any obstacle and working hard to further the internationalization of education in Shenzhen.

Credit: CIPTC Shenzhen. Check out full article here.

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