I’ve been an English teacher for 11 years, and have taught pupils from all over the world, from London to Bogota to Moscow. Teaching is my passion, and I have enjoyed every second of every lesson throughout that time. Nothing in life brings me more pleasure than seeing my pupils throw themselves into a new topic, or seeing the spark of understanding ignite as one of my pupils masters a tricky concept or new technique.
After spending 4 years as the Head of Intensive English and Head of Years 7&8 at our sister-school in Wycombe Abbey Changzhou, I moved to WASHK in August 2021 to open up Key Stage 3 as we expand into secondary education. I’m very proud to be a member of the WASHK community.
Andrew Parr
Head of Key Stage 3
Year 8 Form Tutor
It is a pleasure every day to be surrounded by wonderful and dedicated teachers, to work with our fantastic Key Stage 3 team, and most all to be able to play a part in helping our outstanding pupils reach their full potential.
For me, education is about so much more than just learning facts and figures. Education means helping children to develop into the best, most well-rounded version of themselves that they can become. One of the key facets of this is learning to take responsibility for yourself and those around you.
This is hugely important for all children of course, but especially for our Key Stage 3 pupils at WASHK, many of whom will shortly be taking the enormous step of moving by themselves to another country as they take up offers at some of the best boarding schools in the UK and beyond.
I am a firm believer that the best way to have children take responsibility for themselves and their actions, is to give them responsibility.
Andrew Parr explaining to parents
ECA for UK School applications
That’s why I have made it one of my goals for Key Stage 3 to create as many opportunities as possible for our pupils to take responsibility into their own hands, whether it be for themselves, their classmates, the school community or even their role in the world as a whole.
Responsibility around School
One of the key ways we have done this is by creating positions of responsibility for our pupils. This year we introduced Key Stage 3 Class Prefects. These pupils, chosen by their peers and teachers, take charge of several important tasks. Day to day, they assist with keeping an eye on behaviour in their classes, reminding pupils of the importance of neat uniform and speaking English. At the end of lunch break it is their job to make sure all pupils are lined up and ready to return to class.
They also act as a liaison between the pupils and teachers, making sure the pupils have a voice in several aspects of school life. Beyond that, they have also done a fantastic job helping out with school events, notably acting as ushers during our Autumn Parent-Teacher Conference. Thanks to their work, the whole event ran very smoothly, with parents greeted at the entrance and shown to where they needed to go.
It’s not easy to hold a position of authority at a young age, but I’ve been delighted with the way that all of our prefects have stepped up to the task. They have taken their positions extremely seriously, and shown great fairness, vigilance and leadership in everything they have done – skills which I’m sure they’ll call on time and time again throughout their lives.
Best of all, they have done it with a smile on their faces. As a Year 6 Prefect Sophie told me, ‘I enjoyed helping out in the school community, like taking people to the right classrooms on parent teacher conferences. I felt needed and important. I’ve always wanted to be the best person I could be. Being prefect helped me achieve that.’
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