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Hello, my name is Mr David Bates and I am the Course Director here at Whitgift Summer School as well as the Director of International Education at Whitgift. I am delighted to be writing this blog post and to be sharing with you what I think is one of the best things about Whitgift Summer School: its cultural diversity.

It is testament to the global reach of Whitgift Summer School that during the last programme in 2019 we welcomed students from over 20 different countries who studied alongside boys English-speaking students from Whitgift School and girls from Old Palace of John Whitgift School. This means that each week we have around 150 boys and girls from all four corners of the globe who are enrolled on our programme.

This rich diversity of backgrounds is something that we have prioritised and cultivated since the summer school was launched back in 2015. It has afforded a wealth of opportunities for students to develop their awareness of others and practise their softer skills such as humility, empathy and communication skills.
It also provides an opportunity to make friends and connections with peers from all over the world and with the support of our caring staff, everyone who takes part inevitably does.

Environments such as Whitgift Summer School, which are enhanced by different religions, races, cultural backgrounds, afford learners the chance to grow a wider global perspective. Being aware of a variety of lifestyles and outlooks provide students with an advantage in making independent and more flexible choices about their own paths.

In fact, we ensure that no more 15% of the students attending the summer school originate from any one country. This not only ensures a vibrant, exciting and culturally diverse community, it also helps promote English as the lingua franca on the campus, something extremely important and beneficial in this immersive English and academic programme.  

With the addition of the summer IB preparation course to Whitgift Summer School, the programme is changing slightly, but the focus on cultural diversity certainly is not. In fact, the opposite is true! By incorporating a different aspect to our summer programme, we will be even more diverse in our thinking and doing. Specifically, this has led to us redesigning our afternoon project-based lesson. These lessons will continue to be run in the same way, but the content will be a little different, with a greater focus on IB topics and themes. This this shift towards the IB curriculum has brought the importance of cultural understanding and acceptance to the forefront of our thoughts.

The overall aim of the IB programme is to: 'Develop internationally minded people who, recognizing their common humanity and shared guardianship of the planet, help to create a better and more peaceful world'.  If we dig a little deeper into IB learner attributes valued by IB World Schools, you will see the themes of global-mindedness and betterment referenced again and again. I paraphrase some of the key points here “engaging with issues and ideas that have global signi­ficance, acting with respect for the dignity and rights of people everywhere, critically appreciating the values and traditions of others, making a positive difference to the lives of others and in the world around us, recognizing our interdependence with the world in which we live, and thoughtfully considering the world and our own ideas and experience”

I believe this mirrors what we have been achieving each year since the summer school began in 2015; the creation of a global village in which students learn something new about the world in which they live in, accept difference and become more well-rounded individuals. One of the ways in which we facilitate this, is my ensuring that all students share a room with a student from a different nationality and language. We have always felt that this leads to a better student experience; students are more likely to participate in every area of the programme as they make new friends and gain more self-confidence

Another way in which we foster a sense of community is through our fantastic student hosts.  These students who come from Whitgift School and Old Palace of John Whitgift, are integral to the summer school. Not only do they know the school inside out, which enables the visiting students to immediately feel part of the wider Whitgift community, but they also are extremely keen to make new friends from around the world and learn about different cultures. Having this cross-cultural exchange is a joy to behold and benefits both the international students and the English ones too.

As a leading IB World School, these are outward-looking actions and outlooks that Whitgift staff strive to engender in all our students, be they year-round pupils or short course students.  There is no doubt that the promotion of cultural understanding and diversity has been under threat in recent years in this increasingly polarised world. However, Whitgift School is an outward-looking school with a truly global reach and reputation, and we are greatly looking forward to welcoming international students from all over the world onto our short courses in 2021.