In 1990, Dr Don Bergman replaced Kuhbander as the superintendent of the school. Bergman was somewhat different from his predecessors in that his primary administrative experience had been in overseas schools as high school principal at JIS and then as superintendent of the Nagoya International School. Bergman inherited a school whose challenges emanated from its success rather than its weaknesses. The school at Ulu Pandan was at capacity and had a waiting list. A growing expatriate community was once again testing the limits of what SAS could offer. The growth brought up important questions about the nature and future of the school. Predicting the future needs of SAS was a perilous task. The transient nature of the community and the changing nature of Singapore and its economic growth had on numerous occasions proved assumptions about the future to be wrong. Historically though, the optimists were the ones who had the largest legacies in the school and in Singapore.
As early as the late 1980s, the Board of Governors began to talk about expansion. Given the downturn of the mid 1980s, it is understandable that they followed a conservative approach. The biggest problem was in the lower grades, where there were waiting lists, and it was difficult for non-Americans to gain admittance. In the 1990-91 school year, the question of expansion and the future of the school took on a greater urgency. Where was the school to go from here now that it was at capacity? A short-term answer was the establishment of the BayTree satellite school to accommodate 125 children on the waiting list. BayTree campus was in a recreational club in the Clementi area. Squash courts were turned into classrooms, and Jack's Steak House became the cafeteria. The future of the school was not only of interest to the American community, it was important to the Singapore government. The land that the Ulu Pandan campus occupied was leased from the government, and as the lease approached its expiry date in 2003, the size and future of SAS was bound to be examined.
1990s - GROWTH & TRANSITION 175