Parent Survey Summary

MSF SURVEY RESULTS

Dear Parents! Thank you so much once again for completing the survey and sharing your thoughts with us. We appreciate your praise, as well as your suggestions for improvement! We looked at each and every comment, and we share with you some of the action we will be taking in order to address the feedback received from our community.

KEY HIGHLIGHTS Based on your feedback, we are excited to be introducing new initiatives to MSF. Keep a lookout for…

Community based working groups developing food and logistics,

The MSF Pinboard - a community, ‘classifieds’ style, noticeboard on Facebook, Curriculum and skills fact sheets available via the Parent Zone, Subject-based organigram via the Parent Zone, And so much more!

Responses are categorised by:

Curriculum & Learning School Parent relationships​ & information Services & resources What you had to say

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CURRICULUM & LEARNING YOUR FEEDBACK / SUGGESTIONS

WHAT WE WILL DO

Publish school rankings

We will publish the results of MSF assessments (IB, IGCSE, ISA etc.) on our website. MSF does not receive a specific place ranking from these international assessments.

Tutoring

We have created a closed MSF forum on Facebook - “MSF Pinboard” to publish info on tutoring opportunities and availability. We will also provide website addresses for finding an external tutor. We encourage you to ​join the forum​ and post your request or offer there!

Wider sports range and availability

More clubs and club ideas (especially ICT - robotics, coding, gaming)

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We are working on broadening our sports programme in Primary and Secondary. More information in January!

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We are working on creating two gyms available to students - one outdoor on the roof, one indoor behind the sportshall

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We are working on our new offer, broadening the number and scope of our clubs.

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We will publish the list and the schedule of all clubs and schedules available in the next semester on our website in January.

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Students can sign up for an unlimited number of clubs!

EY Holiday Programme

We have spoken to the EY Parent reps as this year there has been a higher demand in holiday programme places than in any other year. Due to stricter regulations regarding class mixing, it is even more challenging to cater for all families and allow teachers to have a well-deserved break. We have found a solution for the winter holidays. Another brainstorming will happen with interested families and Ms Clearman and Ms Henkel on how to address this need going forward that works for the school and families.

There is too much/not enough homework.

We will publish a fact sheet and video explaining our approach to homework within the PYP and Secondary programmes.

Updating Secondary curriculum

There is a curriculum review cycle for all subject areas. The Secondary ICT curriculum will be reviewed as part of this cycle, taking into consideration pedagogical developments in this field and

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feedback from the community.

Intense IGCSE programme

We will publish a video explaining the IGCSE programme and how MSF is adapting this programme to better suit our needs.

Opportunity for students to In collaboration with teachers and the student council, divisional leaders will look at how students can give feedback to teachers offer meaningful, constructive feedback to teachers in an annual reflection process.

Teacher Evaluation

MSF has a process in place for teacher evaluation. We offer regular feedback meetings with the divisional leader and annual appraisal meetings for staff members with specific goal setting regarding their professional and personal growth and discuss professional development opportunities according to school and teacher needs.

Specific curriculum information at MSF

Subject briefs will be added to Managebac and the parent zone, beginning with IB DP and IGCSE. Following this, Middle school and Primary subject briefs will be added. Additional subject specific videos will also be shared throughout the year.

Parents are encouraged to sign up for the information zoom sessions communicated in Notes to Parents. Please let your divisional leader / parent reps know if there are specific topics you would like to attend.

Teaching specific skills to students: public speaking, conflict management, time management and good study habits.

We will run a series of student workshops on each of these and other relevant subjects through the student advisory system. The presentations will be shared with parents via Notes to Parents. The schedule will be published in the new year. Please follow our announcements on MSF Pinboard if you are ready to lead one of these workshops!

SCHOOL PARENT RELATIONSHIPS & INFORMATION Communication with teachers and leadership during COVID-19

Communication regarding current Covid19 cases will be shared with the community through Community Updates. Each division has a process in place on how to communicate within the division and to the relevant families. The most recent information can always be found on our ​MSF Covid19 Website.​ Parents may also make use of our email ​corona@msf.education​ for their corona-specific questions and when waiting for / reporting a test result.

Communication on COVID

We haven’t had any new cases since our last report. We will inform our community through a

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cases

community update if we have a new case. For data protection reasons we will only inform you that a member of the MSF community has tested positive for Covid-19, we will not give out any names or whether the person affected is a student or staff member. Only those in the immediate ‘bubble’ will be informed about the particular class where it took place. If you have not received this specific information, it means that your class is not affected. Our ‘bubble’ and hygiene strategy has proved successful to date and we have had only isolated cases so far with no spread.

Clear roles and responsibilities

At the start of each academic year and when there is an update, we inform parents via managebac of any updates in staffing, roles and responsibilities. We will publish our organigram with roles and responsibilities in the Parent Zone.

Too many channels of communication

We start working on our own app, which will have all our communications in one place. Be patient, it will take some time!

Getting too many Seesaw / Storypark Notifications? You can change your notification settings and thus the volume of emails through our online portfolio platforms Storypark and Seesaw, please follow the processes explained on the​ Storypark ​and S ​ eesaw ​websites.

Invite parents to share their success stories

We have created a section called “MSF Stars” on our YouTube channel. Here we publish interviews, success stories and recommendations of the outstanding members of our community - students, teachers, alumni - and now also parents! Stay tuned for the interview with one of our parents representing BioNTech - the company which developed the vaccine against COVID! If you are ready to share your own story, offer an internship or provide mentoring to our students - please share your availability on the MSF Pinboard on Facebook!

University information

We will publish the table of the university acceptances as well as the map of where our alumni study at the moment on our ​website​. For information about how the government converts IB grades to Abitur equivalents, parents are encouraged to review the KMK official documentation on this subject: https://www.kmk.org/fileadmin/Dateien/pdf/ZAB/Hochschulzugang_Beschluesse_der_KMK/IB_Diploma_ 14.pdf​* (*please note this is an external process governed by ministry guidelines, not MSF). Ms. Dodier also added this ​informational flyer​ in our last Notes to Parents regarding university applications.

Assessing my child’s progress

In primary we report progress in a number of ways. Throughout the year there are fixed opportunities to meet with the teacher, twice a year we send home written reports and at least once per term, we post summative assessments (for unit, mathematics, language and some specialist subjects) to both Seesaw (the piece of work and feedback to the student) and Managebac (the grade assigned, relevant to

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the general expectations of that grade level). In addition to this, we regularly post anecdotal (written) feedback, on formative assessments, to both Seesaw and Managebac. There has been some disruption to this process over the last 10 months, caused by the changes we have had to make due to Corona.

However, this system should again run as normal in 2021.

In Secondary, grades of both formative and summative assessments are regularly posted by teachers in ManageBac. Grades are entered as soon as the work has been assessed, but NOT before the students have gotten back their work, so that they understand their relative strengths and weaknesses at the same time that they receive their grade.

SERVICES & RESOURCES Quality of lunch

Facilities

Parking & buses

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We have changed suppliers several times in recent years. In order to upgrade our lunch offer we are now looking into the opportunity to cook fresh food in-house. This would allow us to provide vegan options and be even more flexible in addressing allergies. We are creating a working group where you as parents are invited to join and discuss solutions. Please ​fill in the form ​if you would like to join the group or just share your ideas! ●

Bathrooms in the Early Years: we are gradually renovating the bathrooms and the ventilation system in the Early Years division. Due to the lockdown in spring, the project had to be postponed to 2021. During the spring holidays in April 2021, the bathrooms next to KG Butterflies will be renovated.

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As part of our logistics working group, we will look at removing the stone garden next to the Early Years entrances, making this space into something more green and user-friendly

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As part of Parental Involvement in the Early Years, we have invited interested families to a brainstorming and working group to bring the outdoor kitchen back to life. The meeting will be in December for work to finish the project before springtime.

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In the long-term, MSF would like to add a theatre, woodworking & design studios to our buildings.

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Our CAS students/Eco-Committee are working on a plan to make MSF more green and sustainable and receive an eco-status for the school!

We start a working group on logistics, “Logistics to/from MSF” to discuss solutions to all issues related to traffic and logistics. Please​ fill in the form ​if you would like to join or just share your suggestions!

SOME OF YOUR QUOTES WHICH WARMED OUR HEARTS “​The school has proved to be beyond my expectations in all areas. I hope it will keep doing that.”

“We are very happy to be a part of the MSF family” “I know it is tough time for school that they can not offer what they could before (due to COVID19), but I strongly appreciate the school is trying to do the best to keep friendly and safe atmosphere for children and teachers and keep updating to parents on what is going on, as we can not visit the school building anymore. Thank you so much for your extraordinary effort.”

“I really like the concept of MSF and the team who's living and being able to execute that. All of you provide a family feeling to my son and challenge him. To my mind what you do is the best education I can offer to my son”.

“We are very happy with the school and the best teachers. :) We feel very close to MSF now, and it feels like a second home for our child.”

Thank you all for being so incredible and supportive and for helping us to improve!

Looking forward to exceeding your expectations, MSF

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