Dear Parents,

After a well-earned winter break, the APEEE would like to welcome you back to school— even if only remotely for the moment. We hope that you were able to relax over the holidays and have been able to re-charge for the months still ahead under pandemic conditions.

You find below our Winter Edition of the APEEE NewsFlash, an update on current events, recent successes and ongoing issues of interest for families at EEBI. We take this opportunity to welcome our 2021 Board, with several new members elected at the General Assembly in December 2020. At the same time, we feel fortunate to be continuing into 2021 with the same Bureau of APEEE Officers, who have proven a strong and cohesive team. With the new year, the APEEE is also taking on a new “look” - see the report below on our new logo.

Finally, learn about several APEEE-funded projects, including one innovative response to an unprecedented situation...and read the heart-warming results of our December fund-raising efforts to bring St. Nicholas sachets to local hospital workers — EEBI families raised almost 6000 EUR in a few short days! For this and other interesting news, we invite you to grab a coffee and read on...

Wishing a very happy new year to you and your loved ones!

Kind regards,

Kathryn Máthé
APEEE President

New Logos of APEEE and APEEE Services unveiled

We are pleased to announce that new logos have been developed for the EEBI APEEE and the APEEE Services; these will be in use from January 2021 onwards on our website, stationary (mailings) and official signatures.

APEEE’s new logo:

APEEE Services’ new logo:

Many of you might straight away recognise that we kept the visual of the tree from our old logos, as a reference to the past/history. Nevertheless, we hope that you will find the new logos more fresh, dynamic and all in all more modern than the old ones.

To help people differentiate the two logos from each other, we have chosen two different sets of colours (warm/cold) and we also emphasised the words “APEEE” and “Services” respectively. This way we hope to be able to visualise the difference more clearly between these two independent entities – the APEEE a.i.s.b.l. (which represents the voice of parents) and the APEEE Services a.s.b.l. (that provides services to the students) – more clearly than before. The tree in the APEEE logo represents the parents sustaining the community/network of other parents as well as the children. The tree in the logo of the APEEE Services contains leaves of 5 different colours, each representing a service: 1. Canteen & Cafeteria, 2. Transport, 3. Périscolaire Uccle, 4. Périscolaire Berkendael, and 5. Lockers.

The new logos were developed by the APEEE Communications Team in cooperation with the APEEE Services.

Issues and Positions: recent developments

The APEEE follows and reacts on a number of complex issues over the long term.  Here is an update of the main subjects which have kept us busy over the past months.

COVID-19 Update

The APEEE launched its COVID-19 Update page in October 2020 in response to parent requests for a “one-stop shop” for current communication from EEBI management on COVID-19. We have recently streamlined and restructured the page creating an archive so parents can see previous as well as up-to-date information. See: COVID-19 Update.

Enrolment 2021-2022

The first phase of enrolment for the 2021-2022 school year will open on Monday, 11 January. Families with siblings, Berkendael families wishing to transfer, or those applying for the first time should remember that they are required to apply during the first phase. (Later phases are limited almost solely to those entering employment with the European Institutions after 1 January 2021.) The final deadline for first-phase enrolment is Friday, 29 January, but don’t wait until the last minute!

We are happy to say that after a hard-fought battle, this year families with P5 pupils in classes at Berkendael will not have to submit an application but instead will be automatically enrolled for their secondary education--French and German pupils at EEBI-Uccle, Latvian pupils as SWALS at EEBII; and Slovak pupils as SWALS at EEBIII. French and German pupils wishing to attend a school other than EEBI will retain the right to apply for priority transfer based on a ranking of the four schools; the final decision will still be subject to available space at the different sites. (Please note, in choosing to apply for a transfer, these families give up their automatic right to Uccle.)

For more information, please visit: https://www.eursc.eu/en/European-Schools/enrolments/enrolment-policy-Brussels-ES/2021-2022.

Future of the Brussels Schools

The four Brussels APEEEs have worked closely, particularly in the framework of the Brussels Steering Group (Groupe de Suivi), to monitor the overcrowding in the Brussels Schools, the state of play on the fifth school (now promised only by 2028) and the temporary measures taken while we await longer-term solutions. We continue to call for long-term strategic planning by the Central Office in cooperation with the Commission and Board of Governors.

In September 2021, we look forward to the opening of the temporary primary site at Evere, which will be attached to EEBII and populated by new families enrolling in the French section and likely in the English, German, Italian and possibly Dutch sections as well — a development which promises to impact primary classes in these sections at the existing sites. At the same time, Berkendael will be more closely attached to Uccle, with students in French, German, English, Italian and Spanish classes guaranteed the right to secondary education at EEBI when they finish P5 (see Enrolment 2021-2022 above).

Even with these developments, systemic problems remain. These are well highlighted in the 13 November Call to End the Prolonged Critical Overcrowding of the Brussels European Schools drafted by the Staff Committees in cooperation with the four APEEEs, trade unions and AdP (Associations des parents – creches / garderies) to the presidents of the European Institutions and Secretary General of the European Schools. See also: Issues and Positions - Future of the Brussels Schools.

Pedagogical Continuity and Distance Learning

The APEEE has been following the question of pedagogical continuity under COVID-19 since lockdown began in March 2020.  As we enter a new phase, we are pleased to announce that the European School Board of Governors approved a systemwide Distance Teaching and Learning Policy - 2020-09-D-10 v3 at its meeting in December 2020.  This policy, developed by the Central Office’s Pedagogical Unit in close cooperation with INTERPARENTS and other stakeholders, provides key guidance to management and ensures that students across the system receive the same standard of distance education.

At the same time, the APEEE is urging the school management to develop a local Distance Learning Strategy clearly laying out the distance learning regime followed by our teachers under each scenario.  The APEEE continues to engage with the school on its response to COVID-19 and has recently released Parent Feedback Reports on Primary and Secondary Distance Learning in Autumn 2020 at Uccle and Berkendael, among other things. See: Issues and Positions - COVID-19.

2021 Baccalaureate

Given families’ well-justified concerns over the 2020 Baccalaureate and the late-in-the-day decision to moderate results, we are closely following contingency planning on the 2021 Baccalaureate. Current changes to the rules allow exams to be given online, but importantly, traditional in situ exams — even with changes in the timing or locale — will be privileged by school management. It is notable that this year there will be no requirement for all European Schools to follow the same approach to exams, which means in practice that we will not be impacted by the state of the pandemic in other countries or schools.  The Central Office recently circulated a memorandum on the state-of-play, and the secondary management has kept S7 parents well apprised of recent developments at the higher levels; parents have appreciated the timely information.

Child Protection

The school has recently called a stakeholder working group to develop an EEBI Child Protection Policy, covering issues related to physical infrastructure and staffing but also providing a framework for important safety and well-being structures, programmes and policies (e.g. Drug and Addiction Prevention, Internet Safety, Anti-Bullying, etc.). The APEEE is heartened by this new development as the work is long overdue. See: Issues and Positions - Child Protection Policy.

Three new projects receive APEEE funding

In recent years the APEEE has established a practice to award funding to school-related projects, with the aim to promote objectives such as creating friendly and innovative indoor and outdoor spaces, supporting healthy mind and body awareness, fostering the use of digital technologies or promoting sustainability and green initiatives, etc.

For our Autumn 2020 Call for Projects launched in October, the APEEE Board selected the following three projects for funding (out of 17 applications):

1. “Calm Room” – Providing a space for Primary students from all Sections, where children, especially those with specific needs, can relax and find a refuge during the break times. Project leader: V. Szewczuk, School Psychologist, EEBI Uccle Nursery and Primary. APEEE funding: 300 EUR, on the condition that the school agrees to provide a dedicated space. Delivery date: June 2021.
2. “Well Being Conferences” – Raising awareness among parents and pupils about topics of interest, through online conferences: safe internet and challenges/risks of social media, cyberbullying, affection and sexuality, mental health, mindfulness during COVID, challenges of adolescence. Project leader: S. Dagostini, Parent. APEEE funding: 1500 EUR. Delivery date: June 2021.
3. “Parents in TEAMS – E-Quipping Parents for Distance Education” – Arming parents with the know-how of distance/hybrid learning and of the changing educational modes and methodologies via online training sessions on Microsoft TEAMS for education, tailored to our system. Project leader: K. Máthé, Parent. APEEE funding: 1200 EUR. Delivery date: January 2021.

The APEEE runs periodic calls for project proposals, and we invite all members of the community to consider applying. The APEEE’s next Call for Projects is expected to be announced in May 2021. See: Funding of Projects.

This month’s featured project

E-Teaching: Peer Training Pilot Project for Secondary School Science Teachers

In early September, Uccle secondary science teachers ran the first of several peer training sessions to bring MS OneNote and TEAMS Class Notebook into their teaching.  The sessions were part of the APEEE funded project “E-Teaching: Peer Training Pilot Project for Secondary School Science Teachers” led by Máire Mairtin and Marie Butler, English section science teachers.

APEEE funded the purchase of 21 Wacom Intuous graphics/stylus tablets for use in online teaching; these have been made available for long-term loan to all science teachers taking part in the ePeerTraining workshops. Each Wacom tablet can be hooked up to any laptop or workstation and enables the use of a stylus so that teachers can accompany their lectures with manual notes online. In this way, they can use OneNote through TEAMS in streamed classes or even in situ with smart boards.

As Ms Mairtin explains, the tablets are a means to an end...more important is for science (and eventually maths) teachers to familiarise themselves with the OneNote-based TEAMS Class Notebook and to establish a community around new distance teaching methodologies. Together teachers can help each other overcome initial hurdles and can share ideas about how traditional science teaching practices can be translated into the online environment.

Ms Butler confirms that “For me personally, these meetings were more than just learning how to add more creative or effective ways of engaging our students online. They created a space for us as colleagues, across the many language sections, to share our many different ideas and resources. Also, they have given us the opportunity to develop smaller support groups, that will allow us continue to update our practices and go forward together in this ever changing and challenging but exciting world of education!”

See other Comments from Participating Teachers as well as a related 11 November communication on the Commission-sponsored TEAMS training for EEBI teachers: EUSA offers help to European School teachers ; Colleagues host remote teaching tips webinar.

The APEEE contributed 2000 EUR to this project.

Survey on Gifted Children

Below is the link to an online survey that aims to identify gifted children among our ranks.

Online Survey Form - Gifted Children

Gifted pupils have specific learning needs and may even require educational support. The Educational Support Policy of the European Schools and the EEBI Educational Support Guidelines both highlight the aim of the schools to develop specific educational programmes for gifted pupils. To contribute to this objective, the APEEE’s Gifted Children Network needs your help.

If you know that your child is gifted because he/she has been diagnosed via a specific test, or if you suspect your child could be gifted, we invite you to fill in the survey. The deadline for completing the survey is 31 January 2021.

For more information on gifted children and on the work of the Network, see: Working Groups - Educational Support and Gifted Children.

EEB1 Science Festival 2020

Following last year’s success, EEBI is once again organising its traditional Science Festival for secondary (S1-S7) students. Due to the current restrictions, this year’s Science Festival will exceptionally be held online.

At present, 25 groups have applied and submitted abstracts, 19 in the junior category and 6 in the senior category. They are currently working on recording video presentations of their scientific projects (max. 7 minutes), which students around the school will watch on the basis of their age and interest and vote on in the week of the Science Festival (11-15 January - corrected date). Responses to questions posed by peers and the jury will also be taken into account in the final judging.

Four kinds of Projects have been accepted this year: scientific experiment, research, inventions and vulgarisation of science. The jury will see all the projects and see how the participants have answered the questions. The finals will be announced on 22 January 2021. There will be valuable prizes!

Last year’s EEBI Science Festival – with 36 projects and 54 students participating, – was a particularly great success!  Thanks to the enthusiastic teachers and students, more than 1100 students visited the presentations on its day, which actually lasted for 8 hours. This year’s festival will certainly be different, but EEBI is currently the only European School running an event of this sort under current conditions.

As a parent testifies: “The Science Festival has been just great for my two scientifically-minded children who have taken part from early Secondary. When my daughter applied to university last year, having this experience gave her a lot to write about in personal statements and to fill in when asked about extracurricular activities. More importantly, it is just a really good way for kids to experience science or social science first hand”.

For more information, please visit: https://www.eeb1.com/en/projects/science-festival-2/.

EEB1 raises 6000 EUR for health workers’ St. Nicholas

EEBI raised 5941 EUR for the St. Nicholas action. The action provided 2,700 St. Nicholas sachets to staff across three hospitals: Molière, Ixelles and Bracops.  And Primary European Hours classes at Uccle were organised by Ms Marla Candon at amazing speed to produce enough pictures and decorations for all three staff canteens.  A really remarkable response.  The additional funds raised will be used to supply meals until the end of the year to the three hospitals.

We thank all EEBI parents who contributed so generously to this initiative!

EEB1 ranks 6^th in Vélomai Challenge 2020

Many of you must have heard or been part of the Vélomai competition, which promotes bicycling as a form of healthy and environmentally-friendly transport among the staff of the EU institutions and the European Schools’ community. Vélomai was launched five years ago by a group of EU institutions as part of a wider campaign to motivate people to use alternative means of transportation. A similar campaign, which focuses on the promotion of walking (the Walking Challenge), is happening in parallel.

This year, the competition took place between 9 EU institutions, 8 agencies, 16 EU delegations and 6 European schools, including EURSC as a body. EEBI ranked 6th among all the participating institutions, representing 891 rides, 5092 Km in distance, and 33 participants out of the 88 registered. The CO2 saved amounts to 662 Kg and the calories burnt 127311. The personal winner at EEBI this year with 108 rides and 333 Km is Dutch teacher Geertrui Van De Casteele, whom we warmly congratulate! The winning EURSC in 2020 is Alicante.

The concept of Vélomai is that the organisers created a Mobile Application where members of the EU institutions and schools can register. As soon as a person has registered, he/she becomes part of a specific team. In the case of EEBI, you could compete either as a student, or as a teacher or as a member of a language section. Once you have registered, you can upload information about your bike rides, the kilometres cycled and other specific information. The data will eventually add up and show such indicators as, for example, how many tonnes of CO2 you and your team have saved while riding.

For those of you who are not so motivated by competitions, there are many other activities that you as a registered user can participate in, as part of the Vélomai challenge: workshops, training courses and other events focusing on themes such as safe cycling, health benefits, repair or lunchtime bike ride with Greeter, e-biking etc.

If you have a valid European School account, you can download the App from Apple Store or Google Play and have a look! All data is available until the beginning of next year’s campaign. Congratulations again to all this year’s winners and participants, and let’s get ready for next year’s Vélomai challenge!

Fencing: EEB1 students shine in Belgian U17 Championship

EEBI students performed very well in the Belgian U17 Championship for Fencing which took place in Libramont on 10 October 2020.

Barnabás Ozsvárt (S5HU) won the silver medal and Nathan Richaud (S5FRd) ranked 10^th among 61 very good fencers.

Congratulations to both of them!

Meet the new APEEE Board and CE members

The new Administrative Board of the APEEE has been endorsed by the General Assembly (GA) at its 8 December 2020 Meeting. The Administrative Board (CA) of the APEEE is the second most significant body of the APEEE structure, after the General Assembly. The Board consists of 26 members for a mandate of two years. Their meetings are held monthly. The functions of the Board are to take governing decisions, policy positions and strategic actions on issues related to pedagogy, the school community, students’ health, safety and well-being. It supports classes, sections, parents/families facing difficulties, allocates funding and improves the communication between the parents and the school. The first meeting of the new Administrative Board of the APEEE took place on 17 December, followed by an online Christmas Party.

There are three Education Councils (CEs) at the EEBI (two in the Uccle site – for Maternelle/Primary and for Secondary – and one in the Berkendael site); they are whole-school bodies. Each one of them composes of 20-30 members, out of which 9-10 are representatives of the parents. The tasks of the CEs are to find the best conditions for effective teaching, to promote positive and stimulating human relations and to affirm the European character of the school. The CEs meet four times a year.

For the current list of elected members of the APEEE Administrative Board and of the EEBI Education Councils, see: Parent Representatives.

APEEE Activity Report looks back at 2019-2020

The APEEE’s Activity Report for 2019-2020 has been compiled and is now published on the APEEE website along with other documents from our General Assembly Meeting. The Activity Report covers the wide range of fields through which the APEEE took part in the life of the EEBI school community – in both Uccle and Berkendael – during the previous academic year. As APEEE President Kathryn Máthé points out in her introductory notes, the breakout of the COVID-19 pandemic had a huge impact on the work of the APEEE in 2019–2020.

Much of the parents’ effort was spent trying to better clarify their role vis a vis the school and their children’s education, and the APEEE endeavoured to find the most constructive way to convey the parents’ input and perspectives...and to work with the whole school community on practical solutions (esp. in digital learning, hygiene, and health and safety issues).

The 45-page Report contains in detail the APEEE’s participation in the governance of the school via the various councils and committees as well as the activities within its working groups, an overview of projects that were implemented and a short update on volunteer-run services. The final chapter includes the APEEE Treasurer’s report. As you will see, the life “before” and “after” COVID is reflected page after page in the Report. This sharp change in our activities was not a choice, but we hope that parents will feel that the APEEE has responded well to their needs and the needs of their children during this unusual period.

13 Stars Newspaper - Independent student newspaper of the 13 European Schools

The 13 Stars Newspaper is the independent student-run newspaper of the CoSup, the common student union of the European Schools; the paper welcomes all contributions from students from any of the 13 European Schools as well as from the Accredited European Schools and other International Schools, should there be interest.

This newspaper and communication platform was launched last year by the CoSup because student representatives thought that "Student journalism is essential for the cultivation of an informed, interconnected, digitally literate and politically active student body, and offers a pathway to becoming conscientious citizens of the EU. To combat the fragmentation between the European Schools is to make connections flourish between students of all the European Schools uninhibited on a common platform where ideas are exchanged freely without interference from any other stakeholders of the European Schools."

More than just a newspaper, it provides a platform for communication and institutional memory of the 13 student unions.  The site hosts a range of content; the EEB1 transparency project as well as news, articles related to the ES-wide Climate Academy/cut11percent.org to support climate action, hosted podcasts, and a link to the MyEEB1 app. It has published many high-profile articles, such as one on the Plea of the Locally Recruited Teachers in 2018.  Currently, the newspaper is hosting a writing competition for students to write about the most controversial event that has happened at their school.

Survey on an English theatre school

The Founder of The Bridge | An English Theatre for Brussels approached the APEEE to gauge the interest of EEBI parents in a weekend theatre school in English. The school would provide young people aged 10-18 with three hours of tuition in acting, singing and dance (one hour each).

If you are interested in the initiative, please feel free to answer the short anonymous survey below:

Online Survey Form - English Theatre

Please note, the APEEE does not promote any one group over another and would highlight that other English theatre groups, e.g. https://www.englishyouththeatre.be/, are also available.