A long-term partnership agreement between New Taipei Municipal HaiShan High School and Trinity School in London has been finalised, thanks to the efforts of the Education Division at the Taipei Representative Office in the UK in conjunction with Taiwanese teachers working in the UK, in particular Ms Lin Pei-Shu. It was signed on April 22, 2015. The Trinity School of John Whitgift, known as Trinity School, is an independent day school for boys, with a history going back to the late 16th century.

On the day the agreement was signed, the headmaster, Mr Mark Bishop and Ms Lin Pei-Shu, the head Chinese teacher there first accompanied Mrs Hsu Mei-Ling, the principal of HaiShan High School, and Mr Ouyang Yen-Heng, the director of the Education Division, on a tour of the campus and facilities. He outlined Trinity School’s history and tradition, as well as its modern approaches to education. Some of the many positive aspects include a broad, balanced and varied curriculum, an impressive range of extra-curricular activities, and well-organised, modern facilities, and dedicated-use spaces. The language courses, for example, have a specific zone where educators teach English to students using activities incorporating opera, musical theatre, and other singing genres. Chinese, German, French and Spanish are all offered as elective courses for students.

Mr Bishop and Mrs Hsu are delighted to establish a long-term and stable partnership between their two schools and excited by the future possibilities. Both expressed the hope that the partnership would benefit their students’ learning of foreign languages, and expand their horizons. Details of the student-visit programme are still being developed, but Mr Bishop and Mrs Hsu have discussed a range of ideas and expectations.

This agreement is the most recent between a secondary school in Taiwan and one in the UK and is another good example of the practicability of similar international partnerships around the world. Mr Ouyang believes that the language benefits available and the willingness of Taiwanese high school principals to enter into partnership agreements with primary and secondary schools in the UK will definitely lead to more being established. There are already many successful cases serving as models and the Education Division is happy to assist interested schools make contact.

Photo: L-R: Ouyang Ken-Heng; Hsu Mei-Ling, Mark Bishop, and Lin Pei-Shu, and the partnership agreement signed between Trinity School and New Taipei Municipal HaiShan High School.