Head’s Message
Head of School, Dr. Ted Spear
Welcome to Island Pacific School. We are a small, independent, gr. 6-9 middle school that has operated on Bowen Island for over sixteen years. Our students come from the local community, Vancouver, and around the world.
We operate on the basis of the following principles:
- That “Middle School Matters”, i.e. that during these crucial middle years, we can either lose students or set them up for the rest of their lives
- That education encompasses both academics and the development of character
- That teaching is, in part, a matter of initiating students into the great conversations of human inquiry
- That schools must not insult students’ intelligence but must instead stretch and challenge them on all fronts
- That students need specific opportunities to learn to take responsibility for themselves
- That small schools are very powerful sites in which to create an intentional educational community
- That our job as educators is to equip and inspire students to cultivate their humanity
The school expresses and realizes these principles by way of a number of core program elements including:
- The International Baccalaureate Middle Years Programme (MYP) which puts a premium on inquiry-based learning
- Special classes in reasoning, philosophy and ethics
- A grade 9 Masterworks program that requires students to complete—and publicly defend—a 15-30 page piece of independent research
- Hiking, sailing and kayaking expeditions (including a full “Discovery Week” in May)
- Monthly afternoon excursions to the art galleries, museums, theatre, universities, and work sites of Vancouver
- Monthly community service activities
- A cross-grade mentor system where older students look out for, and support, younger ones
- A House system that requires, among other things, that students clean the school
Every year, a number of our alumni students return to the school’s “Rites of Passage” graduation ceremony because they have come to realize that IPS was a defining chapter in their lives. This is precisely our aim: to make a pivotal difference in the lives of our students, so that they might go on to make a difference in the world at large.
Thank you for taking the time to investigate our school. I would welcome and encourage you to set up an interview and a student visit to get an even better sense of who we are and what we do. I think you will be impressed and intrigued by what you find.