An Extra Curricular Activity

Being involved with a private school, I am finding, comes with benefits and obligations. In public education, at least in the US, for the most part, you decide what school your children will attend with your choice of apartment rental or home purchase. The realty market drives the advertising or promotion of a town and therefore its school district. In the expat realm in Beijing, or in any expat situation throughout the world, the decision of housing and schools can be made independently. Therefore, marketing becomes a core component of a private or an international school’s daily life. In a growing, competitive market like Beijing, there is a lot of pressure on the marketing departments and admission staffs of private schools to attract new applicants; very different than the mindset of relying on state and municipal tax funding for education. As a result, I find myself in the role of sales person for a good part of the day. I never realized how tiring sales can be!

Now for the benefits. Because of my connection to BCIS, Steve and I had the unexpected pleasure to attend a most unusual and special piano concert one Saturday afternoon. It was called “Love and Music Charity Concert” and it was sponsored by an organization called Little Angel Action Fund. The purpose of the charity concert was to raise money for music education programs for children living in the poverty-stricken western region of China called Qinghai. In fact, it was in this province that China suffered its most recent earthquake. The organization had been providing music instruction in this area prior to the earthquake; but the recent devastation makes any funds going into this area all the more important.

The international school I work for has been a supporter of the LIttle Angel Action Fund and, over the years, we have held fundraisers at our school to support their efforts. All the proceeds of “Spring in the City,” our annual spring fair which took place on May 8th, will go to Little Angel Action Fund.

Anyway, our Marketing Manager, Sabrina, asked if Steve and I would like to attend the concert because she had some extra seats... so off we went. It was a real treat. The event was held at a grand facility in Beijing call the National Center for the Performing Arts. It is a spectacular building, fondly known as the “egg” because of its shape, that is the premier concert venue in the city. It has a concert hall, opera house and theater. Steve and I had been there once before, to attend a Chinese opera, but in the evening. It turns out that many of the unusual features of the building are lost without the day light.

The concert began with an introduction of the organization in exhibition hall format with posters and displays throughout a room adjacent to the concert hall. Then a group of young performers (about 5-8 years old) came out in traditional Tibetan ethnic dress to sing for the audience. They were very talented little children who did movements with white scarfs, which are a symbol of health and longevity. After they finished their little performance, it was their job to move the audience to the concert hall. They did this by selecting members of the audience to whom they presented their scarves and held hands with them with the rest of the group following. Guess who was chosen by the main singer? It was Steve! The main little performer ran right up to him, presented him with her scarf, and took him by the hand as we all followed. We were all then seated in the concert hall. It was very sweet and special. It happened so quickly I couldn’t get a photo of it in process; but I did get this photo of them afterwards.

Now to the obligations. I find myself responsible for attending school events or functions on the weekends; like proctoring our diploma program scholarship test, working at our school fair, working at the expat show. While the events have not been onerous and have even been lots of fun, they have cut down on our weekend flexibility and mobility this spring. It’s funny. I was asked by someone the other day what places I had been to throughout China so far. In reality, not too many because of the number of weekend Steve or I have had to work. But, I am hoping, at least with regards to my schedule, that these commitments will be limited to the spring...hopefully not too many this fall and winter.