The school had a Halloween Party on Saturday, October 28th, 2023.
10月28日（土）ハロウィンパーティ2023が開催されました。
On the day, the students engaged in activities such as carving out Jack-O'- Lantern and creating Halloween themed posters. The Jack-O'-Lanterns were crafted by each grade from kindergarten to high school, each creating a unique and splendid design, showcasing their creative thinking. As well as homerooms from middle and high school also worked on Halloween themed posters, which got displayed on the walls of the main building later on.
After finishing up the Jack-O'-Lantern, the Elementary school students participated in a Trick-or-Treat event, parading through the school to find ‘wanted’ individuals. PTSA officers, dressed in costumes as "wanted" figures, joined the event, adding to the excitement.
For the Halloween Party this year, PTSA undertook tasks such as purchasing and transporting snacks for all students, acquiring and transporting pumpkins for the pumpkin carving, and preparing and providing prizes for the costume contest and the pumpkin carvings contest. Additionally, following the parents and teacher interview on the week before the Halloween, PTSA officers and spot volunteers collaborated to prepare snack packs and arranged it for the distribution to each class.
Children showcased their enthusiasm from the morning with costumes inspired by characters from books, anime, movies, and Halloween-themed ghosts, along with unique makeup looks and outfits. Teachers and staff also contributed to the festive atmosphere with creative costumes, concluding the Halloween Party on a high note.
The successful execution of such significant school events is made possible by the understanding and cooperation of parents. PTSA will continue the efforts to provide better support for the students. We sincerely appreciate the ongoing understanding and cooperation of all parents.
★ Sports Day2023(Kinder and Elementary)／スポーツデー2023（幼・小） ★
The kinder and elementary sports day was held under pleasant weather on October 14th (Saturday).
This was also the day where parents and guardians were finally able to visit and cheer on their children for the first time in 3 years. Not only the students, but teachers and parents were all enjoying themselves.
The PTSA prepared apples and were distributed to the students at the end of Sports Day.
Thank you to everyone for your hard work!
The school held an open day on September 23rd, and had many visitors.
9/23(土)学校公開が行われ、たくさんの方が来校されました。
During the class inspection period, the PTSA members, along with the current students, graduates, and school staff, accompanied the visitors to answer questions, give insights on the school's atmosphere, as well as share their experiences on topics such as considering paths beyond graduation and how parents/guardians could support their child's education at home.
PTSA Activity Report:
Donation of Sport Equipment to Elementary School
The PTSA has donated new sport equipment to elementary school.
The school had lacked amounts of certain sport equipment including basketballs and soccer balls. In addition, some equipment were in bad quality which was also a problem. The PTSA had a meeting discussing this and decided on purchasing equipment for the school.
The equipment was donated and presented to the elementary students on September 4th, the first day of fall term. The equipment has been used in PE classes and various club activities.
We would like to thank you for your cooperation and understanding.
On Thursday July 6th, the school celebrated Japan＋Canada Day＝“Japanada Day” under a terrific weather condition. As usual, the preschool and elementary students, and the junior and senior students enjoyed various activities including water balloon fights on the field. This year, unlike the previous years, the parents and guardians were also invited to join the students in the activities. We hope you had a great time with the students at school!
For this event, the PTSA board members mainly contributed in planning and preparing for this event, as well as helping the teachers run the event on the day.
The school had an open day on Saturday June 24th. We had a lot of visitors who came around to observe the class of their interest.
6/24土曜日、学校公開が行われました。とても多くの方が来校し、熱心に見学をしていました。
During the day, some of the PTSA members who are also the parents of students from elementary and secondary school got involved in the event, answering the questions from visitors.
Meanwhile, several students from each grade guided the visitors around, answering questions too from the student's perspective.
In addition, alumni students were also invited to school to help out with the questionnaires, which they answered from their past experiences at Columbia and their current life.
On June 7th, we held a uniform bazaar, as well as a parents / guardians get-together during the first parents day of the year. Thankfully, we had a lots of visitors. Thank you so much for those who visited!
During the bazaar, we generated 61,510 yen in total. All of this money will be donated to the school, which will be used to improve the students' experience at school.
バザーで得た61,510円の収益金は、全て学校へ寄付し生徒のために使われます。
We will keep you up to date with all of the activities here on PTSA website, so please check the website now and then, if interested.
We prepared to swap in the new emergency food stock in place of last year's stock on June 7th.
昨年度購入分の災害時非常食を今年度購入分と入れ替えをする準備作業を6/7(水)に行いました。
As you may know, it is important to renew the food stocks every year in order to avoid them from being expired. For this reason, PTSA purchases a new set of food stocks each year, keeping it ready to be used all year round. The food stocks from the last year we will be swapping it out in favour of the new stock will later be distributed to the students to eat, so please try it out with your children.
【Emergency foods distributed in the past】
【過去に配布した災害時非常食】
The next step to renewing the emergency stock is to order the food stock, which PTSA will be doing soon. If you have any ideas on new kinds of emergency food stocks, please feel free to contact us. ※Please be aware that we may not use your ideas of issues regarding allergies is expected from the suggested product.
On May 8th, Dr. Iguchi, the director of Iguchi Dental Clinic(いぐち歯科クリニック https://www.iguchi2525.com/), and Dr. Nakahama, an orthodontist, gave a lecture to the students about dental health. The students learned about four topics, which were:
①Teeth during its growth period and how to take care of it.
②What to do when you damage your mouth or chip your teeth.
③Good teeth alignment.
④The importance of having an education about dental health from a young age.
With the annual school-wide health check scheduled on May 12th, we believe this lecture helped students to learn and gain insights into why maintaining dental health is significant.
Due to the lecture being delayed by a few months from the original date in the previous school year, we had to hold this event on the day without prior notice. For this reason, the parents and guardians were not able to attend the lecture. However, the dentists included information directed toward the parents and the guardians. As a result, we have recorded and will share the second and third parts of the lecture. The link to the videos will be listed below, so if you are interested, please take a look.
On April 9th, the entrance ceremony was held at school, welcoming our new students of various grades.
To all new students, we hope that your time at CIS will be full of opportunities to learn new things and create fantastic memories!
To all of the new parents and guardians, we're happy to have you! We look forward to working with you to make the student's experience at school better than ever before.
Skipping ahead to April 15th, we had our first monthly PTSA board member's meeting. There, we were able to meet some new faces, which we were very excited about. We look forward to seeing more volunteers and staff join us in our monthly meetings, as well as in the events that are to come throughout the year.
Finally, we would like to note that all parents and guardians are always welcome to become a volunteer or staff of PTSA. If you are interested, please feel free to contact us!
To all the students who have been promoted, we wish you all the best in your future academic life, and we will support you. To all the graduates, we sincerely hope that your future path will lead you to the realization of your dreams and aspirations.
After the graduation ceremony, we prepared a uniform donation box at the main entrance. Thank you to everyone who donated.
The uniforms and pe clothes we collect from the donation will be sold during the bazaar PTSA holds once in a while, and all of the revenue from it will be donated to the school.
On March 15th (Wednesday) and 16th (Thursday), PTSA board members and parent volunteers of various grades, from kindergarten to high school, (graduating students awaiting for their ceremony helped us too!)worked together with elementary school teachers to organize the elementary students’ library.
The library, which was donated by the PTSA, located in the main building, is designed for middle and high school students and is not used by elementary school students. Instead, the elementary students have their own library in their building separately. However, the previous bookshelf, which consisted of lined up shelves in the corridors of each floor of the building made it difficult to manage the books, and the shelves were always messy. It was not an environment where elementary school students could actively pick up books that they wanted to read.
In response to the passion and request from elementary school teachers to create a more user-friendly library booth for elementary school students, and the agreement between them and us that enriching the library would make student life more fulfilling, the project began.
We are working hard towards the opening of the new library before the new school year, but the project has only just begun, and is in need of more helping hands. Therefore, we may ask our members to help us as spot volunteers over the spring break. Volunteering will also be a great opportunity to interact with parents and teachers of different grades while working together. We look forward to your active participation as volunteers!
★ Installment of PTSA inquiry booth／PTSA相談ブースの設置 ★
After Parents Day on February 8th, 2023, PTSA board members installed an inquiry booth to interact with other PTSA members.
At the booth, we collected and answered to questions and opinions about the operation in school, inconveniences or concerns regarding school life, stories about what parents should do to prepare for the future of the students, and more. The opinions we collected will be shared with the school staff later, which will be used to further improve school life.
As mentioned in the past reports, the membership fees of PTSA we collect from the members every year are used to host various events and lectures at the school's request (from activities expenses), purchase prizes, celebration flowers, and memorial gifts for students from preschool to secondary school (from prizes and gift expenses), as well as emergency food supplies (from disaster prevention expenses).
In addition, there are several pieces of equipment and supplies PTSA has provided to the school. This includes the water fountains found around the facilities, the reformation of the library room, the bouldering wall at one corner and the spirit bear logo on the floor in the big gym, as well as the automation of faucets.
Furthermore, all of the revenue generated from holding the PTSA fiesta bazaar is donated to the school every year, which has been used to purchase the floor microphones in the gym, the bleacher (portable raised bench to watch games), various sports equipment, large instruments, kilns used for pottery, as well as the fees to support the activities of the student council. These funds, known as "fiesta profit," are used to fulfill the purchase requests from teachers and students.
In these ways, cooperation between the school and the PTSA organization is essential at CIS.
このように、学校とPTSA組織の協力態勢は不可欠なものとなっています。
Bleacher／
移動式観覧座席
The PTSA board is always open to suggestions for events and other activities. If you have any activities you wish to happen, any lectures you think will benefit the students, as well as any suggestions or opinions you would like to discuss with the school as one of the PTSA members, don't hesitate to contact us through the contact form in the PTSA website.
Also, we are always looking for more members to join the board. If you are interested in joining us feel free to contact us!
Finally, PTSA is committed to striving for our goal; to enrich the learning experience and the school life of students at Columbia. To do so, the understanding and support provided by the PTSA members are important, and we would like to thank you. We hope to see your continued understanding and support in the future!
December 11th (Sunday), Christmas Fiesta 2022 held on under clear skies.
For the first time in about two years, guests from outside came to the school for the grand Fiesta, and the school was filled with joyful energy.
At the PTSA booth, we earned 56,500 yen from the bazaar sale of uniforms you donated and 30,188 yen from the sale of PTSA charity cafe, totalling 86,688 yen.
The proceeds will be donated to schools and be used to enrich student's life. at school. Thank you all for your cooperation!
On this year's Fiesta, we held a food bank activity, where we were able to collect a lot of food and donated . Thanks to everyone!
The donated food was given to "Wada Kodomo Shokudo" (https://tgenkijuku.com/), a children's cafeteria run by NPO Tokorozawa Genki Juku in the name of Columbia International School PTSA on the same day.
They told us that with our food donation, they will be able to hold another day of food donation day on top of their scheduled food donation day this year. They are planning to hold one on December 24th, right on Christmas Eve. We are very proud of what we as a school were able to contribute to the community activities! Once again, thank you so much for your cooperation!
PTSA also helped Organize visitor lines outside before the school gates opened, usher in the Big gym, kept the fire pit safe in the main gate area, and organized the bouncy house line in the school yard.
The school's teacher, staff, student council ,and we "PTSA" worked together to ensure that the fiesta was a fun and safe event.
Event 2023-2024 
★ Halloween Party 2023／ハロウィンパーティ2023 ★
Kiln／電気釜
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