Our history is rich, Ecolint and the world movement of international education has survived war, it has grown in impact. Like a phoenix from the flames, we have risen and we continue to rise.
Our strategic plan, which will be launched this year, is our next chapter. It takes us to 2030, the completion date of the sustainable development goals. Our plan focuses on one idea: to flourish. May every student, every colleague, every parent and every partner flourish individually and collectively. This flourishing will be in four areas: global citizenship, innovation, curriculum and sustainability.
This next chapter of our history involves an expansion of our Learner Passport, Scholarship Programme, a renewed vision for service learning, the Institute of Learning and Teaching and IDEA while we introduce a Global Citizenship Education Course in which students learn about philosophy for children, sustainable development, traditional knowledge systems and Swiss history and a new course in systems thinking in partnership with the Villars Institute. This next chapter crafts our collective answers to the core educational questions of the 21st Century:
- How should we learn through technology?
- What is the role of social and emotional learning in education?
- How do we foster a sense of belonging through education?
- How can our education systems create impactful environmental custodianship?
At the centre of our new strategy is the dignity and growth of every person in our community: their flourishing. We must model for the world the very best possible working conditions for staff and a culture of mutual respect. The world pipeline of educators is broken, and we need to fix it, for it is educators who will guide our future generations not towards a world we fear is coming, but towards a world we wish to create, a world where the values of Ecolint shine brightly, like a star in the night, giving hope, allowing us to see the road ahead.
The official launch of the plan will be in the Autumn: you will be invited to join a Strategic Design team to build our plan together, to build Ecolint together.
This 100th year is Ecolint’s birthday. And the tradition is, for a birthday, that we should give a gift. What gift should and can we give to Ecolint?
I’d like to tell you a story. It’s about a father and his daughter. She was a little girl and he was very poor. One day it was the father’s birthday and the little girl gave him a beautifully decorated and carefully wrapped box. He was a bit upset when he saw this because things were tight and he had asked that there be no spending for the birthday. But when he opened the box, it was empty. “But this is an empty box!” he told his daughter. “no Dad” replied the girl, "I blew lots and lots of kisses in the box for you”.
The father kept the box by his side all his life, even after his daughter had grown older and left home. In hard times, he would open the box and take a kiss, to fortify him, to bring him peace, to give him hope.
Let’s make this celebration count by investing it with the most precious gift of all: our humanity, our dedication to the mission of the school and our love for everything Ecolint represents. This, I believe, is what would have made our founders proud. So Ecolint’s birthday present will not be something big and shiny, expensive and material, it will be much more simple and much more powerful: the extraordinary force of our collective work together to educate for peace and to honour the learning of every student in our care the way that no other school does.
This year’s theme is celebration. Celebrate Ecolint, celebrate education, celebrate Geneva, celebrate peace, celebrate sustainability and celebrate inclusion.
Ecolint’s birthday is not just the past, it is the flowing of the past into the present: it is you, it is us, it is our privilege today to carry the flag of this noble institution into the next 100 years to a world in need of peace, a world in need of togetherness and a world where the future of the planet must flourish, a future we will build together.
We are Ecolint, we are one.