From the Senior School Principal, Mr. Alexander Abraham

Herbert Spencer, the celebrated English philosopher and prominent classical liberal political theorist of the Victorian era once said, “The great aim of education is not knowledge, but action”. Though written well over a century ago, this thought holds great meaning in a school like Pathways which looks for ways by which our students may not just acquire knowledge which is essential to any school or education but develops the human personality with all its complexities as well as diverse potential.

Since the new academic year has begun, we have plunged headlong into academics, participated in events happening both at the Inter House as well as the Inter school levels.  We are striving to retain some balance between academics and Founders Day. As many of you are aware, we are doing an amalgamation of 4 major Broadway musicals. So, what is so special about a musical and why is it so different to any other theatre form? Well by nature a musical takes the core areas of drama, music and dance and produces that wonderful heady theatrical creation which has absolutely gripped our students.
Practicing on stage

For the senior school, the production chosen is a famous Broadway musical called “TOMMY”, which is the journey of a young man who faces rejection from all facets of society because they can’t understand his personality. It is the story of the self-realization of a young man who comes to recognize he is special and celebrates at the end by singing, “I’m free!”. As we work towards Founders, our endeavour is to help each one of our young Pathwaysians recognise that she/he is special and has their own place and niche to carve. Alongside we continue to remind them that a truly balanced student (which incidentally is one of the 10 IB Learner Profile attributes) will learn how to handle the academic requirements as well as the other cultural or sports considerations with equal aplomb and be the complete person that a Pathways education strives for.

I must share that our Form 12 students are very focussed in this very intense year of their lives. They are not actively participating in the Founders due to their academic commitment but as the senior most form of the school ,they have been offering very effective advice and inputs to their juniors. Meanwhile they are intensely working towards their rigorous Internal Assessments and college applications and we are looking forward to some very good college offers for Form 12. For the first time we have added  a December preparatory exam for Form 12 this year, as  it will focus their examination preparation in readiness for the IB exams in May 2014.