A Tribute for Graduation Day-Kaye Dunn ACT Education Solutions Ltd.

A Tribute for Graduation Day, 29th June 2015

From Kaye Dunn Senior Academic Manager (Global) ACT Education Solutions, Ltd.

I would dearly love to be with you today on this wonderful occasion –your graduation from the Global Assessment Certificate (GAC)! This year’s cohort has worked hard with their teachers to develop the skills that will help them to succeed in their future studies, career and life.

Michelle Chow GAC Graduate and Valedictorian

Although I have never met you, I do feel that I know each of you very well and have in many ways been on the GAC journey with you. I have observed your academic and personal development from afar throughout this academic year. I have read all of the assessments that come into our shared Dropbox folder and watched with great pleasure your role plays, oral presentations and seminars. Now I do have to admit one guilty pleasure – I always look forward to moderating assessments from AlphaMax Academy as they always demonstrate confidence and a willingness to examine complex and difficult issues. This can only come from a supportive educational environment that encourages all those involved to push the envelope. Through your written and spoken work I have been privileged to be participant – in a small way – in preparing you for a life in a new and changing world. I am confident that you will all make great contributions in the coming years. It has also been a great pleasure to continue learning about Suriname and I look forward to visiting in person!

I would also like to applaud you because now you are part of a large global family of high-achievers who can proudly claim, “I survived the GAC!” and as you know from experience, this is a well-earned achievement and not for the faint at heart! I am sure that there were times you thought you would never get to this day! You have worked your way through the sometimes seemingly endless expectations of the GAC and are now ready for the next stage of your life. You can be sure that all the academic and social skills that you have developed over the course of this academic year in the GAC have prepared you for a successful future in whatever course you choose to follow. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said; “The things taught in schools and colleges are not an education, but the means of education.” It is my hope that GAC has provided you with the building blocks that will foster your ongoing growth and development as you move through life’s journey.

As you embark on this new journey I would ask that you keep three things in your mind and heart:

First of all, NEVER lose faith in yourself and what you can do. Follow your heart and your intuition. Let them lead you towards to person you really want to become and help you achieve everything you really want to achieve. Believe in yourself and follow your heart! As Steve Jobs once said: Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice, heart, and intuition

Secondly, don’t ever compromise your basic values – do only what you truly believe is the right thing to do. Even if everyone else is doing something else, trust in yourself and the values you have been taught by your parents, your community, your school and your teachers. Define your values – commit to your values. As Time Cook, CEO of Apple said: “Your values matter. They are your North Star. You don’t have to choose between doing good and doing well. It’s a false choice, today more than ever. Your challenge is to find work that pays the rent, puts food on the table, and lets you do what is right and good and just. Find your North Star. Let it guide you in life and work and in your life’s work.”


And finally please remember to dream! After all, as Mark Twain said, “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”

And so to each of you in this graduating class of 2015 – Congratulations and Good Luck!

And many congratulations to your wonderful teachers who have guided and nurtured you through this stage of your education with a great deal of care and dedication.

Congratulations and best wishes to all of you!


From Kaye Dunn, Senior Academic Manager(Global) on behalf of Ros Washington, the Academic Director and all the staff of ACT Education Solutions Ltd.

The Value of an Hour by John Assaraf- AlphaMax's Message for 16th Day of Christmas.

For the last seven years I have given the following essay by John Assaraf to my  GAC students so that they can reflect on the value of time and how they use it.
As we head to the end of the year and we think about what we have achieved I think it is  useful to read this.
This is our post for the 16th Day of Christmas.
Milton Drepaul
AlphaMax Academy

Selina from Nativity Play 2013

When I was 21 years-old, a gentleman asked me what I thought the value of an hour was. I honestly did not know how to answer the question. He went on to teach me one of the most valuable lessons I have ever learned.

He suggested that the value of an hour was priceless. This confused me some, so this is what he said to me.

“If you invest one hour each day in understanding yourself and your environment better, you will accumulate nine 40-hour weeks over the course of a year!”

Yikes! As you can imagine I was blown away when he put it to me that way.

Nine 40-hour weeks? This seemed impossible until I did the math. 365 days, times one hour each is…yup, nine 40-hour weeks!

He went on to ask me how good I could get at something if I did it all day, every day for just over 2 months. Well, you already know the answer to that.

I thought I could be awesome!

He went on to tell me that over the course of just five years, I would have invested the equivalent of 1,825 hours of focus on whatever I desired to accomplish my life.

Imagine for a minute, how good you can become at anything that you did one hour a day for the next year. How fit could you get? How much more in love would you get and give? How much more money could you earn?

Let me suggest that one hour is a small price to pay in comparison to the payoff. Just one hour a day may be the razor’s edge you need to really get the results you want in your life.

For me, the decision was easy. I have been studying human potential and the mind for over 20 years. Each time I think I’m getting a good handle on it, I am gently reminded of how much there is to observe and learn.

Is getting what you want worth an hour a day? I certainly hope so.

I still manage to set aside my hour to read motivational stories or listen to inspirational people. They are the fuel for my mind and it keeps me learning and yearning for more.

Please adopt an hour a day for yourself! Pick one area of your life that you want to improve and commit the next 90 days to that one thing.

I assure you that the results you achieve will be well worth the decision! And remember…you can’t take out of life more than you put in.

John

AlphaMax Academy GAC class do Interviews

On December the 5^th 2014, eight members of the GAC class did a mock university admissions interview.  This activity, part of our GAC Level one courses, assessed our ability to be interviewed by university admission officers.  

This interview assignment was part of the GAC003 course, Study Skills for Independent Learning, assessment event 2.  The interview was to be least 10 minutes long, and was conducted in English by four interviewers.  Our interviewers   on Friday were: Mr. Taylor, Director of Studies and our 003 Facilitator, Mr. Drepaul, Director of the AlphaMax Academy GAC Program and Facilitator for our 001, 002 and 006 courses, Mr. Marshall, facilitator for 005 course and Reaan Kersenhout AlphaMax and GAC graduate

Mr. Marshall, Mr. Taylor, Mr.DRepaul 7 Ms. Kersenhout

Before the assessment, the students had to research their university course options, reflect on their study and learning skills, prepare a CV and Personal Statement, and rehearse effective interview skills. 

Friday was the first time the 2015 class were formally dressed for an assignment. We all tried to project images as earnest, successful students who were worthy of being accepted by the best universities.

AlphaMax 2015 GAC class

During the interview, students were asked to give reasons for choosing a particular university. They also talked about themselves and evaluated their own study skills and strategies. They also fielded questions on their time management, and the courses in which they wished to enroll.

            The students found this a very useful and rewarding experience.

Michelle Chow

Michelle Chow, Class of 2015 GAC and AlphaMax Academy

Tagore Ideals on Education

The curriculum at AlphaMax Academy is strongly influenced by the ideals of India's celebrated poet and artist Rabindranath Tagore.

Tagore Bust in the courtyard at AlphaMax Academy

From its inception in September 1998, teachers and students of the Academy have recited, often daily, those memorable words which first appeared in Tagore’s world-famous and respected collection of poetry, "Gitanjali."

            

"Where the mind is without fear and head is held high           

 Where knowledge is free             

 Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls         

 Where words come out from the depth of truth              

 Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection               

 Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary dead sand of dead habit              

 Where the mind is led forward by Thee into ever-widening thought and action      

 Into that heaven of free, my dear beloved God, let us all awake”.

First Lady of Suriname speaking at the  unveiling of Tagore monument

On June 4th 2011 Suriname’s First Lady Ingrid Bouterse Waldring unveiled the Tagore monument, a sculpted bronze figure of Tagore, which has a plaque that bears this inspiring prayer.This monument, a gift from India to Suriname, is one of several worldwide. AlphaMax Academy is proud to be the custodian of Tagore's bust for the people of Suriname.

In 1918, Tagore founded Visva Bharati University – an international center of Culture and Humanistic Studies.

Tagore considered the lack of education to be the main obstacle in the way of national progress and at the root of all its problems. He thought that the basic objectives of any worthwhile national education system were to promote, creativity, freedom, joy, and an awareness of a country’s cultural heritage.

Therefore he worked assiduously towards developing an appropriate system of national education. He felt that each nation was different and this fact should be reflected in its system of education.

Some of his salient thoughts on this topic were:
“In every nation, education [should be] intimately associated with the life of the people.”

“Let the students gather knowledge and materials from different regions of the country, from direct sources and from their own independent efforts.”

“We must try to understand how [our native] genius express[es] itself… Unless we try to put these together and discover the integrating factors behind these diverse streams of thought and make them a subject of study at our universities, we would only be borrowing knowledge from abroad. The natural habitat for knowledge is where it is produced. The main task of universities is to produce knowledge, its dissemination is its secondary function. We must invite those intellectuals and scholars to our universities who are engaged in research, invention or creative activity.”

To help foster and enrich the holistic formation of its young scholars, from its inception, the Academy has devoted four of its five school days to left-brain academic and ratiocinative development and activities, and one full school day to right-brain creative endeavors.

An unswerving resilient insistence on the latter is vintage Tagore, who like his Occidental contemporaries, Rudolf Steiner and Maria Montessori deplored lop or one-sided child/human development at the expense of a willful fostering and guidance of creative gifts and skills.  Indeed it is through the latter that the inner ‘child’ is nurtured and brought to a ripe maturity.

To illustrate how important contact with nature was to the life of the educator and poet, during one of his many travels to lecture in the West, Tagore wrote:

“I wish I could be released from this mission.  For such missions are like a  mist that envelops our souls – they seem to shut us off from the direct touch of God’s world…  The springtime has come – the sky is over-flowing  with sunshine.  I long to be one with the birds, and trees and the green  earth.  The call comes to me from the air to sing, but, wretched creature  that I am, I lecture – and by doing it I ostracize myself from this great world of songs to which I was born.”

New York, March 18th, 1921.

On Mat 7th 2014 there will be a garlanding of Tagore's Bust at AlphaMax Academy.

Carinlangs and AlphaMax Invite you to celebrate Tagore's birth anniversary

First Lady of Suriname with Former Ambassador of Suriname in front of Tagore bust at AlphaMax Academy.

You are warmly invited to a Celebration of Rabindranath Tagore’s Gitanjali:” An Evening of Poetry, Music & Dance” on Saturday, May 10th, 2014 at  7 p.m.

This special evening of celebration for India’s most  prolific and best known artist takes place at the AlphaMax Educational complex - Stanvastestraat 18-24 (Zorg en hoop).

The program is being done by the Caribbean Institute ofLanguage Studies (Carinlangs^®) and AlphaMax Academy in collaboration with Indian Cultural Center and Embassy of India.
Read a book on Tagore.

Caribbean Institute of Language Studies launches second 2014 BA Tesol Program Group

REGISTER NOW

The Caribbean Institute ofLanguage Studies® (CARINLANGS®)

In collaboration with Dr.Robby Morroy

Presents to suitable candidates

Teaching of English To Speakers Of Other Languages (Tesol)

Bachelor’s and Master’s Programs

THE TARGET GROUP

                In-service teachers with an MOA diploma

What’s Being Offered

·       A capstone program to upgrade holders of the MOA diploma to the bachelor’s degree level in                 

·       Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL)

·       The capstone program will serve as a pre-requisite for a master’s degree program in TESOL.

DATES

                Bachelor’s TESOL – June 2014 to June 2015 [4 quarters – 2 semesters]

                                [Vacation periods in September and Christmas 2014]

                Master’s TESOL – starting in October 2015

LOCATION

                AlphaMax Academy, 18-24 Stanvastestraat, (Zorg-en-hoop), Paramaribo

REGISTRATION

                Limited Places – 35 candidates MAXIMUM

                Candidates must have already completed an MOA diploma

                Candidates MUST be in-service teachers in the Dutch or English education system in Suriname

                Candidates must be committed to pursuing the Master’s TESOL program which will commence

                in October 2015

                Candidates must submit a written “Personal Statement” (approximately 500 - 1000 words in

                English) addressing their interests and evaluating their commitment to the field of

                study, the Teaching of English to Speakers of Other Languages

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION

                Call 597- 400588 (AlphaMax Academy)

                Email:  carinlangs@gmail.com

PROGRAM MODERATORS

                Robby Morroy, Ph.D.                                                                    

                Sean F. Taylor, M.A., B.A.

                Milton M. Drepaul, Dip. Ed. (Hons. – UWI), B.A

A TRUE ICON OF SURINAME HAS PASSED: Ruben Karsters, Remembering the Legend

Yesterday, the Alphamax Academy and the nation of Suriname lost one of its living artistic Legends – Professor Ruben Karsters. Born on 22nd May, 1941, he passed away at the Academic Hospital following a short illness. Although he was rushed to the hospital earlier, efforts to revive him in the intensive care unit failed.

Professor Karsters was Head of the Art Department at the AlphaMax Academy where be began giving classes to young talented art students in the Academy in 2004. In 2007, one of his young scholars was selected as the Africa-Caribbean Art Scholar, granting him a summer scholarship to Parson’s School of Art & Design in New York. Very recently, another student, whom the art master had trained for many years, was offered a partial scholarship to a highly reputable art and design university in Georgia, U.S.A..

Ruben Karsters was an autodidact who stunned experienced artists of his time with his unschooled yet deft command of Fine Art Skills. At the tender age of seven he was clearly a young master without letters or credentials. Thus, before he entered his teenage years he had began giving lessons to students twice his age. It was in this period that young Ruben caught the attention of the Dutch-born artist, Nola Hatterman, who saw the extraordinary gifts of this brilliant, gifted, rising, artistic genius.

Until his passing, when engaged in serious conversation about art, it was with a degree of mild chagrin that Professor Karsters spoke of Nola Hattermann. While acknowledging the role she played at that time in perceiving his gifts, for Karsters, she was nonetheless a somewhat disparaging figure who took credit from the work of other gifted artists of that time in Suriname.

In 1963 Karsters became one of the first Surinamers who travelled to the Netherlands to study “Fine Art.” This art connoisseur made a clear distinction between ‘art’, “Art”, and “Fine Art”.

After six years of studying in the Netherlands he returned home Professor of Fine Art in 1968. Recently, the visibly aging artist would often tell his close students that the rigorous study he undertook in Europe was also done by two contemporary still living artists, Erwin de Vries and Soeki Irodikromo, whom he respected.

Ruben Karsters was perhaps Suriname’s most celebrated and internationally recognized “Fine Artist” in the latter half of the 20th century. His techniques, methodology, extremely close, incisive study of any subject, combined with – his inimitable imaginative execution – was deeply reminiscent of the Flemish masters from the Renaissance. As art master, Professor Karsters had given art classes to scores of artists in Suriname, including Jules Brand-flu, Cliff San A Jong, and TMC’s Martin Slagtand – all of whom he fondly remembered as very gifted artists.

According to the Vice Chairman of the AlphaMax Board of Directors, Dr Eugene Merkus, “When you consider this man and his remarkable gifts, it is not an overstatement that Professor Karsters is irreplaceable. This holds true not just for our home-grown international school, the AlphaMax Academy, here in Paramaribo, but to our country, Suriname. Professor Karsters will be deeply missed in circles beyond the walls of this school and these shores where he lived.”

Ruben Karsters was the fine artist who executed in 2007 the now famous “Portrait of Hope & Peace: The Four Ms” which was made internationally famous when President Desire Bouterse presented the masterpiece-painting to the now-deceased President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela in November 2010. This work of art was commissioned by the Directors of the AlphaMax to inspire aspiring young leaders and the coming generation with exemplars of personal self-transformation, sacrifice, and service.

In an MSNBC public opinion poll, Bouterse’s gift to Chavez was voted as one of the top three ‘Most Appropriate Gifts” given in 2010 by one head of state to another. The Karsters-Bouterse-Chavez gift was preferred above other state gifts from leaders of the first world, including Putin and Obama.

Ironically, Professor Karsters passed away on the self-same day as President Hugo Chavez of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.

After his highly successful Portrait of Hope & Peace , in 2011 and 2012, Professor Karsters also executed artworks which were presented internationally.One observer has stated that perhaps the year prior to his demise will be acknowledged as Karsters’ ‘annus mirabilis’.

Ruben Karsters has had the distinction of being perhaps the only fine artist in Suriname to have painted the current leader and President of the Republic, Desire Bouterse, twice: First, as the young revolutionary leader in the 1980s, and more recently, in 2012, the mature astute statesman playing his vital role on the international stage as the Father of his people.

Ruben Karsters is survived by his wife, Sabitrie Karsters-Sewpersad, and their three children, Cheranie, Vasilie, and Irina. He is also survived by his son, Anthony, from a previous marriage.

According to a Director of the AlphaMax which had commissioned the Karsters’Portrait of Hope and Peace , “The Rubens of Suriname is gone to the great beyond again!”