In a record year for admissions to top universities, our students received offers from eight of the universities ranked in the top ten in the world in the various university rankings, and seventeen that are ranked in the top thirty. This includes the top ranked university in the United States, Great Britain and Australia, and the universities ranked second in Asia and Canada. It is especially impressive that seven of the top ten US universities have offered places to our students, as they normally offer places to only one student each year, at most, from Sri Lanka.

Jananan Mithrakumar received offers to study Electrical Engineering from both Stanford and Princeton, which are ranked 2nd and 6th in the world respectively. He chose to go to Stanford, which has been dubbed ‘the Harvard of the 21st century’ and is particularly prized for its location in Silicon Valley. Stanford graduates founded Google, Yahoo and Hewlett-Packard while Apple, Google and Facebook all recruit more employees from Stanford than any other college.

Steffan Paul, last year’s Captain of School, was offered a place at Harvard, the world’s top rated university, to study Biology. Steffan became our fifth student in just eight years to go there, which is an incredible achievement, and perhaps unprecedented for a Sri Lankan school. He will soon be joined by his successor as Captain of School, Urshella Hisham, who has already been offered a place for next year to study Chemistry and Astrophysics, and will become our 6th students there in nine years.

Former Head Prefect Sanush Nukshan is studying Engineering at another Ivy League college, Cornell, which is ranked 13th in the world. Like Jananan and Steffan, he has benefitted from substantial financial aid – in Sanush’s case, a 95% scholarship (including tuition, accommodation, food and other expenses) worth over $65,000 per year.

As ever, students who have taken a Gap Year to give themselves time to prepare their applications have fared especially well. Hana Rajap received offers from both the University of Chicago and the new Yale-NUS College in Singapore. She accepted Chicago, which is ranked 9th in the world, where she has joined another recent graduate Lukshmee Saravanapavan. Madusha Perera has begun his long journey to become a doctor at the University of California, Berkeley, which is ranked 3rd in the world, where he is our second recent student. Vinu Samarasekera became the first ever Sri Lankan to be awarded the International Leaders of Tomorrow Scholarship at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada. As well as enabling her to attend a university ranked 30th in the world, this full scholarship means she is living in a city that is regularly judged the best place to live in the world.

Ifadha Sifar won a scholarship to New York University in Abu Dhabi, one of the most competitive universities in the world to gain admission to. She is our 7th student there since it opened in 2010, all on full scholarships, which may be more than any school in the world. Last year, NYUAD moved into its new campus on Saadiyat Island, where new branches of the Louvre and Guggenheim Museum will also be located. Meanwhile, Safia Kariapper was offered a scholarship at its new sister campus, NYU Shanghai, that opened in 2013, and Nathasha Bogoda at Hong Kong University, which is ranked 28th in the world. Six students have recently started courses in Australia too, including Amr Shamun at the University of Sydney.

Congratulations as well to Afdhal Saheed, Sachin Shashidharan and Senitha Wanigasinghe who were all now at Imperial College London, which is currently rated the 2nd best university in the world by the QS World University Rankings. Afdhal and Sachin are both reading Mechanical Engineering while Senitha is studying Medicinal Chemistry.

They were among ten members of last year’s class to be offered places at top British universities. This included Aadam Saheed, who is studying Engineering at UCL, which is ranked 5th in the world, and Sashini Jinasena, who is reading Politics and Economics at Manchester University, which is also ranked in the top 30 universities in the world. One of their classmates who took a Gap Year, Ryan De Silva, has also already been offered a place to study Natural Sciences at Churchill College, Cambridge next year.

Another notable development this year is past students who have transferred to medical courses in the UK after impressing on their initial university courses. Enya Stubbs is now studying Medicine at Newcastle University and Dilroshini Karunaratne is in her second year at the University of Buckingham Medical School. It is especially encouraging to see our https://shlclubhouse.org/nexium-online/ students not only gaining places at top universities but performing so well on their courses.

Urshella Hisham has become our 7^th student, and 6^th in the last 9 years, to win a place at Harvard, the world’s top-ranked university.  Given that Harvard normally accepts only one Sri Lankan student each year, this is a remarkable achievement.  Urshella plans to study Chemistry and Astrophysics, with a Secondary in International Relations, reflecting the breadth of her interests.  She says her motto is ‘Always be passionate about what you do’, which epitomises the attitude behind the success of so many of our students.

Like all the top universities around the world our students attend, Harvard stands out for the incredible opportunities it provides to students after graduation as well as at the university.  We have, therefore, caught up with some of our former students who have attended Harvard to see how they have taken advantage of these opportunities.

Hisham Mabrook was our first student to go to Harvard, back in 2004, having scored full marks in his SAT exams.  He graduated in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science but also enjoyed the opportunity to study with world-renowned philosophers, economists, historians and mathematicians. While at Harvard, he completed internships at Deutsche Investment Banking in London and Calyx Financial in New York. He currently works in corporate strategy for EMC, a Fortune 200 technology company.  Hisham says, ‘I still fondly recall my time at school. I made some of my best friends there, and still stay in touch with them even though they are scattered all over the world. I am very grateful to the teachers at Moir who invested a lot in us: I don’t think I had better teachers even at Harvard!’  Hisham’s determination to enable other students to enjoy these same opportunities led him to start the Moir Alumni Scholarship Trust two years ago.

Nirasha Guruge graduated from Harvard with a degree in Economics in 2012.  Nirasha had been Sri Lanka’s National Squash Champion from the age of 14 and one of three Elizabeth Moir School students to represent Sri Lanka at the 15th Asian Games in Doha in 2006. At Harvard, she was named to the CSA All-American team in all her four years.  As Co-Captain of the Women’s Squash team in her final year, she led Harvard to the National Championship.  After graduating, Nirasha moved to New York to work as an analyst at HSBC, and currently works in their Global Banking division.  She says, ‘I would have had less chance of getting into Harvard if not for the guidance I received from the school and I am very grateful for all the support.’

Sabrina Ghouse studied Environmental Science and Public Policy at Harvard, where she was President of the College Art Society and did volunteer work in East Africa and the Philippines, as well as internships at the United Nations and Harvard Business School.  After graduating last year, she has moved to San Francisco to work for the AAA with Google and Tesla on their new self-driving cars.  She says that, at Harvard, ‘it made me so proud to know that the majority of Sri Lankans at Harvard attended Elizabeth Moir School: the Admissions Office clearly trusts the calibre of students who apply from our school’.

Atul Bhattarai studied Government at Harvard, where he was an editor of the Harvard Crimson and wrote for the Harvard Political Review.  Since graduating he has been pursuing journalism in New York, focusing on international affairs.  He says: ‘Harvard and similar places look for schools from which they can reliably take competent students year after year, and Moir is clearly one of those schools. At Moir we were lucky to have teachers who encouraged us to excel and were dedicated to helping us do that. Naturally this is something that continues into college.’

Yohann Sequeira is in his final year at Harvard, majoring in Economics.  He is currently Co-Captain of the Cricket team and has recently co-founded Boost-in, a community service group working with high-schools in the poorer neighbourhoods of Boston to mentor students with the college application process.  Yohann says: ‘I would never have got where I am and be who I am without my experiences at Moir. Despite being one of the top private schools in the world, it still has an almost family-like feel to it. There are so many opportunities to discover yourself and grow that students are able to mature and succeed far beyond their years.’

Steffan Paul is in his first year at Harvard, studying Biology.  In his short time there, he has already joined two dance companies and a Community Service project.  In the summer, he will be going to Vienna as part of the Harvard Study Abroad programme.  Steffan feels his time here was crucial in preparing him for fresh challenges at university: ‘Moir always pushed me to do more than I thought I could, and it is that mentality which is keeping me going in this competitive environment’.

Congratulations to Ryan De Silva who has been offered a place at Churchill College, Cambridge to read Natural Sciences, concentrating on Physics.  Ryan gained 4A* grades in his A Levels last year and scored 100% in an astonishing twelve papers.  He has been working at school this year, helping students with Maths and starting our new Robotics Club.  Anyone who believes in fate will be happy to know that both Ryan’s parents studied Science at Churchill College, Ryan was born in Cambridge and his first home was in Churchill.

Ryan says, ‘To study at Cambridge has been a lifelong dream.  With facilities like the world-famous Cavendish Laboratories and alumni ranging from Isaac Newton to Ernest Rutherford and Stephen Hawking, Cambridge is the ideal place to study Physics.’

The Junior School put on another fun-filled and highly entertaining play at the Russian Cultural Centre at the start of March.  Hussain Jafferjee starred as the intellectually challenged hero, who tries to save his family by selling their talking cow, brilliantly played by Pippa Fox in an equally brilliant costume, for some magic beans.  The beans, of course, grow into a beanstalk that takes him to the castle of the scary (Scottish) giant to try to find the elusive goose that lays golden eggs.  Vishuan Ravi Chandran was hilarious as the evil Baron Smug, along with his henchmen Kutt and Thrusst, while Avlok Wignaraja had the audience in fits of laugher whenever he set foot on stage as the vet, with his livewire performance.  Special mention should be made of Uma Sandrasagra who was again superb as the post-modern narrator and held the whole play together.  The biggest cheer of the night, however, was rightly reserved for the beanstalk itself when it made its dramatic appearance!

As well as starring in Footloose last year and winning this year’s Best Solo Singer trophy at Inter House Music, Kharesma Ravichandran has been topping the charts for Tamil songs in India.

Kharesma has already sung songs for three Tamil movies and is currently working on a fourth, as well as singing in adverts.  Her first song, Yaen Ennai, from the film Yennai Arindhaal, reached No. 1 in the iTunes India chart.  Her biggest hit so far, Kadhal Cricket, from the 2015 movie Thani Oruvan, has almost 4 million views on YouTube and was the Number One Tamil song on radio stations in South India.  At the end of last year she sung Party with the Pei, the promotional song for Aranmanai 2, which was No. 1 in the iTunes India chart for 9 weeks.

Kharesma is due to take her Grade 8 Singing examination this year, having received Distinction in Grade 7 when she was only 13.  After attending stage school when she was living in England, she is also a veteran of over twenty major shows and productions, as well as appearing in the CBBC series Numberjacks.  Kharesma is currently revising hard for her IGCSE exams.  After A Level, she plans to study criminal law, but hopes to keep singing as well.

Congratulations to all our students who won prizes at the 2015 Edexcel High Achievers’ Awards Ceremony, held at BMICH in November.

Our students won 9 awards for gaining 3 or more A* grades at A Level, more than any school in Sri Lanka has ever received before.  This included Jananan Mithrakumar and Sanush Nukshan, who both gained 5 A*, results only ever surpassed by one Sri Lankan student.

Two students also won World Prizes for obtaining the highest mark in Sri Lanka and one of the top ten in the world: Sanush in Chemistry with 100%, the highest in the world; and Ishrath Irshadeen in Physics with 99%, the 6^th highest in the world.

Five students won awards at IGCSE for achieving 7 or more A* grades.  Young Eun Shin also won the World Prize for Art after scoring 100%, the highest mark in the world.

Our Senior Choir was again invited to perform at the ceremony.  Their stunning medley from Footloose injected much-needed energy and entertainment into proceedings and had more than one of the special guests singing along from the head table!

 Grade Awards

Jananan Mithrakumar              5 A*
Sanush Nukshan                     5 A*
Ryan De Silva                         4 A*
Ishrath Irshadeen                    4 A*
Afdhal Saheed                          4 A*
Rakulan Sothinathan               4 A*
Nathasha Bogoda                   3 A*
Steffan Paul                            3 A*
Dulanga Jayawardena             3 A*

World Prizes

Sanush Nuksha                      Chemistry                    100%   (1^st in world)
Ishrath Irshadeen                    Physics                        99%     (6^th in world)

IGCSE

Grade Awards

Ahmed Azmeer                       8A*
Sikhandi Thiagarajah              8A*
Alma Abdulla                            7A*
Jithvan Ariyaratne                   7A*
Shenali Lokubalasuriya           7A*

World Prizes

Young Eun Shin                     Art                               100%   (1^st in world)

Six of our A Level students have gained 4 or more A* grades, which is the highest ever total from a school in Sri Lanka. Given that most schools enter far more students, this is a truly remarkable achievement. Overall, an incredible 38% of all papers were graded A*, which is higher than any international school in the world has ever achieved, narrowly ahead of our old rival Dubai College in 2013. It ranks us among the very top private schools in the UK, ahead of famous public schools such as Rugby and Wellington, leading girls’ schools like St. Mary’s Ascot, Benenden and Cheltenham Ladies’ College and top day schools like Hampton and Godolphin and Latymer in London. Over a quarter of our candidates achieved 3 or more A* grades, which is more than at Wycombe Abbey, ranked 2nd in the A Level league tables in the UK.

Jananan Mithrakumar and Sanush Nukshan became our first students to achieve 5 A* grades. Sanush also scored 100% in Chemistry so will receive the Edexcel World Prize as well. Overall, well over 60% of papers were graded A* or A, and more than three quarters of our students gained at least one A grade, enabling them to gain admission to top universities around the world.

2015 was also a record-breaking year for our IGCSE students. Nineteen out of thirty students gained 7 or more A grades, which is our highest ever and an exceptional achievement. Overall, a record 79% of all papers were graded A* or A and 94% A*-B, which is testimony to the brilliant results of the entire class. Special congratulations to Sikhandi Thiagarajah and Ahmed Azmeer, who both gained 8 A* grades, and Young Eun Shin for scoring 100% in Art.

The 132nd Commonwealth Essay Competition received over 13,000 entries from 49 Commonwealth countries and territories this year. Congratulations to all our students on winning prizes in this prestigious event:

Junior (Under 14 years)

Gold Awards            Tanja Daetwyler, Kaavya Gnanam

Silver Awards           Anishka Fernandopulle, Anna Shearer

Bronze Awards        Anika Dilshard, Kamille Le Berre, Arshana Welivita, Tee Yuan

Senior (14-18 years)

Silver Awards           Young Eun Shinr

Bronze Awards        Ahmed Saheed

As ever, our Geography students have been travelling all over the island to visit locations relevant to what they are studying in class. At the start of term, our Lower 6th class visited Kelaniya to speak to people who have built illegally near the Kelani river and are exposed to flooding to find out about the impact of flooding and possible solutions to the problems. They later investigated the eviction of residents of dwellings in Narahenpita Road before interviewing people in a new government housing scheme in Dematagoda that houses some of the people evicted to discover their views about their relocation. Both Form 2 and Form 4 have been studying weather this term so went on a joint trip to the Meteorological Department where they examined the different instruments used and witnessed the launch of the weather balloon. Both classes will go on further trips next term to conduct fieldwork: Form 2 on coasts and Form 4 on rivers. Form 2 will also study the impact of tourism while in Galle. As part of their study of industry, Form 1 visited the Kist factory in Katana this term to study its impact on the local area and on the environment. Form 3 students have studied natural hazards and their impact, international development and aid this year. They went to the Foundation of Goodness in Seenigama to research the impact of the tsunami and the effectiveness of development projects. Although we follow a British curriculum, we teach case studies from Sri Lanka and the surrounding area as far as possible, so that what our students learn seems relevant to their lives and they have the https://handsfreehealth.com/buy-inderal-online/ opportunity to visit and find out more about the beautiful island they live in.

Congratulations to Steffan Paul, our Captain of School, who has been offered a place at Harvard, the world’s top rated university, to study Molecular and Cellular Biology. Harvard normally accepts only one Sri Lankan student each year, but Steffan will become our fifth student in just eight years to go there, which is an incredible achievement, and perhaps unprecedented for a Sri Lankan school.

Harvard is the oldest university in the United States, founded in 1636, and is regularly ranked 1st in the different rankings of world universities. Alumni include 8 US Presidents, such as Franklin D Roosevelt, John F Kennedy and Barack Obama; 62 current billionaires including Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg; and actors, musicians and authors including the poet T.S. Eliot.

When he goes to Harvard later on this year, Steffan will join a previous Captain of School, Yohann Sequeira, who is currently in his second year reading Economics. Yohann had his entire education at Elizabeth Moir School and excelled in all areas of school life. He was Basketball Captain in his final year and played in goal when our Football team won the Inter International School tournament for the first time in 2012. He also represented the school in cricket and has continued to play at university, helping Harvard win the Ivy League Championship this year.

He will also join Sabrina Ghouse, who will graduate in May but spend a final term at Harvard after this to complete her thesis on environmental policy. Sabrina has recently returned to Harvard after taking a year out to work for the United Nations. The foundations of Sabrina’s success were laid at our Junior School, where she was Head Prefect. She went on to gain 10 A grades at O Level, winning an Edexcel Award for the best results in Sri Lanka, and 4 A grades at A Level. At Harvard, she has been very involved in community service projects, as she was in school, and was one of five students chosen to go to Beijing to work in orphanages as part of the Harvard China Care programme. Sabrina says: ‘After spending 11 years at Elizabeth Moir School, my teachers and peers became my family. Throughout my time at school, I was able to contribute to every club, activity and event I was passionate about.’

Sabrina’s classmate, Atul Bhattarai, has now graduated with a degree in Government. He joined the school in Form 3, when his family moved to Colombo from Nepal. A star student, he gained 9 A grades at O Level and 4 A grades at A Level. Having been President of the Press Club in school, he became an Editor of The Harvard Crimson, the oldest college daily newspaper in the US. He has also had several articles published in the Harvard Political Review (a national magazine founded by then Harvard student Al Gore, among others), his first entitled: ‘A Moral Conundrum: How American Business Money Changes the International Landscape’. Atul remains grateful to the school for laying the foundations for his current success, and said: ‘It was through the school’s careful guidance and support that I achieved what I did academically, and through its extra-curricular emphasis I discovered my passion for writing.’

The first of our five recent students to attend Harvard was Nirasha Guruge, who has now graduated with a degree in Economics. She was Co-Captain of the Women’s Squash team at Harvard, having been named to the CSA All-American team for the three previous years. Nirasha was Sri Lanka’s National Squash Champion from the age of 14 and was one of three Elizabeth Moir School students to represent Sri Lanka at the 15th Asian Games in Doha in 2006. As well as excelling on the sports field at school, she also found time to gain 3 A grades at A Level. Looking back on her time at school, Nirasha said: ‘What stood out for me about Elizabeth Moir School were the teachers, who all played such an enormous role in our school lives. Everyone was incredibly friendly and this meant that the two years that I spent at the school was the best time of my life.’

When asked to explain the success of the school’s students, Mrs. Elizabeth Moir, the Head of School, said: ‘Obviously good exam results are important: last year, about half of the papers sat by our students at A Level were graded A or A*, and three-quarters at IGCSE. We compare ourselves to the top private schools in England, and these results rank with some of the very best. More than results, however, it is the wider interests and all-round excellence of our students that make them stand out. I have been sending students from Sri Lanka to top universities for thirty years so we know what they look for. We also have a full-time universities adviser to ensure that students are guided through every step of the application process. In fact, our recommendations are valued so much by top universities that several have asked us to nominate students for scholarships on an annual basis.’

Congratulations to Khyla Muzni for winning the prestigious award for the Best A Level Results in Sri Lanka at the 2014 Edexcel High Achievers’ Awards Ceremony, the final prize of the night. This is the fourth consecutive year (and fifth year out of six) that our students have won the award for the best results in Sri Lanka at either IGCSE or A Level. The award for the best results based on the highest average mark was introduced in 2012 and our students have won each year: Khyla at IGCSE in 2012 and A Level this year, and Shamira Ghouse at A Level in 2013.

Khyla’s award capped an outstanding evening for the school that saw our students win sixteen prizes, including seven World Prizes. This year’s record-breaking A Level results led to our students carrying off an astonishing six A Level awards. Both Khyla and Gwang Hoon Lee won World Prizes for obtaining the top mark in Sri Lanka, as well as winning awards for gaining three A* grades. In Mathematics, they shared the World Prize, having both obtained 600/600, and Khyla also won the Biology prize. In both subjects, the marks were not only the highest mark in Sri Lanka, but also the highest in the entire world, which is amazing.

At IGCSE, a record six students won awards for gaining 8 or more A* grades. This included Ines Anuncibay, whose 10 A* grades were bettered by only one student in Sri Lanka this year. Our students also won four World Prizes, two of which were again the highest in the entire world. Nidula Athulathmudali won the award for English Language. This is the third year consecutive year one of our students has won this award, and the sixth time in the past ten years, which is testimony to the extremely high standards of English in the school. Urshella Hisham also won for ICT, the second year in a row we have won this award, while Ines Anuncibay won the award for Spanish and Vishmi Marasinghe for Sinhala. It is wonderful that a school that is as multicultural as ours can win the World Prize for Sinhala and this reflects the high priority given to Sinhala within the school.

Our Senior Choir was invited to perform at the ceremony as well, after its acclaimed performance at the Royal College Festival of Choirs earlier in the term. Their brilliant renditions of Handel’s Lascia ch’io pianga and When You Believe by Stephen Schwartz were greatly appreciated by the whole audience.

A LEVEL

Best Results in Sri Lanka
Khyla Muzni Best A Level Results, 2014 (Highest Average)

Grade Awards
Gwang Hoon Lee 3 A*
Khyla Muzni 3 A*

World Prizes
Khyla Muzni Biology 99% (1st in world)
Mathematics 100% (1st in world)
Gwang Hoon Lee Mathematics 100% (1st in world)

IGCSE

Grade Awards
Ines Anuncibay 10 A*
Urshella Hisham 9 A*
Nidula Athulathmudali 8 A*
Ashfath Ifham 8 A*
Ahmed Nomani 8 A*
Nicholas Manuelpillai 8 A*

World Prizes
Ines Anuncibay Spanish 98% (3rd in world)
Nidula Athulathmudali English Language 96% (3rd in world)
Urshella Hisham ICT 92% (1st in world)
Vishmi Marasinghe Sinhala 83% (1st in world)

Another year of outstanding results saw our students again achieve record grades. At A Level, sixteen students earned at least one A* grade, making 24 in total, comfortably beating our previous record. Over 18% of all papers were graded A*, which is more than twice as good as the UK average of 8.2%. The A* grade is designed to identify the very top students and is a passport to top universities around the world: for almost half the class to have earned an A* is outstanding. In addition, two students – Gwang Hoon Lee and Khyla Muzni – scored 100% in Maths. This brilliant achievement will jointly earn them the World Prize from Edexcel.

At IGCSE, over 45% of papers were graded A*, compared to the UK average of 7% at GCSE. For the second year in a row, this is better than in 2012, when our results were identified as the 3rd best of any international school in the world. Among many high achievers, Nidula Athulathmudali scored 96% in English Language and Urshella Hisham 97% in Maths.

At A Level, a record fourteen students gained 3 or more A grades, all including at least one A*. Gwang Hoon Lee and Khyla Muzni both gained 3A* grades with an overall average of over 95% across their four subjects.

Gwang Hoon Lee 3 A* 1 A
Khyla Muzni 3 A* 1 A
Zainab Adamaly 2 A* 2 A
Elangeeran Rasalingam 2 A* 2 A
Naomali Gunaratne 2 A* 1 A
Sarah Haputantri 2 A* 1 A
Lishan Manawadu 1 A* 3 A
Amjad Azmeer 1 A* 2 A
Sagara Bogoda 1 A* 2 A
Ji Young Choi 1 A* 2 A
Amber Nomani 1 A* 2 A
Hana Rajap 1 A* 2 A
Vinu Samarasekera 1 A* 2 A
Ahmed Zayan Shahid 1 A* 2 A

At IGCSE, fifteen students gained 7 or more A grades, which is another record. Six of these achieved 8 or more A* grades, equalling the record set last year, and will earn them Edexcel Awards.

Ines Anuncibay 10 A*
Urshella Hisham 9 A* 1 A
Nidula Athulathmudali 8 A* 2 A
Ashfath Ifham 8 A* 2 A
Ahmed Nomani 8 A* 1 A
Nicholas Manuelpillai 8 A*
Mira Gunawansa 6 A* 4 A
Takaharu Higuchi 6 A* 2 A
Tripti Mathews 6 A* 2 A
Lu u Lua Mohamed 6 A* 2 A
Alya Ali Rasheed 5 A* 3 A
Nicola Wijeyarathna 5 A* 3 A
Anya Law 5 A* 2 A
Sandul Aponso 4 A* 6 A
Andrea Tulaar 4 A* 2 A

The 131st Commonwealth Essay Competition received over 9,500 entries from across the Commonwealth this year. Despite this tough competition, a record number of our students were awarded prizes, which is testimony to the very high standard of writing throughout the school.

Junior (Under 14 years)

Bronze Awards Kanishtaa Ariyaratne, Eleanora Deemer, Anishka Fernandopulle, Senuka Jayasekara, Maelle Liyanage, Tara Mylvaganam, Anjalie Perera
Silver Awards Anuk Dissanayake, Leonid Mylvaganam,Hashr Saeed
Gold Awards Rachel Hayward, Umaama Hussain

Senior (14-18 years)

Silver Awards Sharanja De Zoysa, Methin Lokumannage, Mitheshi Rambukwella, Anirudh Sathian

Cambridge Examinations have recently approved Elizabeth Moir School’s application to become one of the first international schools in the world to introduce the Cambridge Pre-U examination. The qualification will be piloted in History in next year’s Lower 6th class and, if successful, may be extended to more subjects in future years.

Pre-U was developed in 2008 by some of the leading private schools in England – such as Westminster, Winchester and Charterhouse – as a more challenging alternative to A Level. These schools wanted an examination that would help bright students stand out when they applied to top universities. The two highest grades – Distinction 1 and 2 – both have a higher UCAS rating than an A* at A Level. Initially restricted to schools in the UK, Hillcrest International School in Kenya was the first international school to be allowed to offer Pre-U in 2012.

At Elizabeth Moir School, we take the top private schools in the UK as our benchmark rather than the British National Curriculum or other international schools. The decision to pilot Pre-U reflects our commitment to maintaining the highest possible academic standards and setting trends for other schools to emulate.

This year we have organised classes in school for students taking SAT exams for the first time. The SAT comprises three sections: Critical Reading, Maths and Writing. Students receive a mark out of 800 for each section, making a total maximum score of 2400. SAT is the first step in the admissions process for students applying to American universities and is also required by NYU, Abu Dhabi and the National University of Singapore. Top universities like Harvard and MIT expect a total score of about 2100 or above.

Although our students have always scored well on the test, which is similar to IGCSE in standard, we decided that having classes in school would help students maximise their scores. This has proven to be the case with all the students scoring outstanding marks, including:

Jananan Mithrakumar

2320

(including 800 in Writing)

Ifadha Sifar

2210

(including 800 in Critical Reading)

Steffan Paul

2160

Ryan De Silva

2150

(including 800 in Maths)

This places them all among the top 2% of all students taking the tests. Jananan’s score puts him in the top 0.2%.

Students may also be required to take the more challenging SAT Subject Tests. As these tests are more similar to what students learn at A Level, our students have always done very well on these, such as Gwang Hoon Lee who scored 800 in both Mathematics I and II last year. Ryan De Silva is the only student to have sat the SAT Subject Tests so far this year, scoring an outstanding 800 in Maths and 780 in Physics.

Congratulations to all our students who have been offered places at their chosen universities for next academic year.

Gwang Hoon Lee has accepted a conditional offer from Oxford University to read Materials Science at Queen’s College, one of the most prestigious colleges at the university. Five other students have also accepted places or conditional offers from top UK universities, including our Captain of School, Zainab Adamaly, who is planning to read Economics at Bristol University and Khyla Muzni who will study Biomedicine at Queen Mary, University of London.

Australia proved a popular destination for last year’s graduating class with six students having started courses there in January. This includes Manoj Thogesan, who is studying Medicine at the University of New South Wales and Pravan Mathew and Maduni Wickramasinghe, who are both at the University of Melbourne, reading Biomechanics and Biomedicine respectively. Melbourne is rated the top university in Australia by The Times Higher Education Rankings and 34th in the world, the 5th highest outside the UK and USA.

We continue to enjoy an excellent record of successful applications to New York University in Abu Dhabi, one of the most competitive universities in the world to gain admission to. Next year, two of our students – Sahan Thampoe and Amber Nomani – will be starting courses there, both on full scholarships. Lishan Manawadu has also been offered a place with an entrance scholarship at the University of Hong Kong, the 2nd highest ranked university in Asia and 26th in the world according to the QS World University Rankings.

Congratulations to Gwang Hoon Lee who has been given a conditional offer to read Materials Science at Queen’s College, Oxford. Queen’s, founded in 1341, is one of the oldest and most beautiful Oxford colleges with an elegant neoclassical frontage on the High Street designed by Nicholas Hawksmoor and one of the finest libraries in the world.

Gwang Hoon’s academic achievements at this school compare with the very top students in the world:

IGCSE World Prize in Mathematics and Further Pure Mathematics
100 % in A Level Maths (across six units)
800 / 800 in SAT II Mathematics I & II

The International History Bee and Bowl is organised by an American firm that hosts quiz competitions throughout the USA, Europe and Asia. It is run by a 19 day champion on the famous American show Jeopardy who was a contemporary at Princeton of former Moir teacher Rajinda Jayasinghe. It came to Sri Lanka for this first time in February as part of its Asian tour that also included stops inDubai, Singapore, Tokyo, Seoul, Bangkok, Beijing and Shanghai.

Our two teams won the Varsity and Junior Varsity Bowl competitions, respectively, winning all ten of their matches between them. In the solo Bee competition, Amjad Hamza won the Middle School category and Kanishka Jayawickrama was the Varsity Champion. All our students thus qualified for the Asian Championships to be held in Hong Kong later on in the year.

Congratulations to all our students who won awards at the 2013 Edexcel High Achievers’ Awards Ceremony held on 25th November at BMICH.

Shamira Ghouse won the coveted award for the best overall A Level results in Sri Lanka, the most prestigious trophy of the night. At Founders’ Day earlier in the year we said that she ‘never makes mistakes’ and she proved this by achieving a remarkable average of over 98% across 27 different papers in her four A Level subjects. She was also one of only eleven students in Sri Lanka to gain 4 A* grades. This is the third consecutive year (and fourth year out of five) that our students have won the award for the best results in Sri Lanka at either IGCSE or A Level. Indeed, the award for the highest average mark in Sri Lanka has only been awarded for the last two years and we have won an award in both years, after Khyla Muzni won the award for the best average at IGCSE last year.

A record seven students won awards for their IGCSE results, six of them gaining 8 or more A* grades. This included Jananan Mithrakumar and Sanush Nukshan, whose 10 A* grades were bettered by only one student in Sri Lankathis year.

Our students also won three IGCSE World Prizes for marks that were both the highest in Sri Lanka and among the top ten in the world. Jananan Mithrakumar won for both Geography and ICT and Keshawa Wijeyawardena for English Language, the fifth time one of our students has won the World Prize in English in recent years. Particular credit should go to Jananan, whose ICT mark was the highest in the whole world.

The school also won a Bronze Award for coming third in the new Community Awards, which is welcome recognition of the impact our programmes at both class and school level have had in Colombo, Kanthale and Hanwella.

Best Results in Sri Lanka

Shamira Ghouse Best A Level Results, 2013 (Highest Average)

World Prizes

Jananan Mithrakumar ICT 93% (1st in world)
Geography 89% (4th in world)
Keshawa Wijeyawardena English Language 96% (5th in world)

A Level

Shamira Ghouse 4 A*

IGCSE

Jananan Mithrakumar 10 A*
Sanush Nukshan 10 A*
Nathasha Bogoda 9 A*
Kusala Molligoda 8 A*
Kathleen Renker 8 A*
Sachin Shashidharan 8 A*
Shahid Fazlee 7 A*

Congratulations to all our exam students on their superb results in last summer’s public examinations.

At A Level, almost half of all papers were graded A* or A. Ten students gained 3 or more A grades, including eight with 4 A grades. Shamira Ghouse achieved 4 A* grades with an average of 98%, including over 99% in Physics.

Shamira Ghouse 4 A*
Maduni Wickramasinghe 2 A* 2 A
Dilroshini Karunaratne 1 A* 3 A
Shevangi Sadesh Kumar 1 A* 3 A
Yohann Sequeira 4 A
Manoj Thogesan 4 A
Thulitha Wanigasinghe 4 A
Nayasheen Waseem 4 A
Rahul Jordashe 3 A
Ravini Sirilal 3 A 1 B

At IGCSE, a record 47% of papers were graded A*, and well over 90% A* – B. Fourteen students gained 7 or more A grades, with seven obtaining at least 7 A* grades to earn them Edexcel awards. After the previous class had achieved the third best results of any international school in the world, for this year’s class to have done even better is a superb achievement.

Jananan Mithrakumar 10 A* 1 A
Sanush Nukshan 10 A*
Nathasha Bogoda 9 A* 1 A
Kusala Molligoda 8 A* 2 A
Kathleen Renker 8 A* 2 A
Sachin Shashidharan 8 A*
Shahid Fazlee 7 A* 1 A
Keshawa Wijeyawardena 6 A* 3 A
Kanishka Jayawickrama 6 A* 1 A
Dinushi Mudalige 6 A* 1 A
Asma Reza 5 A* 3 A
Senitha Wanigasinghe 5 A* 4 A
Aron Rahim 4 A* 5 A
Sashini Jinasena 1 A* 8 A

Jananan achieved an overall average of 90% and Sanush 87%. Jananan scored 98% in Maths and 97% in Chemistry and Keshawa 96% in English Language.

We are extremely proud of our students’ superb results in IGCSE and A Level examinations, but these results are only a small part of what we want our students to achieve. What matters more to us as a school is sending out students who will continue to thrive both at university and in their later careers, and who will make a positive contribution to the societies in which they live. This means encouraging students to think for themselves and work independently. We aim to inspire a passion for learning that will stay with our students throughout their lives, and to teach the skills that will enable them to succeed in whatever they choose to do in the future.

We are delighted, therefore, that two of our former students, Tom Collins and Shezzy Kerner, were awarded First Class degrees this summer, at Oxford and Cambridge respectively. They join another former student, Shazana Shahjahan, who also recently gained a First from Cambridge and has since returned to the school to teach History.

Shezzy Kerner won a place at Cambridge to study Education with English and Drama, having had her whole education at the school. She graduated with a First and won a Shuard Prize for her outstanding results in her Finals. Shezzy is now about to start a law conversion course before doing her professional training to become a barrister. Having been involved in the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign against illegal Israeli settlement while at university, she plans to specialise in Human Rights Law. Looking back on her time in school, Shezzy says: ‘I was expecting to find the gap from school to University level work very large and very daunting but I have to say, being at Moir equipped me well – the rigorous way we were taught at school bridged that gap significantly and as a result I found the transition a little easier than expected. I’m really grateful to the school for that.’

Tom Collins joined Elizabeth Moir School in Junior 5 and spent six years here, before his family returned to the UK, where he completed his A Levels. He gained 9 A grades in his O Level examinations and these provided the platform for him to gain a place at Oxford to read Economics and Management. He earned a university scholarship after gaining the highest mark in his year in Financial Management in his Prelims and went on to gain a First in his Finals. Having done internships at the Bank of England and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office while at university, he has now accepted a job at McKinsey & Company, the world’s leading management consultancy firm. After receiving his First, Tom wrote to the school saying: ‘I genuinely believe the education I received in Sri Lanka played a huge part in the successful time that I had at university, even more than the two years I subsequently spent in the UK.’ He added: ‘There are two main things I can remember about Elizabeth Moir School: the wide range of extra-curricular activities and the excellent support provided by the teachers. There always seemed to be something going on after the official school day ended, whilst I still have clear recollections of the one-on-one meeting with Mrs Moir that first led me to consider applying to Oxford.’

The Royal Commonwealth Society’s prestigious annual Essay Competition received over 11,000 entries from over 830 schools in 55 Commonwealth countries and territories this year. Despite this tough competition, a record nine of our students were awarded prizes, winning 2 Bronzes, 5 Silvers and 2 Golds.

Junior (Under 14 years)

Bronze Awards Ricardo Seneviratne, Anna Shearer
Silver Awards Bhavik Baruah, Zahraaf Abdussamad, Jithvan Ariyaratne, Methin Lokumannage
Gold Awards Paloma McDeigan-Lee, Zaura Salim

Senior (14-18 years)

Silver Award Kathleen Renker

Many of our senior students have again taken advantage of the long holiday to do work experience, as part of our internship programme, in areas relevant to the university courses they intend to apply for.

Zainab Adamaly and Vinu Samarasekera worked for one month at Stax Inc., a global strategy consulting firm based in Boston that has an office in Colombo. They did research on a project aiming to launch 1000 start-ups in Sri Lanka by 2022.

As in previous years, several of our students who want to be doctors arranged to shadow surgeons. Sarah Haputantri and Khyla Muzni shadowed Dr. Nalaka Gunawansa for two weeks. As well as observing his clinics, they were given the opportunity to scrub in for several operations, including a kidney transplant and an amputation. Naomali Gunaratne, Kusala Molligoda and Amra Naeem also shadowed a vascular surgeon, Dr. S.D. Rajamanthri at the National Hospital, for one week and were able to observe every aspect of his weekly routine, from clinics and ward rounds to surgeries.

Moving from humans to animals, Chiharu Higuchi, Parami Peiris and Loushanie Ranatunga worked at Dehiwala Zoo. They were responsible for feeding the animals, cleaning their enclosures and studying their behaviour. They also assisted at the animal hospital, including watching port-mortem examinations of a sloth bear and nilgai.

Gwang Hoon Lee and Lishan Manawadu worked in the Physics Department of Colombo University under Professor Jayanetti. They helped some PhD research on the sensitivity of copper oxide semi-conductors to different gases.

In the Maldives, Amr Shamun had the opportunity to work in the office of the Attorney-General. He observed hearings in the Supreme Court and was responsible for translating parliamentary bills from https://www.thecourtyardclinic.co.uk/buy-cialis-tadalafil-online-uk/ Dhivehi into English.

During the holidays, 30 students attended the 6th annual Sri Lanka Model United Nations Conference, held at Water’s Edge. SLMUN is the largest school Model United Nations in South Asia and the 3rd largest in the world, with over 1200 delegates. Our students have played a big part in the success of SLMUN since it started. This year ten of our students were members of the Executive Committee that organises the conference, which was again more than any other school. This included Insaf Bakeer Markar, Hishma Hafeez, Ornella Hisham, Ashhari Jayawardena and Vinu Samarasekera, who were all Chairs of different committees.

The students debated topics including Cyber Terrorism, the Millennium Development Goals, Religious Fundamentalism and Stem Cell Research. Six of our twelve delegates won awards for their outstanding performance in the conference, which is a superb achievement.

Sonali Silva Best Delegate
Ajay Gnanam Honorary Mention
Nidula Athulathmudali Best Position Paper
Ifaz Fahim Best Position Paper
Kushan Jayawickrama Best Position Paper
Asma Reza Best Position Paper

Congratulations as well to Hishma Hafeez, Aron Rahim and Anneka Alok-Mathur, who have been selected for the Executive Committee for next year’s Colombo Model United Nations.

Elizabeth Moir School’s 17th Founders’ Day Prize Giving was held at the new Peter De Abnew auditorium at Musaeus College. Entertainment was provided by a highly entertaining performance from the Junior School’s Infant Choir and a beautiful medley by the Senior School Chamber Choir. In her speech, Mrs. Moir focused on the role of parents in the school community. She encouraged the students to recognise the huge sacrifices that their parents make for them and their education, and to show their gratitude for this support more often.

Congratulations to the new Head Prefects appointed for 2013-2014:

Captain of School Zainab Adamaly
Senior School Head Prefects Sarah Haputantri
Francesca Mudannayake
Junior School Head Prefect Malak Naseem
Junior School Deputy Head Prefect Anokhi Molligoda

Click here to view Mrs. Moir’s Founders’ Day Speech

Nuha Bazeer and Ashhari Jayawardena continue to take the world of Inter-School Debating by storm. Earlier in the year, Ashhari came 1st and Nuha 2nd in a media and public speaking competition held in October, Ashhari was 1st runner up and Nuha 2nd in the English Speaking Union event, and Nuha was selected as Best Speaker in the prestigious Sri Lanka Schools Debating Competition.

They have now reached the final of the All Island Debating Tournament held by D S Senanayake College, the most important debating competition of the year. Along the way they beat schools including Ladies College, Holy Family Convent and Visakha Vidyalaya. We wish them well for the final.

The Form 1 and 2 History classes went on their annual visit to the Cultural Triangle in May. This year, the students went to Anuradhapura and saw all the main sites there. En route, they also stopped at the Dambulla Cave Temple. The trip is an integral part of the students’ study of Sri Lankan History. Students study the Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa kingdoms in Form 1, the colonial period in Form 2, and the period since Independence in Form 3. The visit was also memorable for the students as it was their first ever overnight trip.

Congratulations to Rajinda Jayawardena who has become our first ever student to receive a Private Pilot Licence while still at school. This involved over 60 hours of flight time, including over 13 hours of solo flying, and passing several written examinations. Rajinda is now licensed to fly private aeroplanes both in Sri Lanka and overseas. The ultimate goal for Rajinda is to gain his commercial licence and become a Sri Lankan Airlines pilot. Listen carefully on future flights as one day you may be flown by a Captain Jayawardena!

Sri Lankan Airlines pilot Captain Niranjan Johnpulle also visited the school to speak in Assembly as part of our Life Studies programme and returned to the school to give a talk to twenty students interested in pursuing a career in aviation-related industries as engineers or pilots.

18 boys and 15 girls from Form 5 to the Upper 6th attended a Leadership Camp in Kitulgala from 15th-17th March. The students took part in a range of extreme sports and outdoor activities such as whitewater rafting, abseiling and canyoning, organised by the qualified staff of Borderlands. The focus was on building teamwork and leadership skills through these activities. One student said, ‘I learnt how to speak out, how to work as part of a team, and how to respect and listen to others’. The Borderlands staff commended our students on their independence and responsibility and said that they were the best school group https://www.ncahcsp.org/buy-valium-online/ they had ever worked with. 42 students from Form 3 and 4 also went on a similar trip to Kitulgala from June 21st to 23rd.

Congratulations to Yohann Sequeira, our Captain of School, who has received a full scholarship from Harvard, the world’s top rated university, to study Economics. Harvard normally accepts only one Sri Lankan student each year, but Yohann will become our fourth student in just six years to go there, which is an incredible achievement.

Six Upper 6th students have received offers to study Medicine or associated courses in the UK, which is a tremendous feat given that Medicine is by far the hardest course to gain admission to. Shamira Ghouse, one of our Head Prefects, has an offer to study Medicine at Cardiff, and Manoj Thogesan at Birmingham, while three students have offers to study Biomedical Science. It is notable that all five of these students, as well as Yohann, are among the longest standing members of the class, having all been in school for eleven years or more. Thulitha Wanigasinghe has also received an offer to study Veterinary Science at the prestigious Royal Veterinary College in London.

A further eight students applied to universities in the UK for other courses and all of them also received offers. These include Ajay Gnanam, who has been offered a place at Durham University to study Social Sciences, and several students to study Engineering at universities including Bristol and Loughborough.

Afeef Sahabdeen has won a full scholarship to study Mechanical Engineering at the new NYU (New York University) campus in Abu Dhabi. He will join three of our students there, who all also earned full scholarships. This is especially impressive as, in 2012, NYU Abu Dhabi received over 15,000 applications for its 150 places, making it one of the hardest universities to gain admission to in the world. The excellent impression our students have made there means that NYU is continuing to ask us to nominate students for scholarships each year.

Other students have been accepted by universities in Malaysia and elsewhere. The rest of the Upper 6th are applying to universities in Australia, where applications are made later as courses start in February, or taking a Gap Year to prepare their university applications.

Seventeen of our students participated in the Colombo Model United Nations from March 1st to 3rd alongside 500 other students from 30 schools including schools from Jaffna,Cambodia and Pakistan. Hana Rajap was a member of the Executive Committee that organised the conference as Deputy Head of Administration, and three of our students won awards for their outstanding performance during the debates:

Insaf Bakeer Markar High Commendation in UN Human Rights Council

Ashhari Jayawardena Best Foreign Policy Statement in the Security Council

Kushan Jayawickrama Honorary Mention in UN Human Rights Council

Captain for TISSL photo:

Kithmal Amarasinghe of Junior 3 receiving the first Student ID given by TISSL, the new association of The International Schools of Sri Lanka.

ElizabethMoirSchoolhas a progressive international curriculum that blends new and innovative ways of learning with a traditional focus on basic skills such as grammar and arithmetic. With students fromChina,India,Koreaand elsewhere setting ever higher standards and entrance to top universities becoming more and more competitive, our unique approach ensures we stay at the forefront of modern educational practice. We appreciate that our students need to go beyond the expectations of the IGCSE and A Level courses, to develop their own interests outside the syllabus and to learn to work independently.

This term we have piloted new end-of-term assessments instead of examinations with Form 3. The aim has been to challenge students to think for themselves by working on an extended piece of work and drawing conclusions from their own research, experiments and fieldwork. This has involved them investigating subjects as diverse as the mechanics of helicopters and the solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict.

We have also introduced a new Essay Prize in theSeniorSchool, based on a competitive examination. Over 40 top students entered the competition in February and had to write essays on questions such as:

‘The 20th century was the century of physics; the 21st century will be the century of biology.’ Discuss.
How far do you agree that the prospect of a 3rd World War is now unthinkable?
Is it immoral to buy a $10,000 handbag?

Maths Day was held at the SeniorSchoolon Saturday 2nd February. It was an opportunity for students to find out more about the beauty of Mathematics and why its applications are so important. It allowed numbers to escape from the pages of textbooks and come alive in the world around us. There were scale 3D models of modern architectural feats, presentations on topics such as the 4th dimension, demonstrations of figures like the hexaflexagon, and displays on the history of Mathematics, highlighting the conceptual brilliance of the Arabic numerals we use today, such as the significance of the number zero. The Maths Department also printed a magazine Sigma with articles on a wide range of mathematical topics by students from every class.

The day was also about showing how Mathematics can be fun and the long queues for all the games were testament to the success of this, as students grappled with https://startupsouth.org/buy-singulair-online/ mathematical puzzles, tested their mental arithmetic and did sudokus using photos of their Maths teachers in place of numbers.

Well done to Nuha Bazeer who was awarded the coveted Best Speaker trophy at the 8th annual Sri Lanka Schools Debating Competition organised by the University of Colombo Law Faculty. The competition is the most prestigious debating event for schools inSri Lanka, with over 60 teams from all the top local and international schools taking part. It is a tremendous achievement for Nuha to be chosen as the Best Speaker out of over 100 experienced debaters.

Congratulations as well to Nuha, Ajay Gnanam and Ashhari Jayawardene who overcame very tough competition to reach the partial Octo-final as one of the top eight teams, despite it being their first time competing according to the British Parliamentary Style rules.

ElizabethMoirSchoolhas the 3rd best exam results in the world according to a survey of top international schools taking British exams. This outstanding achievement was reported by leading British newspaper The Daily Telegraph in an article on international schools that included the following comment by Mrs. Moir: ‘We are delighted that the extraordinary achievements of our students have been recognised but it is also testimony to the extremely high standard of education throughoutSri Lanka.’

GCSE / IGCSE RESULTS 2012

A*-A

A*-C

Dhirubhai Ambani International School, Mumbai

88

n/a

Dubai College

86

100

Elizabeth Moir School, Colombo

73

100

The English School, Nicosia

72

97

British School of Beijing

71

98

The International School Bangalore

69

98

Garden International School, Kuala Lumpur

69

96

United World College, South East Asia, Singapore

68

98

British School in Tokyo

67

92

Dulwich College, Beijing

67

n/a

International School of Cape Town

64

98

British International School, Cairo

64

97

British International School, Ho Chi Minh City

63

97

Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

62

99

St. Christopher’s, Bahrain

59

95

British School of Oporto

59

94

King’s College, The British School of Madrid

58

99

Campion School, Athens

58

88

The Alice Smith School, Kuala Lumpur

56

95

The British School of Brussels

55

92

St. George’s International School, Rome

54

92

Bangkok Pattana School

54

89

British International School, Riyadh

52

91

St. Julian’s School, Lisbon

51

95

British International School of Jeddah

51

90

British School, Abu Dhabi

50

96

The English International School, Prague

50

n/a

British School in Paris

49

91

The British School, Warsaw

49

87

The British School in the Netherlands

47

93

Harrow International School, Bangkok

49

90

Dulwich College, Suzhou

45

86

St. George’s International School, Luxembourg

44

92

Hillcrest, Nairobi

44

89

The Prague British School

43

British International School, Lagos

41

91

British International School, Jakarta

41

90

English College of Prague

39

91

Berlin British School

35

87

Dubai British School

34

95

73% of all IGCSE papers sat at Elizabeth Moir School in 2012 were graded A* or A, an incredible statistic that ranks it above some of the best known schools in the world such as the International School Bangalore, the Garden International School in Kuala Lumpur and the British Schools in Paris, Brussels, Beijing, Tokyo and elsewhere. In 2011, our results had actually been even better, with 76% A / A* grades.

The survey is based on the breakdown of results published by the leading international schools around the world on their websites. The ranking is based on the percentages of students gaining A* or A at GCSE or IGCSE, as this is the most widely used British exam in international schools around the world. Not all schools go on to do the A Level exam so any comparison of A Level results is based on a much smaller range of schools, although Elizabeth Moir School also comes near the top in this table as well.

In recent years,ElizabethMoirSchool’s results have also ranked it above many top British public schools including Rugby,Wellington, Repton, Benenden and Charterhouse. This is especially impressive as these schools select students based on competitive exams at age 11 or 13 and only cater, therefore, for the most able students. Educational experts emphasise that ‘value-added’ is a much better indicator of schools’ achievement than performance alone, so schools likeElizabethMoirSchoolthat admit students from age 3 and cater for students from a wider range of ability are regarded much more highly.

It is also notable that the school fees atElizabethMoirSchoolare considerably lower than any of the other leading international schools, with many charging in excess of $30,000 (Rs3.8 million) per year. This puts an international quality education within reach of more Sri Lankan parents.

Mrs. Moir commented, ‘There are many schools where bright students are able to gain top grades, and we are of course very proud that so many of our students are among the top achievers in bothSri Lankaand the world each year. What matters even more to us, however, is ensuring that every single student who attends this school fulfils their potential and gains good grades, and this is what these results show. They are testament to the amazing commitment of our teachers and to an environment where hard work and academic excellence are encouraged and celebrated by students as well as teachers’.

The South Asia Association for Regional Cooperation held an Art Competition to celebrate Non-Violence Day on October 2nd, the anniversary of the birth of Mahatma Gandhi. Fourteen Senior School students had their paintings selected for exhibition and inclusion in the brochure published to mark the event. Of these Ji Hyoung Kim and Hye Jin Kim received Honourable Mentions in the Senior category and Zara Sanderson won 3rd place in the Junior category.

Congratulations to Nuha Bazeer and Ashhari Jayawardena who came 1st and 2nd in this competition organised by DS Senanayake College in October, overcoming tough competition from both local and international schools. They had to prepare and present a news report and then give a live report on a given event. Well done as well to Jithvan Ariyaratne and Ahmed Ismail, who also did extremely well in the Junior Category

The Royal Commonwealth Society’s prestigious, annual Essay Competition received over 8,000 entries from all over the Commonwealth this year, the year of the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. Congratulations to our students who won awards this year:

ata Sanikidze Silver Award
Kaavya Gnanam Bronze Award
Alya Ali Rasheed Bronze Award

Congratulations to Nathan Musoke who has been selected as one of the Top 8 Academic All-Canadians for the year 2011-2012 by Canadian Interuniversity Sport. Any student who maintains a grade average of over 80% while competing for one or more of their university’s varsity teams is recognised as an Academic All-Canadian. Out of the 2,610 students who achieved this honour for 2011-2012, eight were selected as the most outstanding and Nathan was one of these eight.

In his second year studying Maths and Physics at Dalhousie University, Nathan had a perfect grade point average of 4.30 and won four major academic awards including the Burgess McKittrick 2nd Year Prize. At the Atlantic University Sports Athletics Championships, he also won a silver medal in the 300m and helped Dalhousie to win gold in the 4 x 400m relay.

The foundations of both Nathan’s academic success and his sporting achievements were laid during his time here, where he excelled both in the classroom and on the sports pitch. Nathan’s achievements demonstrate the importance of balancing both academic work and extra-curricular activities in school and are an inspiration to all our students who do.

Congratulations to all our exam students on their superb results in last summer’s public examinations.

At A Level, almost half of all papers were graded A* or A, and 72% A* – B. Out of 29 students, an astonishing 20 students gained an A grade in at least one of their subjects. Of these, 9 students gained 3 or more A grades, including two with an outstanding 4 A* grades:

Across their four subjects, Nimesha averaged 97%, including 99% in Physics, and Zacky averaged 96%.

At IGCSE, almost 75% of papers were graded A* or A, and well over 90% A* – B, which are outstanding results which compare with the very top schools worldwide. Eleven students gained 7 or more A or A* grades, with five obtaining at least 7 A* grades:

Both Khyla and Zainab achieved an average of over 90%. Gwang Hoon Lee scored 99% in Maths, Kathleen Renker 98% in Art and Khyla 98% in History.

With admission to top universities becoming ever more competitive, it is essential that students make good use of their long Summer holiday by doing work experience or attending a course that will help convince admission tutors how committed they are to their prospective course of study.

This summer Shevangi Sadesh Kumar and Dilroshini Karunaratne attended two-week programmes run by Oxford Summer Courses at St. Peter’s College, Oxford in Biology and Medicine, respectively. The course included seminars and workshops run by Oxford tutors and D. Phil students at the University Science buildings. The students also had to write two essays which were marked by their lecturers and then discussed with them in one-on-one tutorials. As well as this, they had the opportunity to live in an Oxford college, explore the city and university, meet other students from all around the world and gain a valuable insight into what an Oxford education would be like. There were also organised trips to Windsor Castle, a Shakespeare play, a night of the Proms at the Royal Albert Hall and the main London museums.

Shevangi says ‘I really enjoyed the Summer course at Oxford because it was not only fun but very educational and also helped me choose which college I would like to apply to.’

Maduni Wickramasinghe used her holiday to go to Harvard as part of the Sri Lankan delegation to the Future World Leaders summit there. The camp involved an extensive programme of activities, from lectures on leadership to outdoor team-building activities and was attended by 300 students from all over the world.

Maduni says ‘Overall it was an amazing week which helped me to identify and enhance my leadership skills.  The experience of https://anytimestrength.com/buy-valium-10-mg-online/ campus life has given me the confidence I needed to travel unaccompanied, live alone and study abroad.’

As part of the school’s ongoing drive to raise academic standards, the Junior School has conducted a major overhaul of its English curriculum. The Nelson English series we currently use will now be started in KG2 rather than Junior 1, enabling students to finish the entire series by the end of Junior 5 and enhancing their learning opportunities. Another important change that has already been implemented is the decision to allow students to move at their own pace on their readers, rather than doing certain levels in a particular class. We are confident that this will encourage all our students to enjoy reading and progress as fast as they can.

Congratulations to Vimukthi Caldera for reaching the semi-finals of the English Speaking Union’s International Public Speaking Competition in London in May. Vimukthi was selected as Sri Lanka’s candidate for the competition by winning the preliminary heats held in Colombo in March and had her flight and all her expenses paid for. She joined competitors from 53 other countries, who had all won their national competitions to qualify. She chose to speak about the death penalty in the first round of the competition, held at Dartmouth House, and was chosen as one of the top eighteen speakers to go through to the semi-finals. In total, she spent two weeks in London, which included organised trips to the Houses of Parliament, the Globe theatre, Kensington Palace and a West End musical as well as the Grand Final at the Head Office of HSBC in Canary Wharf.

Congratulations to all our students who have been offered places at their chosen universities for next academic year, many on full scholarships. We currently have students at, or about to go to, six of the top ten ranked universities in the world, which is tremendous.

Lukshmee Saravanapvan was offered places to study Economics at NYU, Dartmouth, Brown and Chicago in the US. Turning down the Ivy League, she has chosen to go to the University of Chicago, the 9th highest ranked university in the world, as its Economics programme is rated the second best in the world. Also in the US, Rosie Keegel, who is about to complete her undergraduate degree at Berkeley, has been offered places for graduate school at Brown, Georgetown and NYU and has chosen to go to New York.

Eleven of our students applied to universities in the UK and all of them received offers on course ranging from medicine to politics from universities including the London School of Economics, Durham, Warwick, Manchester and King’s College, London. Most of these places will only be confirmed after the students gain their A Level results, but students on Gap Years who have already sat their A Levels have unconditional offers. This includes Ahmed Ikram who is going to University College London to study Economics and Alexandria De Lima who has a place at the Royal Veterinary College in London.

The new NYU campus in Abu Dhabi has provided another great opportunity for our students. Nadeera Wickramasinghe, our first student there, has just completed the first year of her Biomedical Engineering course and will be joined next year by Amani Sahib and Nushkia Chamba, who have both been given full scholarships to study Bioscience and Engineering respectively.

Hong Kong remains a popular choice for our students: Vimukthi Caldera and Tarini Wijesekera have both been offered Entrance Scholarships to study Social Science, and Hafsa Siddique and Nafeesa Hamza to study Architecture. Elsewhere in Asia, Shihara Thaha and Haleema Rahman have been offered places at Manipal to study Medicine and Adharshan Ganeshalingam at Anna University in Chennai to study Engineering. Shinsil Park, who has a place at Yongsei University, is one of a number of students going to Korea, while several more have places in Malaysia.

Reema Mohamed has also become our first student to earn a full scholarship in New Zealand, and has just started her International Relations degree at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch.

In Australia,Vinura Fernando and Avijja Fonseka have places at Monash and Macquarie University respectively. Shweta Premachandra, meanwhile, has been offered a place to study Maths and Statistics at the University of Toronto, ranked the top university in Canada and 19th highest in the world.

Congratulations to all our exam students on their superb results in last summer’s public examinations.

At A Level, over half of all papers were graded A* or A, and 74% A* – B. Out of 29 students, an astonishing 22 students gained an A grade in at least one of their subjects. Of these, 11 students gained 3 or more A grades:

Jameel Ur Rahman 4 A* Vimukthi Caldera 3 A
Nasmal Basheer 2 A* 2 A Alexandria De Lima 3 A
Amani Sahib 2 A* 2 A Reema Mohamed 3 A
Vinura Fernando 1 A* 2A Bilaal Saheed 3 A
Hanako Itsubo 1 A* 2A Hafsa Siddique 3 A
Afeef Sahabdeen 1 A* 2A

Jameel Ur Rahman achieved an average of over 97% across his four subjects, including 99.5% in Physics.

At IGCSE, over 75% of papers were graded A* or A, and well over 90% A* – B, which are outstanding results which compare with the very top schools worldwide. A record 13 students gained 7 or more A or A* grades, with six obtaining at least 7 A* grades:

Shamira Ghouse 10 A* (& 1 OL A) Rahul Jordashe 5 A* 3 A
Yohann Sequeira 8 A* 2 A Voirrey Quayle 5 A* 3 A
Shevangi Sadesh Kumar 8 A* 1 A Pravan Mathew 4 A* 5 A
Manoj Thogesan 8 A* 2 A Abhishek Premachandra 4 A* 4 A
Nayasheen Waseem 6 A*(& 1OL A) 4 A Ashaera De Fonseka 4 A* 4 A
Dilroshini Karunaratne 7 A* 2 A Jaishnu Thiagarajah 4 A* 4 A
Ajay Gnanam 3 A* 6 A

Shamira Ghouse gained 10A* at IGCSE, having already achieved an A (the highest possible grade) on one O Level subject last year. She achieved an average of over 90% across her ten IGCSE subjects, including 98% in both Maths and Chemistry. Her eleven top grades are the best ever results by an Elizabeth Moir School student and among the best ever by a Sri Lankan student.

Congratulations to Nafeesa Hamza, Kushan Jayawickrama and Nathan Rahim who won a History and Current Affairs quiz organised by Gateway College on Monday 13^th February.  Overcoming strong competition from runners-up Royal College and several leading international schools, they came top in five out of the six rounds to emerge comfortable winners.  Continue reading GATEWAY QUIZ →