A Cornel Christmas Message

December, 2006
Dear Cornel Alumni:
Season's greetings to one and all from

Christmas is just around the corner and there are the usual wonderful festivities that come with this time of the year. We will continue with the tradition of drawing names for our ‘Secret Santa' exchange of gifts and on December 16 th Santa Claus will give out gifts at the annual Kindergarten Christmas party where parents, students and staff will celebrate together at the International Plaza Hotel. Then we have our annual staff party to look forward to on December 23 rd – always an exciting event.

We would also like to bring you all up to date on what has happened at Cornel over the past year. Each year there are improvements as Cornel continues to provide the best services possible with the best facilities possible and 2006 was no exception. Cornel now has 464 students, 33 Chinese staff, and 25 foreign staff. Lucy Huang was recently promoted to Chinese Director at Hueijhong, a just reward for many years of dedicated service to Cornel.

The recording studio at the Nan Men campus is fully utilized by both Chinese and foreign staff. Rainbow Time is back on the radio winning a contest for the second year held by the National Education Radio station to present our stories in both English and Chinese. The students continue to enjoy reading and listening to the Rainbow Time stories presented for their entertainment and education complete with a variety of voices, music and sound effects. Our teachers are in demand at various libraries, the Tiachung Cultural Center , AIT American Corner at the Taichung library, and Caves and Eslit bookstores, for regularly doing storytelling and bringing English to the general public of Taichung . Our libraries at both campuses continue to grow, as do our library services. There are now over 10 000 books in the two libraries for use by students and parents.

Throughout the year we celebrated holidays, birthdays, and many special events. The 2005/2006 school year was rounded off in June with an outstanding Graduation ceremony held at the Taichung Cultural Center .

As usual the ‘newies' arrived at the end of June and soon settled into the Cornel fray. In August a staff outing was arranged to Tong-Hsiao Beach Resort in Maoli County, where great fun was had by all; playing volleyball, swimming in the ocean, watching Russian magicians and acrobats and getting into the ‘war zone' with ‘Paint Ball'. In October the foreign staff gathered once more for the traditional Moon Festival barbeque at Bih Hua's house where, of course, the most delicious food was enjoyed.

On December 1 st ninety-five student teachers studying Early Childhood Care and Education from Tajen University in Pingtung, visited the Nan Men campus. The Cornel Administration and teachers went out of their way to make it an exciting and informative visit. The student teachers were suitably impressed.

Family members and friends of our foreign teachers have visited or still plan to visit Cornel before the end of the year. The most memorable visit was by Yve and Marty Zinaman. It was a grand occasion with the all the Kindergarten students singing ‘You are my sunshine' followed by a tea party on the third floor at the Nan Men Campus. The students also delighted the Zinamans with their songs and excellent oral abilities when they visited each of the Kindergarten classrooms. In the afternoon they continued their visit at the Hueijhong campus, visiting some Yves classrooms.

Although we have had the usual staff changes, fifteen of the current foreign teaching and administrative staff of twenty-five have been at Cornel for two years or longer. Besides the regular program, the summer program offered in July and August, remedial classes and classes in science, drama, music, art, chess, public speaking, and writing, we have a very successful Graduate program with the biggest group at 17 junior high school students, which proves we still offer the best English program for the children of Taichung .

Ron and Bev Ball went home to Canada to unite their family and there was great joy when the first grandson, Adison, was born on November 4 th to their eldest son Tyler and wife, Jen.

Devon Reid and Maryke tied the knot in East London , South Africa .

In closing I want to wish you and your families a Merry Christmas and a very happy and prosperous New Year.

Love from us all at
Bih Hua Chen
Principal