Dear Chinthes,

This week our high school volleyball teams had a mixed time in their respective semifinals. Our boys team won and our girls team lost. Please read below for more information on how to cheer for both our teams in their respective final games.
Calling all high school runners! There is still a chance to trial for the high school SEASAC cross country team. Please read below in the SEASAC section for your opportunity to represent ISY and get fit while doing it!
ISY held its first swim meet of the season. This was an internal swim meet to give our swimmers a chance to practice what it is like to compete in a swim competition. A review of the meet can be found in the Swim Team section below.
Our middle school basketball players continue to do well against the other international schools from around Yangon. They played two matches this week. To find out how they did continue reading in the Middle School Athletics section below.

Middle school basketball action

Middle School Athletics

This week the middle school basketballers had two matches. These matches were against International School Myanmar (ISM) and Yangon International School (YIS). With the teams building up to the middle school end of season tournament next week these games gave our young athletes a good indication of what’s going well and what areas they need to improve on.
First up on Tuesday was ISM. This game was played at ISM and the teams went with great anticipation.
The first game to be played was the girls. The girls have been playing well this year and wanted to continue this momentum. They started well with a small lead and quickly maintained that lead throughout the first half. They continued this throughout the second half and eventually won comfortably.
The boys were next. The boys have also played well this year and are improving with every game. The boys started strong with a 8-0 lead in the first quarter. However, ISM changed their gameplan to a faster style which ISY struggled to contain. At the end of the match ISM won 13-26. This was a good game to have for the team because it will help them revise their playing style coming into next week’s tournament.
The next matches were at YIS on Thursday. The first challenge was to get to the venue as the roads around YIS were flooded! With this challenge successfully negotiated it was time to play basketball.
The boys would play the first of these matches. YIS started well and the ISY boys took a little while to warm into the match. They were competitive for the whole match but only in the third quarter showed what they could do. This was an exciting game but ultimately YIS would be eventual winners.
There is a lot of potential in the boys team and their coaches and players are working very hard to build on their skills for next week’s final tournament.
Next up it was the girls turn. The girls were challenged in this game and it wasn’t an easy game for them at all. YIS were able to play tight, sometimes too tight, defense on our players. This made scoring difficult at times. However, after a close first quarter where the lead changed hands several times, the girls were able to maintain a comfortable lead. The girls kept this lead for the whole game and won the game 15-6.
Both teams have one more game next week on Wednesday at home against ISM and then it’s the big end of season tournament on Friday next week.

High school volleyball action

High School Athletics

This week is the culmination of the high school volleyball team’s Yangon Athletic Conference (YAC) season. On Wednesday the semi finals were held for both the girls and boys teams. ISY hosted the boys semi final versus Yangon International School (YIS) and our girls team traveled to International School Myanmar (ISM).
The girls have improved a lot this year and have shown in patches their determination and ability. However, they would not be able to play with the consistency that they know they can do. The girls were competitive in each set but ultimately went down 0-3 to ISM.
ISY teams love the home court advantage and our boys wanted to put on a great show for the crowd, which they did. Although there were times where YIS put up a good fight, the boys from ISY showed how much they have learnt this year and ran out comfortable winners 3-0.
This sets ISY up for the finals today, Friday 29 September. The finals will be played at YIS and will start at 4:00 PM with the girls 3rd/4th and 1st/2nd playoffs. Our ISY girls will be playing for 3rd/4th. Our boys will then play their championship match at the conclusion of the girls’ games. It would be great to see all the Chinthes there supporting our high school volleyball teams.

SEASAC Information

The high school cross country team is looking for more members. By training for this team you will improve your fitness by a long way! You will feel good about yourself and your added fitness levels will help you with other sports.
You will be expected to run a 5km race but by then you will be so fit this will be easy for you!
If you are interested in running please speak with Mr. Just or contact me on my email at the end of this blog about this exciting opportunity.

The Southeast Asian Student Activities Conference is the athletics and activities conference that ISY belongs to outside of Myanmar. Each year ISY sends students to athletic, Model United Nations conferences and arts festivals. These events are a very valuable opportunity for our students to connect with other like minded students across Southeast Asia. This section in the Athletics and Activities blog will outline some of the important information and general happenings around SEASAC events.

SEASAC Dates:
SEASAC Football @ British School Jakarta, November 3, 4, 5
SEASAC Volleyball @ NIST, Bangkok, November 3, 4, 5
SEASAC Golf @ Bangkok Patana School, November 22, 23, 24
SEASAC Cross Country @ Garden International School, Malaysia, November 24, 25

Swim Team

The first swim meet at ISY this year has been a success. I would first like to thank all the volunteers for their help last Friday. No swim meet can take place without volunteers and we are lucky enough to have a wonderful swim community at ISY. Thank you to the parents and teachers that helped with this event.
I hear that the event was a great success and our swimmers all achieved goals at this event. The first goal for our younger swimmers was to experience a swim meet. The students will now understand what it’s like to be in a meet and what they can expect. This is very important for our new members of the ISY swim team.
Another goal would have been to set and/or improve times. This can be hard when a swimmer has had the summer off from training. However, on looking through the times I am pleased to say that most swimmers met or bettered their personal best times.
All in all I would say that this was a successful event.

Here are the training times for our elementary, middle and high school swim teams.

ES Swim Team:
Monday, Wednesday and Friday 2:20-3:20 PM

MS and HS Swim Team:
Monday, Wednesday and Friday 3:30-5:00 PM
Tuesday and Thursday 6:45-7:45 AM

After School Activities 

Please remember that elementary school ASAs finish at 3:05pm and middle and high school ASAs finish at 3:25pm. Students will be ready for pick up from the Teak Steps at these times. When elementary school ASAs have finished, elementary school students should be waiting at the Teak Steps for pickup, even if they are waiting for an older sibling.

ASA Times:

Elementary school ASAs 2:25pm-3:05pm

Middle and High school ASAs 2:40pm-3:25pm

ISY Sports Broadcasting

Last year a sports broadcasting club was started at ISY. They were able to cover some of our high school basketball games with great success. They produced a very professionally polished product.
This year they will cover our high school athletics for the whole year. If you are interested in this please follow the link below and this will lead you to the group’s Youtube page. So far the group has covered two high school volleyball games and some of the high school basketball games from last year.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIzBh86SGxeV22RG6ZHYW2g

Community Sport

There are currently two community sport opportunities happening at ISY. The first is community touch rugby. This is held on the ISY field from 5:30 PM every Thursday. Touch rugby is a fast paced game and easy to learn and is a great way to meet new people from our community and around Yangon. All levels of experience and fitness are encouraged. Come along and give it a try.

On Saturday, there is an opportunity for parents to play badminton. Each Saturday there will be community badminton in the ISY gym from 2-4 PM. You will need to bring your own rackets and birdies.

Questions or More Information

As always, if you have any questions about what is in this blog or anything else that you may think of related to activities or athletics please feel free to contact me at:

josullivan@isyedu.org

Kindest regards,

Mr. Jonathan O’Sullivan

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