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Diversity is our Strength

By Anonymous

What Makes Our Students Special?

          'Our Community is our Village and our Diversity is our Strength'.

We are proud of the fact that we have around 50 nationalities represented in our school. Even so, each one of us is still 99.9% genetically identical to everyone else. But, it’s the 0.1% that provides for the beautiful diversity in our world.

There is a great deal of research that shows that babies and young children do not see differences. It is as we get older that we tend to separate ourselves in to groupings based around artificial notions such as race, color and faith. We are not born with these tendencies; we acquire them.  As an international school, we are uniquely placed to help our young students see past these artificial barriers that society tends to create.

Although we are one race, the 0.1% variation is vital. One of the things that has made the human race so successful is its diversity and its ability to adapt. The most successful businesses understand that narrow-minded thinking is limited and destined to fail. In so many ways, diversity of opinion and approach are vital to sustained success.

Unfortunately, we are living in a time when isolationism seems to be a trend in some countries. A trend in which some seek to cut ties, build fences and alienate whole groups of people.

Fortunately, history also shows us that those who tend to isolationism are destined to fail. The trend of history is towards embracing diversity, inclusion and valuing different views.
Those who act and think otherwise tend to be on the wrong side of history. Personally, I comforted by the fact that the current trend will be a small blip in the history of humanity.

Here at The International School of Belgrade, we live by a core values; Empathy, Integrity, Respect and Responsibility. We believe we are stronger because of our diversity and we celebrate it as much as we can

Here at ISB:
  • We have around 50 nationalities with even more languages
  • We support several  Mother Tongue programs and growing all the time.
  • We are a truly beautiful melting pot of humanity, all learning from each other and learning together. Our IB programs are purposefully designed to do the same.
  • We have incredibly supportive parents who help set the tone, and help create our culture of a proudly diverse and inclusive place for children to grow and learn; to become the world’s future leaders.
  • Our wonderful PTSA brings our community together for fun and fund raising through events like the International Spring Fair where we celebrate our diversity.
  • Our students and teachers are encouraged and empowered to work together to make a difference in the world - just this week our students are fundraising for the Australian Bush fires and we are rolling out several school wide initiatives to reduce our impact on the environment.

 We know that our children’s world will be even more inclusive and diverse. To be successful, students need to have experienced that in school.

Enrichissons-nous des nos differences.
Paul Valery

Andrew Derry   
February 2020

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