ISSH Summer School Co-ordinators, Ms. Spentzos and Mr. Nicholson, said that a third of the 164 students attending ISSH Summer School 2015 are from other schools.

Most of the students live in Japan, and are either from Japanese or other international schools. The majority of these students are in the Kindergarten and attend for the experience of English education.

A few students have travelled long distances to join a diverse international community for the two-week summer session. Students have come from countries as far as Indonesia, Guam, Malaysia, Taiwan, Turkey, and South Africa. Multiple students arrived from some countries: two students each from Kazakhstan and Shanghai, and four from USA.

Aimi, a grade 7 student who has attended ISSH’s Summer School for the past three years, came with her sister from Kazakhstan to Japan as they are half Japanese. She chose ISSH for the chance to be at an English speaking school, because she does not attend an English speaking school in Kazakhstan.
Rika, a grade 10 student from Johannesburg, South Africa, has attended international schools in other countries, but wanted to travel specifically to Japan. She said, “I’ve just experienced international schools in other countries, not in Japan, which is my nationality, so I wanted to experience what kind of life that is.”

Rika also chose ISSH because it is a Catholic school, and she felt familiar with this as she had previously attended a Japanese Catholic school. “I felt kind of familiar with Catholic school, so I wanted to choose summer school in a Catholic school. I’m thinking that I’m losing my Japanese language, so I did not choose a Japanese school in Japan. Instead, I chose this international school.”

Rika enjoys ISSH’s compact, clean, and welcoming environment. The classes are also smaller, so they provide more personal and focused interaction with teachers. Rika said, “It’s because the community is small, I feel kind of very different in a way. Because it’s not like teachers are like ‘Do this, do that, do this,’ but instead teachers say, ‘Let’s maybe do this, let’s do it together.’”

Both Aimi and Rika received a friend’s recommendation to come to ISSH. Ms. Spentzos and Mr. Nicholson said that word of mouth is the most common way of people finding out about ISSH Summer School. Ms. Spentzos said, “Almost always, if the applicant was not a Sacred Heart student, they had heard about our program through the recommendation of a friend.”

The Summer School Co-ordinators said that many students from other schools choose ISSH’s summer school because of ISSH’s proximity to their homes, low competitive prices, extended care service for longer hours, and customisable programs with a number of courses to choose from.

“We’re very central, I can’t imagine another program of this size which is so nicely located. We’re offering about 35 different courses for students to choose from so there’s a feeling that you can really get something you’re interested in, and not just sign up for a generic program,” said Mr. Nicholson.