My background is a school leader and IB curriculum trainer. When I moved to Switzerland, I met the future co-founder of Lucerne International School, who is also a parent. He needed a solution for his sons that he couldn’t find. We started slowly building up personalised education for his eldest son and then launched Lucerne International High School 3 years ago. We started completely from scratch and opened the school with zero students, soon we had 7 students and parents started to be interested saying that their child does not fit into a regular school for reasons varying from personal ambitions to professional sport or health issues, – Kamran Baig, Lucerne International School Founding Director.
Photo: Lucerne International School
Today Lucerne International School accommodates 45 students from age 15 to 18 and expects that next year enrollment will reach up to 55 students. The full capacity that the current campus may accept is 120 students. This is the new 689 m2 facility where the school recently moved. “It was clear that we needed more flexible space with a greater number of classrooms to accommodate students who are both in classes and working independently. We also needed to make sure that we are in compliance with the regulations of the JCQ for holding exams”, says Kamran Baig.
Campus consists of traditional classrooms, a specialised science laboratory, an art room, a number of spaces that students use for collaborative study and a “silent study room” to work independently. Campus is decentralised, meaning that the cafeteria and gym are located close to the school.
Kamran Baig believes that personalised approach demands a certain space and attitude. He personally knows teachers, students and their families. This is the part of the school fabric: to track not just academic success, but also to care about well-being and safety.
When the school reaches 100 -120 students, another campus will be launched in the other location.
“To manage 1000+ students is possible when they are located in different campuses, even in different cities. I used to work a lot in Japan and this concept of multiple campuses with an overarching philosophy body is inspired by a Japanese school system “N” School” when a publishing company with online resources decided to start classes in office buildings, where students would go and flexibly work with teachers. Today they have about 20,000 students all over the country”.
Online and Offline Learning Balance
Lucerne International School’s team assumes that a personalised approach might be realised the best within a balance between online and offline learning.
The online learning is provided by an online provider that was carefully chosen — National Extension College. Students work through the set of courses with online tutors, do exercises, do assignments that are graded by their online tutors. Lucerne International School provides them with school computers which are controlled in terms of what they can access to obtain the focus of their learning environment.
National Extension College was established 60 years ago in the UK. Their founders also launched the Open University and it was the first distance learning university. Searching for a provider Kamran Baig personally met their CEO to discuss the online programmes and content. “It was the start of a very close partnership, we discussed a lot face to face and gave feedbacks. And we are still in a very collaborative relationship, our partners also feel that personalised, adaptive learning models are the future of education”, - says Kamran.
There are a lot of online providers and courses in the world. Some instruments are specifically adapted for the school from the context of the curriculum, and some are quite bespoke because the British international standard requires specific subject combinations to enter the universities.
The offline learning is a compulsory part of the curriculum. Students come to school five days a week and work offline with teachers and classmates. Teachers’ main task is to help students and to guide them. They check that students have a chief demonstration of the topics, set the goals. This allows students to have different points in the same class. School team believes it is important to have teachers guiding students face to face, because online remote learning only works with highly motivated young people. As a blended-learning or hybrid system, the personalised study programme is integrated into all of the classes. Students are typically at a different point of their course compared to their peers. Classes incorporate group work such as debates and presentations where it is appropriate to consolidate the understanding of the concepts covered in class. This is subject-specific and is done at the discretion of the teacher.
Photo: Lucerne International School
“We have a monitoring system of the students’ attendance. They can be off campus only by an agreement with their parents: we don’t want them to come back and forth freely because we believe that only a structured hybrid environment is efficient”, - tells Kamran.
The learning balance comes with benefits: students benefit from working with a teacher who gives them immediate feedback, answers their questions, who is an expert in the subject. And they benefit from coming to school, having a social life, working with their classmates and having personal teacher support and guidance.
Personalised learning allows students to move through topics, investigate quickly, they’ll have more time to develop their knowledge and understanding on more difficult areas. “If some school says “we have small classes” – that’s not a personalised education and that’s not an adaptive learning environment”, tells Kamran Baig.
Students come to school at 9.15 am. Educational researches have shown that teenagers do better when the school day starts later. Depending on their individual timetable based on subject choices, students would either have classes with teachers and fellow students or go to the self-guided learning spaces – individually or in small groups.
We have a structured timetable and expect students to be on campus 5 days a week, unless otherwise is agreed in advance. Lunch is taken at the same time to foster a sense of community. Students can stay on campus or go to Business Park cafeteria as we are a part of it. Afternoon classes follow the same format.
Every Wednesday we have a Student Council Assembly. All students are automatically the part of the student council - there should be a democratic input regarding the school working. We believe that they should have a voice in shaping their own school. During conventional school holidays, students are encouraged to continue studying remotely when necessary as they can communicate with their tutors through the online platform for their courses.
Kamran Baig
Admission Process and Students’ Progress Tracking
In Lucerne International School a personalised approach starts from the admissions.
The British Curriculum is different from the IB: it allows students to concentrate on their strengths and they can pick certain subjects, spend more time focusing on them. For students taking iGCSE subjects, English Language and Mathematics, as well as the first level of the Project Qualification are compulsory. Other subjects are decided by the needs and interests of the student and the desired work or study beyond school graduation.
Polina says that some students join for the transfer grade, some plan to take a gap year before the university, but most of the students plan to enter the university, and then the question is what university and where. When the personal schedule and timeline is completed for each student, it is discussed with an academic team and learning coach. Then Microschool Team Platform is used to track the progress. Personal channels are created in the Platform for each student. All teachers, learning coaches and tutors have access to the channels. They give weekly comments for each student and subject section.
Photo: Lucerne International School
“Personalised approach doesn’t end in virtual classrooms or in the channel - it continues in the office communication, all the school team is involved; it’s always on, never on pause”, says Kamran Baig.
July 2024
