Pastoral care refers to the practice of “looking after the personal and social well being of children”. It can involve a huge variety of issues including health related, social and morality issues, learning needs, behaviour management and emotional support.
At KYS, pastoral care is the primary feature in the housemaster system. The housemaster of each house is responsible for pastoral care of students in his house without unnecessary intrusion and they are on call 24/7.
The welfare, educational needs and progress of the students in the houses are integral to the pastoral care of students. This includes housemasters seeing to the students learning needs, meeting with families or teachers as necessary, dealing with behavioural or disciplinary issues, overseeing and leading the House Team in its meetings and activities, arranging for health care, look into safety and security of students and ensuring that there is no unnecessary encroachment into the privacy of the students.
Housemasters manage leadership needs at house level. There is also a tutor system in each house. The housemasters together with his house tutors look after their students’ personalisation of learning, intellectual stimulation, attitudinal and physical development.
Within the boarding houses, the housemasters are responsible for the social environment, in particular the interactions among the junior and the senior house members should be one of respect, acceptance and welcoming.
Food check is conducted daily by the housemasters to ensure that healthy food are prepared for students.
The best practices in pastoral care ensures that the students are safe, well taken care of and are living in a conducive for learning environment.
House Leadership and Personality Development
Each house has its own House Committee, headed by a House Captain. The other members in the House Committee are a Deputy House Captain, Secretary I and II, Treasurer I and II , Sports Head, Food and Accommodations Head, Special Tasks Head, House Discipline Head, Health and Safety Head and Religious Affairs Head. House Committee members usually consist mainly of senior house members who are in Form 4 and Form 5. Assisted by their housemasters, they provide the leadership style for their own houses and at the same time train their junior house members in leadership skills to run house activities and inter-house competitions. There is a clear involvement of House Committee members managing the entire house. The roles of House Committee are clearly defined to avoid an overlap of responsibilities with the College Committee, a body representing the students at school level, which is headed by a Head Boy and a Head Girl.
In line with our effort to develop future leaders and captains of industries, the opportunity for leadership experience is extended to involve more students, thus the appointment of dorm leaders. A dorm leader takes care of the dorm he stays in. Usually he has to provide leadership for eleven other dorm members. This provision acts as a cross training for other leadership needs at school level, for example the College Committee and Presidents of clubs and societies.
Every new house member is assigned to a house buddy of the same gender. The role of the house buddy is to assist the new house member to understand both the housemaster and also the school systems. Usually the duration of the house buddy arrangement is at the discretion of housemasters.
Students do independent learning in prep classes. One or two senior house members are put into the same prep class of new students to ensure proper prep class management.