Harrow International School, Bangkok

Since 2011, Harrow, Bangkok, has provided vital support in the form of candidate entry fees for Cambridge students and material support for refugee and migrant schools. However, Harrow was prepared to make their involvement more meaningful: their staff providing expertise as Cambridge examiners, and by giving up their weekends to come to Mae Sot or into Myanmar to deliver exams. They also involved themselves in cultural events where Harrow pupils worked with refugee and migrant pupils on joint projects.

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But in effect, the impact of the Cambridge went much further than this as the teachers, through their own studies, picked up new teaching techniques which they applied in the classroom. Eventually, this led to the development of a new MEP initiative called ‘Cambridge Plus’, which incorporates Cambridge exams with the training of local mobile units of teacher trainers.

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What has, in fact, been created is a system of cooperation in which a large, well-resourced organisation can work with a small, well-skilled organisation, creating a working model that maximises the strengths of both.