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When we were here from 2016-2018, I had the chance to put together a slideshow of memories for the Grads of 2018. It was really fun to take a brief look at a portion of their school journey and to reminisce alongside them, while knowing full well that we were only present for a short bit of their school experience.
In 2019, we were on furlough or we would have also made one for the awesome Class of 2019 who we were so sad to miss during their Senior Year at UIS.
This year, we were back in Ukarumpa and I would have done the same for the Class of 2020 but then the whole world turned upside down.
A number of unexpected circumstances, both in my life personally and around the world, later and I finally have their video ready for them to enjoy.
Have a watch and, while you're at it, would you pray for the Class of 2020? They are spread out all over the world and we love them, along with all the classes we've seen graduate from UIS in our short time here in PNG!
Thank you, friends!
www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYon2bfuK2o
www.youtube.com
Some memories for the Class of 2020 of Ukarumpa International School#uissc #classof2020I have purchased all of the songs played in this video but do not own ...Happy New Year from Papua New Guinea 🇵🇬 (and, yes, Lucy is wearing a fake mustache. It just wasn’t a battle I felt like picking and it makes for a much more accurate family photo 😉 ) !
Thank you all so much for your love and support over this past year.
We have experienced the power of your prayers so clearly in 2020 and we are thankful for the numerous reminders of how God has carried us through and heaped upon us blessings in the midst of difficult things.
He is truly always faithful and always showering us with love if only we have eyes to see His hand and hearts softened to experience His peace and presence even if He doesn’t remove the struggles.
He sits with us and we desire, in 2021, to feel His presence more palpably and to let the magnitude of who He is give us hope for the hard days. It is our prayer that we, our kids, the people of PNG and the youth we teach and serve here in PNG and spread out throughout the world, would grow in their understanding of who this amazing God is through the power of His written word and the reality of His presence.
Happy New Year dear friends!
Love Jon and Anita & crew
Merry Christmas from Papua New Guinea! Love and miss our dear family and friends at home but thankful that our immediate family is together and so thankful for dear friends to share the day with here. Living overseas has given us a head start on imagining Christmases without our loved ones and, while I"ll never completely get used to it, I have been thankful for new traditions, surprise gifts in the midst of some of the loneliness and beautifully quiet and slow-paced Christmases in Ukarumpa.
Praying that, wherever you are, whoever you're with, that you will find beautiful gifts in the midst of the loneliness this year. I have no doubt that He will meet you in this season and give it a new and special meaning for you and your family.
Much love to you all and many many thanks for being the people that stand with us and love & support us from afar on a regular basis. We are so thankful for you all.
Merry Christmas!
love the McCarthy's
Jon is a great teacher and has really enjoyed teaching Physics, Chemistry and Biology since we returned to PNG. Here's a little snapshot of him teaching overtop of the rain sound. He's got pretty good projection normally but the rain can be SO loud!
youtu.be/qjHjB5diHVs
#mccarthysinpng #sendthemccarthys #servingthroughteaching #teachingovertherain #chemistry #uissc #PNG #cometeachhere #cometeachwithus #cometeachatuis #TeachBeyond #Wycliffe
youtu.be
Jon trying to teach above the noise of the rain 🙂 If you are interested in teaching at Ukarumpa International School, check out teachbeyond.org/png!#uissc #...Ever since the onset of Covid, the wonderful people in our directorate have had to re-think our, previously three times per week, market.
People from off centre come to Ukarumpa and sell the produce from their gardens. It is a great way for all of us in Ukarumpa to support local villages and get delicious produce in the process.
Since April, we have had market only once a week and, while that might be a slight inconvenience considering we have to find space in our fridges for a weeks worth of fruit and veggies once they've all been bleached, we are just so thankful that we can have a market that complies with the Covid guidelines put in place by the PNG government.
We are so happy to comply and happy that we can still support the villages surrounding Ukarumpa by purchasing their produce and we are thankful for all of the volunteers who have been working at the market week after week to make sure that it can be run safely.
Jon has been helping out since April and is happy to do a small part to make this possible. Huge thanks to our friend and neighbour, Jon Jagt, for doing the bulk of the organizing and scheduling of volunteers to make this market a success.
Every time we jam our fridge full of fresh produce on a Wednesday, we think about how grateful we are that we can still interact with the members of the Aiyura valley in this safe Covid-compliant way and we know that none of that would be possible unless people like our neighbour and friend, Jon, stepped up and committed to volunteering for an undetermined amount of time. We also know that we couldn’t be here without people like you supporting us financially and in prayer.
This new normal is a reminder of the wonderful community in which we live and the community at home in Canada that we love and miss and we are thankful.
#mccarthysinpng #sendthemccarthys #newnormal #covidprotocols #freshproduce #marketwednesday #makeroominthefridge #eatthemupfast #butnottoofast #servingtogether
This is the current staff at Ukarumpa International School - Secondary Campus. We are missing quite a few due to Covid but we are so thankful for those who are serving and those who are trying to make it back.
Please continue to pray for our colleagues who are trying to return to PNG but are running into intense travel snags and delays.
Thank you so much, friends!
Anita
#mccarthysinpng #sendthemccarthys #servingthroughteaching #servingtogether #supportingbibletranslation #skeletoncrew #Godsincontrol #prayingourcolleaguesbacksafely #sendmoreteachers #cometeachhere #cometeachwithus #cometeachatuis #uis #uissc
Just a little Alpha vs Beta ultimate firsbee. Love these students and their passion for all things fun and active.
I've also really enjoyed watching the middle schoolers get in on the action whenever possible!
#mccarthysinpng #sendthemccarthys #ultimatefrisbee #alphavsbeta #leadershipevents #communitybuilding #lotsoffun #uis #uissc #cometeachhere #cometeachwithus #cometeachatuis
Sometimes Physics labs get thwarted by wood posts that aren't quite level 🙂 Jon is really enjoying teaching Physics this year and, here, he is trying to arrange this wood post so that that a ball can drop through two photo gates that keep moving ever so slightly.
Thankful for his many skills and the flexibility he has to adapt to whatever needs present themselves at this school.
We're always looking for more teachers and we specifically need teachers for the 2021-2022 school year. Would you like to come and teach with us?
You can visit teachbeyond.org/png for more details!
#mccarthysinpng #sendthemccarthys #uissc #uis #servingthroughteaching #cometeachhere #cometeachwithus #cometeachatuis #physics #PNG #supportingbibletranslation
Flash card treble vs bass cleff note identification races? Yes, please!
So thankful for the wonderful music teachers here at UIS and especially thankful for this friend who is currently the only band teacher for both the Primary Campus and Secondary Campus.
Courtney continues to serve joyfully as a teacher, a community group leader and a volunteer for many events that benefit the student body. She is a gifted musician and she has a special way of imparting those gifts to others.
Please join me in praying that her musical colleagues would be able to return and that the school would be able to, once again, run separate bands and a choir without putting undo strain on the staff.
Thank you so much!
#mccarthysinpng #sendthemccarthys #servingthroughteaching #musiceducation #uis #uispc #uissc #cometeachhere #cometeachwithus #cometeachatuis #PNG #supportingbibletranslation
You know those teachers who create hands-on experiences that you can really relate to and that inspire you to learn and experience more in relation to your studies? Donna Smith, our colleage at UISSC, is one of those teachers.
In the first term of 2020-2021, Donna created an irrigation lab simulation that complimented her unit on Mesopotamia in her middle school Western Civilization class. Ben is a part of her 7th grade class and had an amazing time acting as part of her tribe of hunter-gatherers who were wandering down into the fertile river valley of Mesopotamia - otherwise known as the dirt behind the audiovisual room and a garden hose in the hand of the teacher.
The students learned agriculture and created little farm plots in the dirt and then had to respond to periodic flooding by inventing irrigation canals, dams, and reservoirs.
It was an amazing, inspiring, activity for Ben (and I'm sure so many others) and it inspired a few afternoons of problem solving, creating and flooding in the ditch in front of our house in the week that followed.
So thankful for teachers who are passionate about teaching the material and creative about the way in which it is delivered and thankful that Ben had the chance to do something that really meshed with his massively creative mind.
Would you please keep praying for all of our colleagues as they teach here at UIS and would you continue to pray that more staff would be able to return to PNG to start teaching once again? The staffing situation for next semester and next year is not ideal and we would always love to find other teachers who want to come and teach with us!
go.teachbeyond.org/Ukarumpa+International+School/
Thank you, friends!
#mccarthysinpng #sendthemccarthys #servingthroughteaching #creativelessons #InspiringLearning #learnwithyourhands #uis #uissc #cometeachhere #cometeachwithus #cometeachatuis #PNG #supportingbibletranslation #Wycliffe
This is the Class of 2021!
Would you pray for this group of students? Would you pray that God would seek out each one of their hearts in a clear way? Would you pray that they would listen to His voice and follow His invitation to live a life that is focused on Him and His Kingdom and His plans? Would you pray that they might have wisdom and discernment as they make big decisions about their futures?
We are thankful that God has put each one of them here, in PNG, together and we count it a privilege to share life with them in small ways.
Thank you, friends!
#mccarthysinpng #sendthemccarthys #servingthroughteaching #classof2021 #seniors #PrayForWisdom #almostreadytolaunchintotheworld #multicultural #PNG #America #korea #australia #netherlands
This is our friend, Crystal. Crystal and her husband came to PNG at the same time that we did and attended the same POC (Pacific Orientation Course - the cross cultural and language training that we did in Madang before coming up to Ukarumpa in 2016). She and her husband have 4 boys, similar ages to our kids and their oldest two are in the same grades as Ben & Jacob.
As we approached the 2020-2021 school year, there were many gaps in staffing at both the Secondary and Primary campuses and many volunteers were needed from within the community to make things work. There were classroom helpers needed, specials teachers needed for Art, PE & Music and a need for teachers who hadn't planned on teaching this year to step back into those roles and even teach a grade or subject that they'd never taught before to make in-person schooling possible.
Crystal is one of the awesome parent volunteers who has helped to make this school year possible and we are so thankful.
I am thankful for her contagious joy and relaxed demeanour and I am thankful for the friendship that Ben shares with their oldest.
Mostly, I am thankful for each and every member of our community who has willingly given of their free time to contribute to a feasible solution for offering full day school to the kids and youth of Ukarumpa.
Our kids thank you and we thank you. Would you pray for all of the members of our community who are going above and beyond and who might feel stretched or tired right now? Would you pray that God's strength and joy would fill them up so that it can pour of out them like it does out of Crystal and so many others who give of their talents day after day.
Thank you, friends!
#mccarthysinpng #sendthemccarthys #servingthroughteaching #servingthroughvolunteering #fillingtheneeds #inpersonschool #suchaprivilegerightnow #prayfortheworld #prayforpng #covid #Godsstillincontrol #uispc #uis #cometeachhere #cometeachwithus #cometeachatuis
