Welcome to Students Incorporated, a podcast exploring the topics of business, education,
technology and design.
I'm your host, Mr. Jason.
Join me weekly as my team and I produce content that's informative, positive, fun and uplifting.
Episodes include student conversations, interviews with thought leaders and inspirational stories
with an international flavor.
This podcast is created and produced with the help of students from the International
Community School of Bangkok.
In today's episode, we'll be introducing two teachers who are new to our school.
We are excited to get to hear their stories and we welcome them to our community.
But before we jump into our guest segments, let's hear the quote of the day and get some
headline news.
Our quote of the day comes from Simon Sinek.
He is quoted to have said,
Life is beautiful not because of the things we see or do.
Life is beautiful because of the people we meet.
It is the profound connections we make with others that truly define the beauty of life.
Embrace the power of human connections, for it is through the people we meet that our
lives become richer, more meaningful and truly extraordinary.
Japan's release of the Fukushima nuclear power plant, Wastewater, has sparked backlash
from numerous countries in the area.
These countries have banned seafood imports from Japan due to health concerns.
The impact from these bans on imported seafood would cause Japan to lose billions of yen,
which would impact the local economy in Japan and also drive up fish prices in countries
that import seafood from Japan.
There is also an environmental concern due to some countries possibly increasing their
amount of fishing, leading to overfishing.
A Taiwanese electric vehicle company, Goguro, and two companies from the Philippines are
partnering up to form a joint venture.
The goal of the partnership is to increase productivity at Goguro's electrical scooters
that rely on swappable batteries found in different stations throughout the country.
The companies claim that the cooperation will be an environmentally friendly solution for
transportation that is both scalable and sustainable.
Back to the tourism industry, hotels in Thailand have seen a 20% decline in Chinese tourists
as compared to pre-pandemic conditions.
Additionally, China has been increasing its domestic tourist attractions with the hopes
of boosting its own economy.
Thailand's new prime minister has promised to improve the tourism industry, yet the help
may be delayed until the government is formed.
Thank you, Rebecca and Premi.
Now let's jump into the first part of our episode.
We'll start off by introducing our guest with some icebreaker questions.
Mr. Keith, could you tell us a little bit about yourself?
Yes.
I am teaching geometry and engineering foundations.
I grew up in the United States.
I lived in Florida, Virginia, Michigan, and also taught in Hong Kong for four years.
Thank you.
Our first question is, who is your hero?
So I really had to think about this and I thought of Christian philosophers and I like
history and read history, but I really had to decide on a heroine, Ahsoka Tano, which
is funny because her episodes came out recently, but I really respected her a long time ago
because she really saw, I'm trying not to give spoilers, but when the Jedi Order represented
all this good character, really was misguided, she saw that and she stepped away from it,
even when it was difficult for her.
So I really respected that, even what everyone thought, this is, we should be part of this
Jedi Order, she's like, no, they're not following truth anymore, so I'm going to go off on my
own.
And at the same time, she was very compassionate.
You always see the compassionate side heart.
So the balance of truth and compassion, I think she's a great character.
Up next, what is your biggest fear?
So this is maybe a little cliche, but I would say my biggest fear is fear itself.
So when I look back, I would say that when I was afraid of something and held back, that
those are the times I look back and regret.
But then times I was courageous, like when my wife said, what do you think about going
and teaching internationally?
And I was like, yeah, let's go for it, just no fear.
And we did it.
And that's been a big reward.
So I struggle to think of animals or anything I'm afraid of, because I love animals and
bugs and stuff.
So I usually can't pull out one of those.
Yeah, but that's definitely very valid and very real, fear and fear itself.
I can understand, I relate to that.
Our next question, what is your go-to karaoke song?
If you don't do karaoke, then what is your favorite road trip song or playlist?
Yeah, I try not to punish people with karaoke too much.
So I had to go with more road trip.
And the songs I always enjoy and ask Alexa to play are Rich Mullen songs.
So Rich Mullen's You May Know Awesome God, which is a big classic.
A lot of people know Awesome God, and it's just that song that makes you want to jump
up and shout.
But at the same time, he has Hold Me Jesus, I'm Shaking Like a Leaf.
So just those times when you're just fearful, right?
Or overwhelmed, just that's a good song that guides you to look to Jesus for that strength.
Wow, I'll have to listen to some of those songs sometime.
And for our last icebreaker, what was your weirdest and most random class you took in
high school or college?
And if you don't want to share any, what grade did you get for that class?
Oh, I didn't know you were going to ask about the grade.
I didn't take many weird classes, but I got to tell you about the statistics class I took.
So I was in engineering and engineers traditionally don't like statistics.
So it's even a class like statistics for engineers.
And the professor, and this is back in the 90s, the professor said, I'm going to post
all the notes.
He didn't take attendance.
So I was like, this is great.
I'm going to just read everything.
I'll just come in on test day.
And I planned on coming on the day before the test because he would do test review.
Well, I came in for test review.
He had moved the test up.
All I had was a pen with me, no calculator.
So I was like, I got to take the test.
So I took the whole test and I wrote on almost every question.
I don't have a calculator, but if I did, this is what I would type in.
Oh.
And fortunately, he took that.
So I still tell students today, if you forget your calculator, you can just describe what
you type in.
So not a weird class, but it was kind of a crazy incident.
You've recently moved to Thailand.
What was your transition like moving to Thailand and ICS?
It's been really good.
I transitioned to Hong Kong from the US back in 2016.
And that being our first international transition was really overwhelming, but we had good support.
So then we moved back to the US and then came here.
So we kind of knew what we were getting into.
And that helped a lot.
So the transition was better.
And we were able to buy a car from a family that was leaving.
So now we can get around and load everything into the back of the car is so much easier.
In Hong Kong, we never did.
So we had to do public transportation and carry everything.
So we learned that lesson.
It was well worth getting a car.
The school has been so good taking care of families.
I've really been impressed with that.
There's been a lot of people looking out for my wife and my sons.
And I really appreciate that.
The school does a good job in welcoming whole families.
That's really lovely to hear.
But yeah, I'll definitely agree.
ICS is known for its great community.
And I love that about ICS.
And building on to that, what are some cultural differences that surprise you when you move
to Thailand and ICS?
So Hong Kong, definitely there were a lot of cultural differences I had to get used
to.
And we visited Thailand while we were there.
So there wasn't a lot that at first I was like, oh, wow, this is shocking.
We kind of knew what to expect.
But I will say there's one thing that's really puzzled me.
And I didn't know that this I would realize.
But as I drive around, everyone pulls in backwards to parking lots.
I still haven't figured out why.
In the US, everyone pulls straight in and then like driving nerds back in.
But here I'm super impressed.
Everyone backs in.
So I haven't figured out why yet.
But that's the big cultural difference that still has me scratching my head.
Oh, wow, that's crazy.
I would have never thought of that, of backing out a car, how to park, being a shocking culture.
Like being a culture that's crazy.
And for our last question, what were some of your first thoughts about ICS and teaching
here?
So really, I think I would sum that up with balance.
So I've taught in a lot of different schools, from public schools in the US to private Christian
schools.
And I see good balance here.
So sometimes I've been in schools where the community is the big focus.
And academics, it's OK.
But there's all these events and everything around, let's build community, let's make
sure that's strong.
And I've been in other schools where academics is.
They would, community was important, but you could tell academics was overwhelming and
drove a lot of the community.
And I see a good balance of that here.
We're still stressed sometimes with academics, but there's a good balance, I think, with
community.
You can tell people care about each other and look out for each other.
So I really have been impressed with that here at ICS.
Thank you.
And with that last question for Mr. Keith, we'll be right back after a short announcement.
For the seniors, Carnival is finally over.
There were various games and competitions for people of all ages to enjoy.
The seniors had put in a lot of effort to make sure everything runs smoothly.
And it definitely paid off.
These activities not only brought joy to the attendees, but also helped raise money for
their senior trip.
People were excited to participate and support the seniors in their fundraising efforts.
The success of the Carnival can be attributed to the seniors' excellent organizational
skills and their dedication to making the event a memorable experience for everyone.
As for upcoming sports event, our varsity volleyball team is having a pool play at ISB
on September 9th.
We are back with part two, where we'll be introducing another one of our new teachers,
Mrs. Jess.
We'll start off with introducing our guest along with some icebreaker questions.
Mrs. Jess, could you please introduce yourself, what classes you teach, and a little bit about
yourself?
Sure.
I am teaching 10th grade British literature and 12th grade world literature.
And a little bit about myself, I am entering now into my 11th year of teaching.
I taught seven years in the United States in the Chicagoland area in Illinois, and I
was a middle school English teacher.
And then I taught for the past three years in Casablanca, Morocco at a private school
as a high school English teacher.
And I'm super excited to be here.
I'm really thankful to be your first guest.
Thank you.
Our first question is, who is your hero?
Many people have heroes that they don't know, right?
Someone they look up to, somebody famous.
For myself, that feels really impersonal.
And so I look at someone who I do know as my hero, and it really was my high school
cheerleading coach.
I was a cheerleader of middle school, high school, and then college, and so my high school
cheerleading coach, Miss Cheryl Jokic, was just such a fantastic woman who actually changed
from being one of the leading anesthesiologists in Chicago.
She was one of the first female anesthesiologists in Chicago, turned into high school cheerleading
coach.
And so she was just someone who really took a turn in life and came alongside us to mentor
a bunch of silly, goofy high school girls who came in with very little talent to offer.
And she transformed our team in such a positive way that by my senior year, one of my best
high school memories is finishing first place at our competition.
And it was, we were the underdogs, and it was such a joyful experience.
Being under her leadership and finishing first place was just a phenomenal experience as
a high schooler who walked in without much to offer as a freshman and really seeing myself
be pushed to be the best that I can be.
And so as a teacher, I usually refer to my class as my team.
If you're in my class, you're very familiar with team qualities, inspired really by my
experience as a student athlete and my hero who pushed me to be the best person and athlete
that I could be.
Thank you so much.
Our next question is, what is your biggest fear?
So starting with a really deep question here.
So if I was going to answer it with a deep answer, my response would be one of my biggest
fears is being misheard or misunderstood.
So actually being on a podcast is a good way to face that.
And this fear of just not being able to fix something that was a misunderstanding is always
something I'm afraid of.
But more on maybe a lighter note is I have recurring dreams that I am late to class.
Like still to this day, as an adult, my dreams are either as a high school student, like
showing up to their own class.
I can't find my schedule.
I can't unlock my locker or dreams as a teacher where my class has started and I'm running
late or I'm like still at home and I realize class has started and I'm not there.
So I don't know if any of you feel the fear or the pressure to be on time for class, but
that is something that still is a fear that I have even into adulthood from reflecting
on my time in high school.
Oh wow, I have the exact same dreams too.
I'm always like these recurring dreams that I'm late for school or like I completely missed
out on the first day of school because I did not wake up in time.
I know.
Yes, that is very scary to be the thing you wake up to.
But also like feeling the fear of not being understood as well.
I think I relate to that fear as well.
Our next question, what is your go-to karaoke song?
If you don't do karaoke, then what is your favorite road trip song or playlist?
So I'm actually really excited about karaoke.
I hope that in Thailand it is more of a thing than we experienced in Morocco.
I am quite the singer.
Not a good singer, just a singer as in a person who sings often.
Much to my husband's chagrin, I will sing all the time.
Not that I've had a lot of experience actually singing karaoke, but in the car, my thing
is a little unique.
I love maritime folk music.
Most of you may know this as sea shanties.
So they came a little bit popular during the lockdown.
There was one song in particular that became really popular and it was kind of all over
social media.
And I was like, yes, this is my time to shine.
Like this is my jam.
My husband is not a huge fan, so we do have to kind of compromise with each other.
But if it was my choice, sea shanties for hours.
All right.
Okay.
Jumping to our final icebreaker.
What was your weirdest and randomest class you took in high school or college?
And if you don't like sharing, what grade did you get for that class?
So I was kind of the queen of random and weird classes in college.
I had gone to a small private high school, preschool through my senior year.
And there just weren't a lot of options for myself in high school.
And so when I went to college, I took every weird and random class that I could that still
qualified for the credits that I needed.
So my two classes that stick out the most, I took ice skating as a class and I did receive
an A in that class as in the beginner level.
But I remember our final performance, we did an ice skating routine to like my heart will
go on for like tight panic.
And I was a cheerleader in middle school, high school and college.
And so I got my ice skating class together and we came up with this routine and we all
built like a physical human Titanic on ice skates and we skated around the rink and reenacted
this whole Titanic scene.
And then my other class on the science level, I took the study of honey.
Oh, wow.
Bees.
I didn't know that was a thing.
That's well, I guess it's a thing.
But like a whole class, it's crazy.
Yeah, I didn't know you could make a whole class about the study of honey.
But it was a semester long class.
And my final project.
Yeah, my final project for the class, I baked cookies.
And so I baked cookies, the same recipe using sugar, like granular sugar and then honey.
And I wrote about the difference in baking and the process making it, the texture, the
quality, taste testing, passed out cookies to my class.
And it was a phenomenal science class that got me a science credit.
And it was so much fun.
They sound like some really cool, interesting, fun classes.
I'll be sure to take some of these classes when I go to college.
It'll be fun.
I hope that our seniors really do take advantage of fun of college.
We have to be all studying and all nighters all the time.
Have fun, do something different.
I'll definitely do that.
Enjoy college.
I will do that.
You've mentioned that you lived in Morocco prior to moving here.
What was your transition like moving from Morocco to Thailand?
Transitions can always be a little bit scary, a little bit exciting, a little bit sad.
And we had all the feels.
We absolutely love the country of Morocco.
We were there during lockdown and COVID and all of the things where we couldn't leave
the country.
So we spent so much of our time moving around Morocco because we couldn't leave.
But what a great country to be stuck in, quote unquote.
And so the transition from a country that we loved into a new experience, you'll always
have, like I said, some loss.
One of those losses was that my husband and I are very sensitive people to animals.
We are animal lovers and Morocco has a very, very large, almost uncontrollable population
of street animals.
And very early on, my husband and I got the reputation of being the neighborhood Americans
who loved animals.
And so within our three years there, people would leave baby animals on our doorstep.
So we had a litter of puppies dropped off and we had three different litters of kittens
dropped off.
And we were also taking in our local street dogs to the vet on regular occasions for different
therapies and treatments.
And we just raised and took care of all the street animals to the point where actually
about only five months ago, we had 12 cats in our house that we were taking care of all
in different rooms because they all had these ones took eye drops.
Those ones were taking pills.
Everyone was taking all of their different medications.
And so the transition was actually really hard to leave behind these animals that we
had cared for and helped raise.
I did find adopters for nine of our kittens because I brought them to school with me the
last week of school and convinced my students to adopt kittens.
We had a big adoption fest.
So that was something that part of loss.
And also the transition of language was very difficult for me in particular because I took
French in high school, hoping that I would someday live in French speaking Africa.
So I had already had this vision being in Morocco using the French was so easy in my
life being able to communicate and now moving to a country in which I didn't know the language
was actually very challenging for me.
And I relied a lot on my husband, who in both circumstances, he did not know the mother
tongue.
He does not speak French.
And so I pulled some support from him with that moving into a country that now neither
of us know the language and we get to learn together, which is pretty great.
And I know I'm talking a lot here, but there's so many differences that are also really great.
For example, Morocco is 99.98% Muslim.
So I will not miss the 5 a.m. call to prayer in the morning.
Will not be missing that.
And I'm just so thankful to be moving also from a public school into a Christian school
and just have more freedom.
In Morocco, we all had to sign documents that said we will not speak about our religion
in the classroom.
Like if a student asked us, we were not allowed to answer.
And so that's a change.
I talked about loss earlier and now we're talking about gain.
I feel so much more freedom and less fear coming here and being able to share who I
am because my faith plays such a big role in these big life decisions that I'm making.
And maybe lastly, on more of a lighter note, I'm still getting used to the transition of
my name being called by my first name is a really big transition where in the States
there's always Mrs. Kastner.
In Morocco, it was respectful just to say miss.
So I was always just miss and my husband was mister.
And so that was a transition and now transitioning into Miss Jess or Miss Jessica.
I didn't even know what to say for my preference because I've never been called my first name
by students.
And so that's more one of those small adjustments that some people might not think about, but
that I'm adjusting to each day.
That's adorable.
I wish I could adopt a kitten from you.
Honestly, building on to that, what are some of the cultural differences that surprise
you when you move to Thailand and ICS?
Some of the cultural differences, man, when you first arrive somewhere, I think immediately
your brain goes to looking at what's different and you're kind of pointing like, oh, that's
different and that's different and that's different.
And before you transition to like, oh, well, what's the same?
What feels similar and we're at home?
I will say on a funny note, one of the first cultural differences that I noticed, like
our second day here, we went to Mega, the mall, and I am just not used to seeing animals
and strollers at the mall.
Like take your pet shopping for the day is not a thing that I had ever seen before.
And more recently, I went to go see a movie and there was like the concession stands and
I thought there was a vending machine and it had pretty collars.
I was like, oh, what's in there?
Maybe ice cream.
And I walk up and it's dog food.
Oh, dogs.
Because there's a pet cinema.
Like you take your pet to the movies with you.
And that was just one of the things that I've been sharing with my friends and family at
home.
Americans love their pets.
We do, but we've never been in a mall situation or public with so many animals in strollers.
That was one of the biggest differences that I had noticed.
But coming from Morocco, I moved here straight from Morocco and so I really enjoyed the culture
where I feel that in Thailand, so far in Bangkok, in Bangna, I've had a mix of that American
culture and some of my Moroccan culture that I feel is home, like walking down Market Street
with all the vendors and the motos just zooming around you like this feels like home.
This feels like my Morocco home.
And then walking into the malls with your air conditioning and your Dairy Queen and
your Cold Stone.
It's like, okay, this also feels like home.
So I've really, really enjoyed that my experience here so far has felt like a really safe and
positive mixture of the two cultures that I've been living in for the past 10 years.
Moving to a new country often comes with lots of challenges and difficulties.
It's completely normal to struggle with certain aspects of the transition.
For me, the biggest challenge was to get used to ants and geckos like near my bed.
Yeah, that's my experience.
And for our last question, what were some of your first thoughts about ICS and teaching
here?
My first thoughts that I had very soon after arrival was seriously, I love this place.
I genuinely just felt so much love the staff here, your teachers and their families are
so, so welcoming.
Maybe not as much of interest to students, but for teachers having administrators that
really care about you was phenomenal.
And the administrators held a dinner for the teachers a progressive dinner, right?
And so we traveled from each of our admin, so our bosses houses, one for appetizers,
then we went one for dinner and one for dessert.
And it was just such a sense of community and it was so much fun.
And this year, as I mentioned earlier, I've been teaching 11 years.
So besides the teachers, besides the administrators, going into my 11th year, I'm usually a little
bit nervous before the first day of school, like, ah, what are my students going to be
like and are they going to like me and how are things going to go?
And this year, I just felt excitement.
Like I just knew from the teachers, the administrators, even like the handbook, just the way the school
was run, the hallways and like the amount of student work.
And it's so clear that students play such a big role.
I mean, even right now in this podcast, sitting with you guys in this room is great.
And that students have such voice and advocacy in their school.
Starting day one, I was not nervous.
I was so excited to be here and be part of this community.
So thank you for inviting me today into this podcast and being able to share a little bit
of my voice and my perspectives with you.
Thank you to Mrs. Jess for coming today.
Thank you for answering so many of our questions and for taking the time to join our podcast.
I know my team and I have learned a lot about you from our short time together and so have
our listeners.
As we close out this episode, I'd like to mention our quote of the day again.
Life is beautiful not because of the things we see or do.
Life is beautiful because of the people we meet.
I encourage you to meet someone new today, say hi or what's up or just a head nod to
start.
Our lives can be enriched by the new relationships we can build.
Stay tuned for our next episode as we'll be talking with Mr. Sean about something we
all go through many times in our lives, transitions.
He'll also be sharing some of his personal journey as an educator and mentor to many
students.
As always, this podcast will not be possible without the hard work and support of our international
student production team.
All music and sound effects are courtesy of Pixabay.com, a vibrant community of creatives
sharing copyright free images, videos and music.
And we are signing off until next time.
Be your Students Incorporated, because your voice matters.