The Regional Dictator. (Part 2)

Picture a Grade 12 Advising Lesson.
“One piece of advice that helped me through university and life: Always do the opposite of what your enemy wants you to do.”
I heard sniggers from all around the video conferencing room. It was yet another memorable quote by Mr. G.
He went on to talk about how all Choueifatis are to hate other students because “they are our enemies” in that they compete with us in external examinations and places in universities. To even suggest that students in other schools want us to fail so that they will do better proves how ignorant and cynical Mr. G truly is.How could one even imagine how he expects us to hold a grain of respect for him when all he “advises” us to do is to be misanthropic?
_{I know this is a short post, but I have weeklies to study for...}

AMS Tests And Weekly Exams

One of the scariest facts about Choueifat to newcomers is the number of exams and tests they will be doing a week. I can still remember my first day at Choueifat, laughing when my friend told me that we were going to have an English test, third period. Then I realized he wasn’t kidding…
The average student in the seventh grade has something along the lines of four weekly AMS tests and two weekly periodic exams. By the tenth grade, this generally escalates to something like 9 weekly AMS tests and three to four weekly periodic exams. Every single one counts towards the final grade point average.
A failed AMS would mean a “make-up” exam after school. Failure in the make-up would mean a weekend “retest”. And on the weekend, the student would have to keep repeating it until he or she would pass.
Is there really a point? I mean, we are pretty well prepared for written exams by the end of grade 12, but sacrificing 13 hours a week solely on exams seems a little excessive. Not to mention how tired the students can be after three hours in the exam hall. Then they expect us to concentrate in class for the rest of the day.
What a truly amazing system!

The Regional Dictator. (Part 1)

The Regional Director of the ISC branches in the Gulf is man of many names. “Mr. G”, “Ratman”, "Germaniac" and “Jumanji” to name a few (Sadly, I’m not exaggerating.). I have been, and will be referring to him as Mr. G in my blog for the sake of confidentiality. His name though, is not of much importance. We are supposed to judge people by their actions and this man’s actions have heavily affected the last twenty-odd year groups of Choueifati students.
“Choueifat is the best school in the world!”
He would tell us, over and over (and over and over). Advising, Careers, and any other videoconference he would host. He would take things like the average graduating GPA in the UK and compare it to Choueifat’s, thinking that the students wouldn’t realize how misleading the statistics were. Of course we’re going to have higher Physics grades when the average UK student is allowed to have a life!
“Choueifat is the best school in the world!”
The videoconferences were also filled with post-graduate stories of Mr. G’s private club of “Power Prefects”. (Haha!). The basic layout would be “Dear Mr. G, I would like to thank you and the SABIS system for the huge advantage you have given me in university. Yours faithfully, X”. It would be painfully easy to tell that X was lying, and that he/she simply sent the letter in to get it published in the Advising/Careers textbooks. Or, it could be one of the rare freak students who Mr. G had managed to completely transform into a pure Choueifati. Truly sad stories.
I think that any Choueifati would agree with me when I say that Mr. G is probably one of the most interesting people on the planet. I mean, who else can so blindly believe in the SABIS system and everything it stands for?

The Brainwashing Sessions.

For students in the eighth grade and above, Mr. G holds weekly “Advising” and “Careers” lessons in Abu Dhabi, which is also video broadcasted live to the other regional ISC branches. In these lessons, the innocent students are repeatedly told that Choueifat is “The Best School in the World”. Ha. They are told how they are to think and how they are to behave whilst in and outside of school. It is here where much of the Choueifati mentality is planted in the minds of the children. Although, even at that young age, I thought that both the ideology and the classes were inane. I can even recall some of my friends and I releasing grasshoppers and throwing eggs in the classes…
In these classes, we are supposed to be taught that it is good to be a snitch. That it is good to get other students into trouble, no matter how minimal a mistake they make. This is a serious moral and social problem in some Choueifat schools, especially in the younger grades, when they haven't matured enough to know better. You would probably find that a large portion of the comments on this blog are complaints about it (See: Mr. G and his “Shadow Government” or “Power Prefects” as he likes to call them).
I often discuss with my friends what would happen if a brainwashed grade eight Choueifati were to move to a non-Choueifati school. When it actually does happen, we could take bets on how long it would be before he or she becomes a social outcast…

The Opinion Of An Older Non-Choueifati.

Spoon says (7:06 PM):
i think my old schools going ur way though
Spoon says (7:06 PM):
new principal is an ass
Spoon says (7:06 PM):
turning the students into drones
Spoon says (7:06 PM):
they just dont understand
Spoon says (7:07 PM):
by doing that they r robbing u
Spoon says (7:07 PM):
of social skills essentially

I couldn’t agree more. Although in our case it’s not so much the staff. It’s the entire SABIS system (and the ideology of Mr. G…).
Spoon was telling me about how his or her school used to be more focused on extracurricular activites rather than academics in the past. It was one of the top schools in the city then, and it still is today. I wonder why Choueifat cannot ease on the academic side and still maintain a school of high standards.

Detentions And The "Discipline Sheet" System.

See, Choueifat has managed to create a system to make it just that little bit easier for teachers to generously distribute detentions. Every possible reason, from "Talking in Class" to "Setting a Fire" is coded on the back of the "Discipline Sheet" which the "Class Prefect" has to make sure is signed by every teacher of every class. All the teacher has to do is write the student's name and the code of the "offense" on the sheet and the student instantly loses at least an hour of his or her life.
Of course, since our breaks are usually full of “extra” (read: mandatory) classes, we usually can’t do lunchtime detentions. After-school or even weekend detentions are frequent for students in all grades. These detentions tend to pile up, forcing students to stay seated in a dead quiet exam hall with a textbook for three to four hours at a time.
Apparently, Choueifat didn’t think that having classes from 8:00am to 4:00pm (or even 5:00pm, depending on classes.) every day was enough to build a student body that despises the system.

They Took Our Sports Away. (Part 1)

It's funny how they try to make maths problems sound less dull by using words like "Exercises" and "Activities". It's probably just another daft Choueifati attempt to compensate for the complete lack of physical activity in the higher grades.
In Choueifat, most students are forced to “drop” PE in the tenth grade. In the eleventh, there is no mention of sport or PE whatsoever. If the students wish to play some kind of sport, they have to go through a long and grueling process of registering a “club” at the SLO office.
Not that we even have enough time to play anything. In an average grade 12 student school week (44 hours), we usually get about two (three if we’re lucky) free periods in which we can throw a ball around. Of course, we’re advised to either work for SLO or study in an exam hall for the duration of the free period. Generally, by the time we’ve arranged to get a basketball or a football, we’ve wasted about half the break…

The Opinion of a Fellow Choueifati

Grenade says (8:25 PM):i hate my life
Grenade says (8:25 PM):this sucks

The above is the basic overall outcome of the Choueifat Effect (not to be confused with normal teen depression). For over 120 years, the SABIS system has ruined lives through Choueifatism. The students have been tortured, brainwashed and given no chance to lead a normal school life. We have been given incredibly excessive workloads with little or no proper recreation. There is no school spirit. There will never be school spirit. There is no bright side. There will never be a bright side. There is no hope. There will never be hope.

The Choueifat Effect.

Let's Start With A Few Photoshopped Logos!