Fine Arts
St. Mary's Fine Arts include:
- Vocal Music
- Instrumental Music
- 2-D Art
- 3-D Art
- Architecture
- BrainBowl Team
- Debate Team
- Speech Team
- Math Contest Team
- Fall Play
- Musical
Students can earn International Baccalaureate credit in some courses.
The vocal music program features groups such as the Men's Choir, Varsity Ensemble and International Show Choir. These award-winning choirs have performed in the United States, Austria, Hungary, Canada, Australia, China, South Korea, Indonesia, and many other countries. St. Mary's high schoolers may also take part in the Tokyo Area Honor Choir amongst other KPASSP schools, if they are accepted through auditioning. The St. Mary's High Schoolers enroll in contests in the United States with other choirs from Universities, since the level on tone and quality of the choir is very high. St. Mary's has never lost a choir competition in the Kanto Plains.
The instrumental music program features groups such as the Concert Band, Jazz Band, and the Wind Ensemble. Seisen International School collaborates with St. Mary's for the Orchestra used in the Musical. Similarly to the choir, high schoolers may take part in the Tokyo Area Honor Band amongst other KPASSP schools, if they are accepted through auditioning.
2-D Art, 3-D Art, and Architecture courses are also provided at the school, with students taking the International Baccalaureate being able to take these classes as credited courses. Notable artwork usually gets into the Tokyo Artscape, an annual exhibit collaborated on by some KPASSP schools, and some other Tokyo Area schools.
The BrainBowl Team competes in the annual BrainBowl tournament, where SMIS has proven to be a powerhouse, capturing the title 30 times out of the 38 championships. The last title it won was in 2011, the most recent tournament, with Henry Litt, Arjav Shah, and Ricky Dasdeb receiving Kanto Plains all star awards.
The Debate Team in St. Mary's is also particularly strong, and competes against Seisen International School, The American School in Japan, and Yokota High School. The team has won the annual Kanto Plains Debate Tournament three years in a row, from 2010 to 2012.
The Speech Team at SMIS is also a strong team, and they compete in the annual Speech Contest amongst other KPASSP schools. In the most recent tournament, held at Seisen in Fall 2010, the SMIS Speech Team won first place.
Each year, the Math Contest team, composed of students skilled at math, take part in the Math Field Day, a tournament for KPASSP students. St. Mary's tends to do particularly well there too, with usually at least 1 member of the team in the Top 5 at every grade level.
The fall showcases the Fall Play, where selected students perform and help to make it an annual success, while every year in the spring, selected students perform and help in the Musical.
Read more about this topic: St. Mary's International School
Famous quotes containing the words fine arts, fine and/or arts:
“The division between the useful arts and the fine arts must not be understood in too absolute a manner. In the humblest work of the craftsmen, if art is there, there is a concern for beauty, through a kind of indirect repercussion that the requirements of the creativity of the spirit exercise upon the production of an object to serve human needs.”
—Jacques Maritain (1882–1973)
“Another success is the post-office, with its educating energy augmented by cheapness and guarded by a certain religious sentiment in mankind; so that the power of a wafer or a drop of wax or gluten to guard a letter, as it flies over sea over land and comes to its address as if a battalion of artillery brought it, I look upon as a fine meter of civilization.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“These arts open great gates of a future, promising to make the world plastic and to lift human life out of its beggary to a god- like ease and power.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)