Bill’s Blog

Today is a Day #4 and I will be in the MS the entire day today. Branka  and Bojana will be handling any discipline issues.

Lunch in the Library: Due to repeated occasions of food debris and litter in the library, there will be no lunches allowed to be eaten in the library. There has also been too much disruptive behavior in the library. The following notice is posted by the librarian:
The Library is a space for reading, writing, and quiet conversation.
No one should suffer from another’s noise, mess, or disruptive behaviour.
·         No food or drinks
·         No music, videos, or gaming
·         No mobiles or online telephony (skype, gtalk, etc.)
·         No behaviour that disrupts other’s ability to learn.

High School Knowledge Bowl Competition: Students interested in joining the team are asked to meet today at lunch in Mr. Slough’s room.

Hooded Sweatshirt Sales: Our PTA has asked me to let you know that today during LS conferences, they will be taking pre-orders for new ISB sweatshirts that they are selling.  There are 3 different styles of sweatshirts available.  Samples of the shirts, and pre-order forms will be in the LS library for interested parents and/or staff members during the day on Tuesday.
HS Receptionist Update: The receptionist will begin training on Monday December 8. A new desk is being designed and built for her and will be ready by December 15th. We are currently in contract negotiations.
High School Math Competition: Mrs. Vuckovich will be holding an informational meeting at lunch on Friday. The competition takes place in Bucharest on February 13-14.

Why Asian Children Are Better at Mathematics: An interesting idea from Malcolm Gladwell, the author of “Blink” in his new book “Outliers”. He reckons that it is the Chinese language and organizational system for numbers that makes mathematics easier for them. The  Guardian has an excerpt at this link.

After talking with ISB parent, Vlade Divac at Parent-Teacher Conferences on Tuesday, I learned that the Adriatic Basketball League is sort of a minor basketball league. He follows the Euroleague Basketball

The Official Logo of the Euroleague Basketball

The league consists of 24 teams from around Europe. The teams each year are selected by the ULEB, a consortium of professional basketball leagues. The teams are selected on their performances in recent domestic leagues and contracts with ULEB. There are three teams from the Adriatic Basketball Association that Serbian teams play in. There is one team from Croatia, one from Slovenia, and two-time defending league champion, Partizan of Belgrade, Serbia.

The Euroleague Basketball has a strange format of play. The 24 teams are placed into 4 groups of 6 teams. Each group plays a round-robin schedule of 10 games. Partizan is in Group D along with teams from Moscow, Madrid, Athens, Milan, and Istanbul. This stage is from October 22 - January 15.

The top two teams in each group moves on to the next round of 16 teams, appropriately called, The Top 16..The 16 teams are put into 4 groups of 4. Once again there is a home and home round robin format so each team plays 6 games. This stage is from January 28 to March 12.

The top two teams in each group advances to the Quarterfinal Playoffs. First place teams are matched with second place teams. Each pair plays a best of five series.

The winners of each quarterfinal series advance to the Final Four. The final four is the same as the NCAA Final Four, in that it is a knockout round.

In summary, it goes from 24 to 16 to 8 to 4, and then a champion. A team that wins the league, could play 21 to 23 games.

The Serbian representative, Partizan, last year made it to the Quarterfinal Playoffs. This year they are second in their group with a 2-1 record. Below is their first round schedule.

2008-2009 Games Regular Season

I am blogging live from the Ambassador’s party at the Sava Center in Belgrade, Serbia. There is around 500 people at the party and there are TV’s tuned to CNN and plenty to drink and eat. They did a vote of party attendees and Obama won 313 - 41. This was expected as it is a very cosmopolitian, liberal crowd of American expats, diplomats from everywhere, and important Serbs. Time to go, photos coming soon.

I have had no time to blog this week. We worked extremely hard at revamping the secondary schedule and have put in 14 hour days consistently. The first day of school is today so the boys and Nadia are quite excited. I’ll blog more this week when things settle down.

We made it to Belgrade and we are in our new home! The flights went very well without delays. The kids were well behaved, especially Owen and Oliver. They had their own personal movies on the flight that they loved. Ocean was a bit of work as she would only sleep on me and that was after a lot of bouncing and fidgeting. Goran and Gordana Z. were at the airport to greet us with the school van. We lost one piece of luggage out of the 13. We flew Northwest Airlines over the Atlantic and then the Serbian national line JAT to Belgrade. We were not impressed with the Charles De Gaulle airport in Paris, it was a bit shoddy. The only thing nice about it was the Concord placed in the middle of the airport.

Our home is much bigger than it looked in the photos. We are in a very nice neighborhood of Belgrade called Senjak. Gordana prepared the house with food and bedding etc. so we are settled in quite nicely. The school really set us up well!!!!

Lots of work to be done around the house. I wish my brother Andy and Dad were here with their handyman abilities and tool kits! I just didn’t get that construction gene they have. I’ll start blogging photos of the settling in as soon as I can.

A big thank you to my parents and brothers for a wonderful summer! My Dad and Andy dropped us off at the airport and Shelly came over with my nephews to say a goodbye to our children. It was very sad to leave my mother - we love you! We were surprised at the airport by my Aunt Darlene, my mom’s sister! She came up and fed Ocean and had dinner with us before our flight.