This month the Class 10 students, aged 16+, sit their external Matriculation Examinations before leaving school. The results will be available in March when the students make final choices on further education or work opportunities.

The students are working very hard as they are all striving for good examination results.

Students enjoyed making musical instruments with music volunteer Will Embliss from KINSHIP, UK, this summer.

Will made instruments out of spare construction wood and taught the students how to play them. On the day of the Plant Nursery Inauguration guests also enjoyed the xylophone. Will also made instruments from metal tubes and old oil drums.

His Holiness Gyalwang Drukpa was invited by His Eminence Thuksey Rinpoche, Chairperson of the Druk Padma Karpo School, to inaugurate the "Dragon Garden", and to watch a series of performances by the school children and a presentation by the landscape architects from UK.

Three years ago this month, a big mudslide hit our school in the night and did a huge amount of damage. Nobody was killed on the campus, but more than 200 people lost their lives nearby in the Indus Valley. School staff saved our residential students and led them to safety on adjacent high ground. Villagers' fields were left covered in mud, boulders and debris, dramatically affecting their livelihoods.

The school buildings took a direct hit, but top-class design and good construction enabled them to withstand the large forces. The mud made a terrible mess inside buildings, and carried away books, furniture and equipment.

This year has seen the South block of Residence 4 constructed, from the foundations being dug through to completion, accommodating 44 students and including a latrine block.

The two-IT suites pictured below have also been completed, and facilities for the School Managing Committee are being built on site too.

In order to landscape the school campus and create gardens, the site needs irrigating. A drip irrigation system is being installed that requires digging trenches throughout the site for the main water pipes. The JCB has been invaluable for this work.

The final components of the 1km long defence wall are finished, this has been a huge undertaking and taken two years to complete. The wall averages 3m high.

The JCB digging foundations at the beginning of the construction season in April.

Students take part in many extra-curricular activities. A few senior students performed in a cultural programme organised by the Ladakh Buddhist Association to celebrate the birth anniversary of Dr. B R Ambedkar as seen in the photograph.

The school also took part in the Buddha Jayanti procession organised by Ladakh Buddhist Association and various students participated in the cultural programme.
The students of Class 9 were taken to see a Science Exhibition organised by Bharatiya Vidya Niketan (BVN). There, the students saw different models and exhibits illustrating various scientific concepts and theories.

The House competitions continue every Saturday at school.

The school participated in the Secondary Sports Tournament in May, organised by District Youth Services and Sports. It was held at the Boys’ Higher Secondary School, Leh. Thankfully the conditions were better than during their winter sports events. The following awards were won:

• Girls Football (Winner)
• Girls Handball (Runners Up)
• Boys Relay (Gold)
• Girls Relay (Gold)
• 100m race Girls (Gold)
• 100m race Boys (Gold)
• 400m race Boys (Bronze)

The 2-day annual Kurman Gyalmo Inter-school literary festival was organised by the school in May. This is held every year to encourage budding literary talent among the students of Ladakh. There were different events such as creative writing, drama, dramatic reading, art, and a quiz. The festival was themed “Child Rights”.  Among the participants were 13 schools including Lamdon, Moravian, Kendriya Vidyalaya, and a few government schools. The best school award for the Junior category went to Druk White Lotus School and the senior award was taken by Lamdon School, Leh.

In April the entire school observed Plantation Day. Different areas of the school campus as well as the staff quarters were allocated to different classes for planting. Many trees were planted all over the campus.

On Independence Day, 15th August 2013, Sumita Sinha, Executive Director of Charushila led a workshop at the school with the residential students. Charushila is a small charity focusing on the empowerment of the individual and the community through participation and engagement.

Charushila engages in projects, research and events connected with the creation of public spaces using sustainable and local resources, knowledge transfer and community engagement. Charushila believes that in particular, engaging with children and youth encourages their potential and creativity through positive interaction with the built and natural environments. The Sanskrit word 'Charushila' is made from Charu meaning 'Beautiful' and Shila meaning 'foundations'.

The children were asked to draw their vision of Ladakh's future or their environment (school/home) on long sheets which became 'horizontal tangkas'.  Each group collaborated, debated, negotiated and finally drew their ideas on paper.

It was a fascinating process and the drawings themselves provided very revealing insights into what attracts, focuses and engages children into the built and natural environments. In particular, children were very close to the spiritual environment which is very dominant in the landscape and culture of Ladakh. Some significant themes emerged and could indicate further how children can become active citizens and responsible for future of Ladakhi society.