Academy Showcase Week - a festival of ideas, sport & art

The Aga Khan Academy Hyderabad opened its doors to the public during its annual Showcase Week, that took place on its sprawling 100-acre campus in Shamshabad between Friday 8^th – Tuesday 12^th March 2019. Students, staff, parents, prospective parents, their families and friends showed up at the Academy for the numerous events lined up over several days.

Showcase Week kicked off on Friday 8^th March with the inauguration of the annual Diploma Programme visual arts exhibition. Students displayed their work and spoke confidently about the creative processes and motivations that had inspired their art. Later that evening, a stupendous performance of Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” took place, acted out by a Senior School cast. The play made use of various venues at the Academy, and included moving the audience from the amphitheatre to a beautiful rocky patch nearby where the quirky characters came alive against the lit-up trees behind them, transporting the spectators to a magical forest where fairies, actors and lovers came together in the playwright’s famous comedy of errors.

Saturday 9^th March had several attractions running all day and into the evening. The Senior School swimming gala turned the pool into a bustling hive of activity in the morning hours. Concurrently, the Junior School held their annual IB Primary Years Programme exhibition, where 30 grade 5 students stood at booths and shared information about their projects, discussing global issues they aimed to tackle, and the actions they had taken in that regard. Parents and guests flocked from one spot to another, enjoying the summery ambience around campus, where flowers of all colours are in full bloom and the smell of jasmine fills the air.

A parent orientation for the incoming grade 6 students also took place on Saturday afternoon, where the IB Middle Years Programme coordinators made a presentation and hosted a Q&A session about what to expect as their children transition from the Academy Junior School to the Academy Senior School. Captivated parents and guests attended sessions in grades 1-4, where students explored themes around cities of the future, human migration and urban construction through the lens of literature and design.

Towards the early evening, the amphitheatre filled up again with an excited audience, who enjoyed an evening full of musical performances, ranging from classical Indian songs to pop covers, from instrumental renditions to beatbox rhythms. On the evenings of Monday 11^th and Tuesday 12^th March, two different versions of the same original play, “Sleeping Cinderella Aur Ek Chor Ki Family” was performed with different casts. The first performance was in Hindi, and the second was multilingual, with 10 languages used by actors, representing the diversity of the student community at the Academy. 

AKA Hyderabad’s annual Showcase Week is a chance for the larger Hyderabad community to get a taste of what the Academy proffers: world-class education that works to raise home-grown leaders; a stunning campus environment with excellent sporting and infrastructural facilities; and the rich artistic talent that rests within its existing cohort of 650 students, as well as a dedicated team of experienced faculty.