Bertrand D Hsu American & Chinese Bicultural Academy

We just graduated our first class of four 8th graders!! A milestone for Bert Hsu Academy and for those students and families!

We have done our best to teach them academics, Chinese language and culture, and most importantly the values of integrity, self-discipline, resilience, respect, gratitude and service. We hope they carry these knowledge, skills and values not just to high school but for the rest of their lives!

We are excited to announce our new Board Member: Annie Ma-Weaver!

Since opening its doors in August 2023 with an inaugural class of four students, Bert Hsu Academy has
experienced remarkable growth. Now concluding its third academic year, the school has increased
enrollment by 500% and expanded its programming. Today, BHA offers a thriving after-school program
serving both regular students and families from the broader community, alongside a summer program that
seamlessly blends academics with enriching camp experiences. To sustain this momentum and position
the academy for long-term success, BHA is strategically expanding its governance team.

Annie Ma-Weaver joins the board as a BHA parent, bringing a wealth of leadership experience. She
currently serves as Group Product Manager, Cloud HPC at Google, where she has spent the past 16 years
in various leadership capacities. She is also a guest lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley Haas
School of Business. Alongside her partner, Annie is actively engaged in entrepreneurial and philanthropic
initiatives, bringing a robust blend of strategic, operational, and community-building expertise to support the academy’s next phase of growth.

“Annie has been an engaged and thoughtful member of the BHA community and fully embraces our
mission of educating students through academic excellence, character development, and multicultural
learning,” said Ann Hsu, Founder and Head of School of Bert Hsu Academy. “Her leadership experience,
perspective, and commitment to our vision will be invaluable as we continue growing and strengthening
the school for the future.”

“Watching Bert Hsu Academy grow into a vibrant, bicultural community has been incredibly inspiring as
a parent,” said Annie Ma-Weaver. “I am honored to join the Board of Directors and look forward to
leveraging my experience in strategy and innovation to support the school’s dedication to academic
excellence, character building, and deep cultural connection.”

Three weeks passed in the blink of an eye! After meeting the students of our partner school in Dali, our students started a 7-day “Tea Horse Ancient Road” study tour together. The first stop was Jianshui City and the nearby Tuanshan Village, where we saw the richest Zhujia Garden in southern Yunnan. The second stop is Shiping. In addition to its famous tofu, it is also the most famous place for literati in southern Yunnan. In the imperial exams of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, 640 scholars placed in the local exam, 77 scholars placed in the provincial exam, and 15 scholars placed in the national exam! Shiping is also home of the only all-China National Champion in Economics! The last stop is Yisa, the base camp of the horse caravan traders. These three groups of people (literati, businessmen and horse caravan traders) played important and different roles in the era of the development of Yunnan Railway in the 1910’s. Our students not only saw the architectural styles left by different cultural groups, but also learn about an interesting period of modern Chinese history.

This is a unique China study tour experience that’s very different from visiting the big cities and famous sites. We will be taking our 7th and 8th grade students to China every year, and in the near future, will return to Yunnan to work with our partner school.

Planes, trains, subways and buses — after 36 hours of travel, our BHA 7th and 8th graders finally arrived at Dali, Yunnan province of China for our inaugural annual 3-week China study tour! We visited the Buddhist pagodas before meeting our partner school students to start the project.

,

Every week, we have a class in which our 3rd through 5th graders read to our kinder through 2nd graders. The older students get practice reading, and younger students enjoy the stories. These experiences build stronger bonds within our school community!

Our Founder and Head of School shares her journey from software engineer to dot.com and yogurt entrepreneur to school board member to founding the first and only American and Chinese bilingual and bicultural K-8 school in the U.S.

Link in bio and here:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/onehaas/id1356691316?i=1000751756855

As a community service, our temporary school during the SFUSD teachers strike provided academic learning and lots of fun! Here’s a reflection:

https://www.berthsuacademy.org/so/70Pnoc5ON?languageTag=en

In the spirit of helping SFUSD parents navigate a potential Teachers Strike, Bert Hsu Academy is offering limited seats in our school for students for the duration of the strike.

Signup link: tinyurl.com/BHATeacherStrikePlan

We are a cell phone free school, and this is our device cabinet. All cell phones and laptops are kept in the cabinet all day, except when laptops are needed during class. They are promptly returned after class. Nowadays, people are increasingly aware of the harm that electronic devices can cause to students, preventing them from focusing on their studies or communicating with others. Our school has seen this first hand. Even when using computers for learning, some students are tempted to visit gaming websites. Therefore those sites are blocked from our school network.

A new year and new semester, our campus is bustling again with energy and activity: a new basketball hoop, art projects, pair reading, and field trip to the newest park in San Francisco (Crane Cove Park)!