The Berlin to Kalpitiya Cultural Exchange 2025 marked another meaningful step in the growing partnership between schools and communities in Kalpitiya, Sri Lanka, and Berlin, Germany. Rooted in cultural understanding and sustainability education, the collaboration involved the Nelson Mandela School and the Friedensburg-OS School in Berlin, together with six partner schools in Kalpitiya: Pallivasalthurai Muslim School, St. Sebastiyan Government Sinhala School Kudawa, St. Anne’s Thalawila, Roman Catholic Tamil School Kalpitiya, Sinhala School Kandakuliya Mune, and Kandakuliya Muslim Maha Vidyalaya. Key institutional partners included the Town Council of Kalpitiya (Pradeshiya Sabha), the District Office of Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf and SBNE Berlin, the Goethe-Institut Sri Lanka, and Kitesurfing Lanka.

From November 3 to 7, 2025, a cultural exchange sponsored by the German-Polish Youth Association took place for the 12th time at the International Youth Meeting Center at Morawa Castle (Lower Silesia). Around 40 children from the Społeczna Szkoła Podstawowa in Świdnica (Schweidnitz) and the Nelson Mandela School in Berlin came together under the motto “Just Different” to explore the question of how diversity and otherness can be interpreted artistically through theatre (Mr. Szulc), art (Ms. Martens), and music (Mr. Fischer). In addition to the creative work, the program included joint activities such as a trip to the city of Świdnica and an atmospheric campfire with Polish delicacies. However, the highlight of the week was meeting 98-year-old castle resident Melitta Sallai, who told us stories from her long and exciting life and answered our questions. The atmosphere between the Polish and German students was very warm from the start, and new friendships were quickly formed. We had a lot of fun and the time flew by. In the end, we all agreed: this cultural exchange was an unforgettable experience!Naima and Elena (8a)

On October 16, Mr. Wandtke's Biology class 13 visited the Gläserne Labor in Berlin-Buch where the students had the opportunity to work with modern molecular biology methods such as PCR and gel electrophoresis. The aim of the project was to find out whether genetically modified soy was present in various soy samples from different countries and areas of application.
Despite the long journey and the afternoon session, everyone showed great commitment and enthusiasm for the practical laboratory work. It was an exciting insight into the world of genetic engineering.

Once again this school year, students from grades 8 to 10 at Nelson Mandela School took part in the renowned Diercke Knowledge Geography Competition. With over 300,000 participants, this competition is the largest of its kind in Germany and enjoys great popularity every year – both in German schools at home and abroad.

We congratulate Taran Sharma from class 9a on winning the school competition! Milan Bercio (8a) and Jonathan Schubert (9c) also performed excellently, impressing with their outstanding knowledge of topography and geography.

We are already looking forward to the next Diercke Wissen competition in 2026 and hope that our students will participate enthusiastically again.

Anke Müller, Head of Geography

Congratulations and many thanks to Csenge, Shakira, Hannah, Oisin, Maano, and Gagik! They represented our school at the UNESCO Project Schools' soccer tournament. The event was traditionally organized by the Max-Planck-Gymnasium.

In midsummer temperatures, nine school teams took part.

The matches were played according to fair play rules. Mixed girls' and boys' teams from different schools played against each other in teams of four, without referees or offside. The teams were newly mixed in all nine rounds. Goals could only be scored with flat shots.

The winner was determined based on points for fairness, victories, and goals.
Our school team finished in 3rd place, just behind the Max-Planck-Gymnasium and the Königin-Luise-Foundation.

From June 10 to June 14 2025, we—four students from Q2 and Q4, under the supervision of Ms. Balsters and Mr. Goode—embarked on the Duke of Edinburgh Gold Expedition. Our journey took us to the Oberpfalz in Bavaria, where we hiked through the terrain for five days and four nights, carrying all our belongings and equipment on our backs.

Extensive preparation went into planning the expedition: coordinating meals, repeatedly weighing and repacking our bags, and carefully plotting the routes and campsites we would follow.

Upon arriving in Windischeschenbach, our adventure truly began. We quickly found ourselves immersed in nature, walking along streams and moss-covered hills, trying to decipher what qualified as a path and what would lead us completely astray. Our campsite for the evening was a small clearing in the middle of the forest, with not another soul in sight. We ended the evening by cooking dinner on our portable stoves and finalizing our route for the next day.

On July 10 2025, Mr. Fischer's and Ms. Brauns' Deutsch-Grundkurse gathered at the main train station early in the morning to head south to Weimar in Thuringia. After around four hours, we arrived at our destination in bright sunshine and headed straight to Goethe's house.There, with the help of audio guides, we embarked on a journey through time into Goethe's world. We explored his private rooms and took a look at the so-called “Junozimmer”, which once served as a music and reception room. We then discovered the opulent garden, where we admired the flowers and herbs and bathed in the sun.Afterwards, we were given a guided tour of the “Lebensfluten – Tatensturm” exhibition in the Goethe-Nationalmuseum. Together we analyzed the hymn “Prometheus” and familiarized ourselves with the novel “Die Leiden des jungen Werthers” and “Faust” in a lively and humorous way.The next item on the program was a guided tour of the city, during which we saw the Schillerhaus and learned interesting facts about the library of Herzogin Anna Amalia. The city guide recommended a stall selling delicious Thuringian roast sausages.Freshly fortified, we walked on to Goethes Gartenhaus on the Ilm and strolled through the impressive garden.

Finally, to round off the beautiful summer day, we sat down in a café where we rounded off the eventful day with ice cream.

Elsa Gazzea and Shiraz Schindler (AbiQ2)

Sunday, June 29th 2025 was the final tournament in a very successful season for our master mixed team. The finals took place in the Max Schmelling Halle. Our NMS team won their group and then played for in the finale against the winner of the other bracket. In the end, we lost to a team which had no girls and had noticeably larger players. Despite the uneven playing field, our players fought their hardest and turned in their best game of the tournament, making the coaching staff and parents very proud.The NMS team took home 2nd place and our ballers should be very proud of their performance throughout the season.
They won every single game in their three tournaments until this final match!Huge thank you goes to Dan Mayer (coach) and Franziska Talai-Rad (co-coach), without them this would not have been possible.
We can’t forget to thank to the NMS Friends for their financial support in purchasing our beautiful jerseys.Thank you to those parents who supported our players throughout the season, and thanks to many parents who made it to the final tournament. We could hear you cheering for our team!Many thanks to our ballers for showing amazing team spirit and dedication! Wishing you all the best at the lower secondary basketball team.Good luck and bring more trophies 🏆

Rhyming - storytelling - paraphrasing and acting: These are the four “Olympic” disciplines in which six learning groups of mother and partner tongue with a total of 45 participants competed against each other in the “Aula” on Thursday, July 10., 2025

Sentences with mostly matching end rhymes were assembled into funny stories, beginning and end sentences provided the framework for bizarre stories, terms had to be carefully paraphrased and guessed, as in the TABU game, and the acting part required physical effort in addition to the linguistic performance.

And all of this with only 2 minutes of preparation time - in other words: high-performance sport!

All the teams tackled these tasks with great enthusiasm and remarkable creativity. The winners were the mother tongue group of 8d and the partner tongue group of 8c/d, who each won 1st prize. Congratulations!

A big thank you goes to Ms. Kolb for preparing and moderating this annual great event and to the four-member jury from Year 9, who did not make it easy for themselves to determine the winning groups and found words of appreciation for all teams. (report: Astrid Bursian)

A highlight this year for the school sports club “Sports Club International at the Nelson- Mandela-School“ was once again its participation in the 5x 5 km Team-Tiergarten- Relay.

We took part with 2 teams. Our youth team started with number A924, with Tizian, Benjamin, Ivan, Sebastian and Felix. The second team, consisting of parents, staff and older teens, took part this year with starting number A2. The team included Jullian, Alexis, Lucas, Carlo and Jannik. The race started at 18:30. A total of 1975 relay teams with five runners each took part on June 3. It wasn't simply about the sport, but above all about experiencing, moving, motivating and successfully working together as a team. After the run, there was a small picnic for everyone. Both relay teams were able to significantly improve on last year's performances, achieving times of 01:46:57 h and 01:53:23 h over the 25 km.

Our youth team won 68th place out of 1975 relay teams in the daily ranking, our second team won a strong 41st place. Congratulations on the great achievements!

The results can be found under this link: https://berlin-wasserbetriebe.r.mikatiming.com/2025/?pid=list

38 students from our school took part in the relay day on 7 May 2025. It was a great event at the Mommsenstadium, with exciting races, a supportive atmosphere and loud cheering for the relay team members.

Congratulations to 4x 2nd place and 1x 3rd place!

2nd place over 4x 100 m, girls' team - Naima, Elena, Judy and Maia 2nd place over 4x 100 m, WK 2 boys' team - Arto, Richard, Nikola and Toni 2nd place over 4x 100 m, WK 1 girls' team - Lora, Merle, Elsa and Shiraz 2nd place over 3x 800 m, WK 3 girls' team - Adalia, Lilly and Helene 3rd place over 3x 800 m, WK 2 boys' team - Tizian, Ivan and Sebastian

The relay team of WK 1 girls (4x 100 m) successfully took part in the Berlin-Relay-Final on 19.06.25 and won 5th place in the final.

Congratulations to Lora, Lidia, Merle and Carlotta!

For almost 70 years, the Landesmusikrat Berlin has regularly organized „Musische Wochen“ to give talented young musicians the chance to showcase their skills to a wide audience. This year, for the first time, the NMS orchestra was invited to perform in a concert on July 4, 2025 at 6 p.m. in the Kammermusiksaal of the Berliner Philharmonie.

During the first half of the concert, the NMS students listened attentively to the ensembles from the Schiller-, Lessing- and Georg-Büchner-Gymnasium and the Tempelherren-Grundschule. The NMS Orchestra, conducted by Ira Brauns and Axel Fischer, then played „How To Train Your Dragon” (John Powell), the overture from the opera „Carmen“ (Georges Bizet) and „The Muppet Show Theme“ (Jim Henson / Sam Pottle). The Georg-Friedrich-Händel-Gymnasium and the Romain-Rolland-Gymnasium then performed.

Afterwards, there was tremendous applause for both the students and the teachers. The audience was thrilled and the NMS Orchestra is already looking forward to taking part again next year!

Elena Mozer (7a)