About us
At VIS we embrace the spirit of the stork which travels long distances to nest in Lithuania. Their journey speaks to our commitment to making VIS and Vilnius a place families call home.
Vilnius International School was founded in 2004 in conjunction with Lithuania’s accession to the European Union. This is significant because the school was riding on the wave of a collective desire to become a modern progressive educational institution.
At the time of the school’s founding, Lithuania was experiencing a significant exodus of professionals and university educated young people and the country needed to attract them back to Lithuania to build more robust public institutions that would elevate the country to the level of our EU neighbors. A key to retaining talent and skill, and motivating others to return from abroad and build lives in Lithuania was the need for a school that actively embraced a new mindset. We continue to honour our initial intentions over 20 years later.
VIS has drawn inspiration from Peter Kotter’s work in developing our leadership model. The concept of networked roles is designed to align with the school’s evolving needs and trends, allowing us to respond agilely to strategic priorities.
Our pedagogical leadership team consists of: PYP Principal, Jemma Thomas, and Upper School Principal, Asta Balkutė; PYP Student Support Coordinator, Ryan Garrigan; Upper School Instructional Coach, Jurga Dzikaitė; Curriculum Coordinator, Thibault De Smet; CIE Coordinator, Deirdre Jennings; and VIS Director, Rebecca Juras. Operations leadership includes Finance Director, Vytautas Kairelis and Admissions Coordinator, Valdonė Jakšienė.
The VIS strategic initiatives are pinned to our school objectives and reflect school improvement projects that evolved from our Council of International Schools reaccreditation process. They focus on three key areas: student and staff wellbeing, cultural proficient teaching and learning, and elevating and aligning our teaching pedagogy with our principles of learning, most specifically concept based inquiry in action.