Thanks to CASL
I have been able to complete all of the projects’ requirements I’ve been
involved in school; such as the President Award Scheme, Interact Club,
Brainshine School on Wednesdays, MUN, and Sports like Basketball, Soccer and
Volleyball. It changed my perspective of “community service”, its not anymore
wanting to finish the required number of hours, now I just want to continue
what I have started because I have learned that volunteer work is not something you just do for the sake of
it; it is something you love to do and I did that
by: reaching out to children, being exposed to diplomatic views, and continuing
being a part of a team sport. CASL definitely prepares you for what is coming
up next year, the CAS program, which I am starting next year in 11th
grade. From the moment I started CASL I have learned to balance, Creativity,
Action and Service.
For action, I
decided to try out for sports, such as Basketball, Soccer and currently in
Volleyball. Basketball season was on for 4 months, with 3 days a week practice
and matches at different schools, likewise in Soccer and Volleyball. At every Sport
season I was able to achieve my objectives, which was to learn new skills, such
as; ball handling, shooting, endurance, offensive/defensive positioning, and
rules of the games. My personal objectives were: become one of the most
improved players, never miss practice, attend every game no matter what,
scoring points and emerging a relationship with my teammates. Basketball,
Soccer and currently Volleyball, were just amazing sport seasons, we were like
a family, given that we COMMUNICATED really well on the field and off the
field. Our objectives during the season were ‘FUN’ and ‘LEARNING’! As coach
wanted us to have fun while at the same time learn new things in an
“individual/team” disciplined way. The biggest interpersonal skill that we as a
team developed was learning to work together as a team and to accept each other
as teammates. Although there were a couple of friend sets already established,
it was encouraging to see how each of us got along well with every other player
and we learned to bond together. We seemed to thoroughly enjoy being together
for practices and games. We displayed good character and sportsmanship
throughout the season. We always showed respect to the referees publicly even
when we disagreed with their calls privately in our team huddles. Also, we were
an encouragement to one another. When one of us was feeling discouraged for any
reason, or was injured or sick, we would gather around her, give her a hug and
a word of encouragement [A clear sign of our character of always thinking what
was best for the team and not just our own individual feelings]. I came to realize in 10th
grade that being in a Team sport gives you more heart to play harder, you push
yourself to be a bit better because you give your all. I love the sport, that’s
why I do it everyday and it’s up to the person to manage their time in order to
succeed, for example the minute I get home from practice, I take a shower, do
my homework and/or revise for a quiz/test then I go to bed, I understood that
this method was better then coming from practice, taking a shower, and going
straight to bed, to then waking up at 2-3am to do homework, that never works.
For
creativity, the main activity I participated in was being part of MUN, my
objectives were to gain great research skills, and
public speaking skills, along side interacting with people and cultures all
over the world, and enjoy an international and professional environment. I was
able to achieve that by attending the 30th annual EAMUN here at the
United Nations office in Nairobi, I was proud to be representing for the first
time ever, Antigua and Barbuda, in the Human rights committee at the
conference. EAMUN was a once in a
lifetime opportunity; I say this because I got to meet about 950 high school
students from 61 schools [from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC),
Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Rwanda, Sweden, Tanzania, and Uganda. Students from
the DRC, Malawi and Sweden were participating in the conference for the first
time]. Surprisingly, we all were involved in the same projects at school! During
this conference we were challenged to adopt views and attitudes other than our
own; breaking away from narrow self-interest and developing international
cooperation, which is one of the core values of the United Nations. We also met
Ambassador Solomon Maina, the Director of the International Organization and
Conferences Directorate in the Kenya Ministry of Foreign Affairs, he urged us
to engage our energies in "activities that would help make a difference in
the environment, culture and enhance diversity in the world.” He
underlined how the Government had pursued the youth agenda through the Ministry
of Youth and Sports by establishing the Youth Enterprise Fund. The Fund has
been instrumental in the creation of over 300,000 job opportunities and
disbursement of KSh 5.9 billion to over 157, 000 youth enterprises across the
country. The EAMUN conference is one of three such conferences hosted by the UN
in Nairobi. Thanks to the EAMUN Conference I was exposed for the first time to
authentic simulations of the UN General Assembly, Security Council and other
multilateral bodies, which introduced me into the world of diplomacy and
negotiations. EAMUN provided a forum for
discussions on different topics of international concern, and since I was in
the Human Rights committee, we addressed issues such as; Women’s rights, Child
labor in Africa, Human Trafficking, Modern day slavery, Education in south
Sudan, and Malnutrition in central America. Currently, we are writing
resolutions and preparing for the Portugal MUN Conference! With the skills I
have learned I am ready to face what’s coming next.
For service, I had two major
projects, which were the Interact Club and Brainshine School on Wednesdays, but
the main one was the Nairobi service Trip to Brainshine. The Nairobi Service Trip for me was more than just
traveling daily to the Brainshine School and teaching small children between
the ages of 4-12 years old for 7hrs, this trip was all about reaching out to
these children as well as facing and studying about Kenyan culture and building
a relationship with the local community. Leading an educational curriculum was
no easy job, we had to put into consideration not only the grade level, but
also knowing our roles at all time, being very flexible, developing a high
energetic voice, making the kids participate more in what we are teaching,
having a good pace and speed, and lastly constantly defining vocabs. However,
what we thought was going to happen didn’t, given that the local school gave us
a whole different teaching schedule, which left us to make one ourselves. This
situation shows the Kenyan culture, as Kenyans love to please to make their
visitors feel more contented which however backfires on them most of time so
giving us a different teaching schedule at the beginning was to make themselves
look good, Nevertheless the bright side is we got to experience the culture and
we as a group we not only quickly adjusted and able to adapt to these last
minute changes but also made the effort to do what we have now, like Mr.
Bismeyer said “you do what you can with what you have”, in other words
we’ve shown as a school that we were resilient. Teaching the kids was no easy
job too as most of them didn’t speak English and looked puzzled, so we’ve tried
every possible angle for them to learn as well as understand, we’ve used
methods like taking them outside to teach, known as “exploration time” and
we’ve also tried incorporating our teaching with singing and dancing known as
“sing a song”. The effort of not giving up in trying to reach out to the kids
was something we definitely took from. This trip became a very significant part
of my life, because I not only bonded with these kids but I feel like I’ve
known them for such a long time as I cared for them like my own sisters and
brothers would to me. No matter what the lesson was that we were teaching them,
confused or not, they never gave up, they would always be smiling and looked
forward to seeing us, they just loved us. Its really fun working with kids, it
was a great experience, especially knowing that we are making a difference for
these kids’ lives. We learned a lot for example; the adaptation skills we used
are gifts we will carry on for the rest of our everyday life. Most importantly
everyone on the trip made some sort of contribution, like Mr. Bismeyer said
“its like putting together a big puzzle” without everyone’s contribution it wouldn’t
have happened.
Like I said
before, CASL has taught me that volunteer
work is not something you just do for the sake of it; it is something you love
to do and most importantly something you continue no
matter what, because you love it. And that’s exactly what I’m going to do next
year and the years to come; I’m going to continue to reach out to children at
OVC, Runda and Brainshine.
