Aj.Lisa has been going through some of the Grade 11 students’ reflections on their CAS activity through this school year. The example included below was written by a student who rather modestly did want to be named, but it demonstrates the depth of impact that CAS can have on our students. It also shows how an IB education encourages self knowledge and a truly growth mind set:

1. What have you achieved in your CAS experiences?

Throughout CAS, my achievements cannot be defined as a single feat but rather they are the long-lasting impacts that it has had when looking back. CAS has promoted me to think about my role in the world and my goals for myself in multiple ways, and for each individual part of the Creativity, Activity and Service training. Personally, the service aspects have brought me appreciation for many of the events that students take time to organize to provide for the community, as well as the things we do as a collective to help those in need around our local community. The activities that were initially started only as a CAS experience morphed into a habit of exercise after a continuous period of reflection and progress tracking that allowed me to view my results in the long term. Last but not least, the creative activities allowed me to expand my scope of knowledge and allowed me to take the time and explore the aspects that I have enjoyed as a part of the extracurricular course. To me, the achievement of these all in a year was amazing.

2. What has been the most challenging part of CAS?

The most challenging part about CAS definitely comes with endurance and resilience in times of tiredness and mounting pressure. CAS itself was not an easy journey through Grade 11, and there have been many times during a lot of my CAS experiences that I wanted to quit due to physical or other difficulties. For instance, my Long-Distance running experience has been very difficult to keep up in the beginning, as it was in the beginning of term which coincided with the pressures from as one enters the diploma course. It was difficult to even find time to complete the experience from time to time. Though in the end, it was very gratifying when completing that experience.

Thank you to Aj.Lisa for sharing this!