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LO2 CHALLENGE – Undertaken new challenges & developing new skills. A new challenge may be an unfamiliar experience or an extension of an existing one. The newly acquired or developed skills may be shown through experiences that the student has not previously undertaken or through increased expertise in an established area. |
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LO4 COMMITMENT – Showing perseverance, resilience. This may be accomplished in collaboration with other participants. Students may show their knowledge and awareness by building on a previous experience, or by launching a new idea or process. |
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LO5 COLLABORATION – Working together to achieve an outcome. Students are able to identify, demonstrate and critically discuss the benefits and challenges of collaboration gained through CAS experiences. |
Project Week is an integral feature of the UWC experience. As students, it gives us an opportunity to develop our own skills of leadership, planning and inter-communication beyond the walls of our school. Even before grade eleven, outdoor education has been a constant and defining feature of our educational programme. However, what makes Project Week special is that small groups of students each plan our own trips from scratch.
Whilst I was really excited to be able to take on the responsibility of organising my own trip, something I initially found quite challenging was finding the group that I was going to go with on Project Week. The trip my close friends were wanting to plan revolved around activities that I (truthfully) was not interested in. This worried me because whilst I truly wanted to do something I was passionate about on this trip, the idea of going with people that I didn’t know made me very nervous.
Nevertheless, I persevered and took the tough decision to not go on this trip with my group of close friends. Instead, I began to explore other opportunities. Ultimately, I ended up starting a conversation with three other grade twelve students from the global concern – Smiles of China – that I was a part of. We discovered, that we all were interested in doing the same kind of things and made a plan to visit our global concern for Project Week. Two of the group members even invited two other students from outside our global concern to join our group for Project Week. Regardless of the fact that I wasn’t close with these students from before, I began to realise how happy I was that I chose to take a risk and join this group. As we began the process, I was able to meet and become friends with a new set of students.
In the end, collaborating with one another, helped us all to achieve our desired outcome: to be able to plan a Project Week experience that both interested and challenged us. Having taken this risk, I really felt as though I have taken a step forward in being able to embrace rather than shy away from difficulties. In the future, I hope I can continue to develop this growth mindset.
