Growing up, I had initially viewed service as a mandatory aspect of school with little to no connection with my one true interest, mathematics. Year after year, I recognised the importance of the issues but undermined the ability of us students to make an impact. When I entered G9, I felt an urge to become a more active part of my community and push myself out of my comfort zone. To put myself forward to represent my peers, I ran for student council and managed to get selected. While I was thrilled for that one year, the next year was an ordeal as I failed to get elected. Shattered at the thought that I wouldn’t be able to continue the amazing work being done in Student Council, I started looking for other doors to represent the student body. Then I was introduced to the Service Executive, where highly motivated and passionate individuals come together to discuss and take action upon making someone else’s life better.

When I found that I had been given the position of Vice-Chair in SSD Exec, I was thrilled at the idea of being part of the team paving the path for the entire service program of our school. Given how intensive the workload that comes with this responsibility is, Season 1 passed by in a flash.

LO5: Demonstrate the skills and recognise the benefits of working collaboratively.

Throughout Season 1, I felt that LO5 was particularly important in order to not only get the work done but also improve morale and productivity among the team. Something I noticed was that the system we had of designating a different aspect of the service program to a small group of 3 or 4 students made each of the team feel like they played a crucial role in the team and were actively contributing to discussions during the session.

When we were preparing for the Giving Tree event, it was amazing to see how efficient we were in sending out around 25 emails and calendar invites. On the day of the actual event, all of us sorted hundreds of goods into the various local services that our school partners with. It was a big learning point for me about the benefits of collaboration and delegation.