Tag Archives: #LO6

Sustainable Enterprise Consultants reflection #3

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I started Sustainable enterprise consultants with the goal of taking more responsibility and initiative in the service. After several months, I believe that I have achieved that goal since I was responsible for creating a brand new infomercial-esque video describing the purpose and service that SEC provides. This video, in my opinion, is a much-needed improvement on the previous video which consisted of people sitting in front of a camera and speaking to it.

{LO5} Thirdly, making a film was clearly a collaborative process across all stages. I needed dedicated cameramen, actors and critics to ensure that the film was the best that it could be. The benefits of working with other people were that there were enough for a sufficiently diverse cast, they could give input and add improvements and they were an important source of morale. What made it easier to work together was the fact that we were all familiar and comfortable in each other’s presence which allowed us to work productively and exchange ideas casually. The challenges were that everybody had different opinions and some people become defensive when there acting was criticised. The fact that we were well-acquainted also means that there were several tangents that we could go off of, hindering our progress.

{LO6} Fourthly, I was able to include elements of global significance in my SEC infomercial. Given that SEC aims to combat worldwide issues such as sustainability, corporate social responsibility and consumerism on a college level, I had to ensure that the video remained true to SEC’s mission. I had a positive impact on this issue  by including statistics about the amount of garbage that ends up in landfills and discussing the triple bottom line upon which our service is based.

{LO7} Lastly, I recognised the ethical implications of producing a comedic video by keeping it politically correct, omitting dark humour and ensuring that copyright music and footage was not used.

JSK CAS reflection

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For the sake of context, the coronavirus pandemic has not been kind to our NGO partner, XS project. The pandemic has halted demand for upcycled products and stripped trash pickers of their livelihood. This hinders XS projects’ goal to provide scholarships to trash picker children, provide food and accommodation, medicine and education facilities. To help alleviate the financial burden of caring for so many children, we decided to enter JSK into a video competition in which each GC had to appeal to an audience of tenth graders to win as many votes so that the proceeds from the G10 Enterprise fair (~5,000$) will go towards them.

Collaboration was essential in the process of writing, starring, producing and editing the video. We only had a few minutes to convey to the audience the dire situation that XS project is in. This meant that every second had to be as impactful and emotional as the previous one. I worked with my fellow chair and one of our other GC members. What made it easy to collaborate was our determination to win the 5,000$ as it would establish our legacy and prove our competence and dedication to ensuring XS-projects success. The challenges that we faced was primarily encountered when writing and editing the video as there were several disagreements. One example was what the speech would consist of and the content of our video. We resolved this issue by taking the time to explain our respective rationales and coming to a compromise. There was the challenge of ensuring that our video had exemplary video and audio quality but we were constrained by the lack of resources. Collaboration was vital in achieving our outcome as we were able to pool our skills to create a well-written and edited video.

For the video, we had to learn a lot more about XS project and their efforts to alleviate poverty in the trash picker community. I learnt about the different programs that they had, what they would use the money for and how many children they have supported. This is a significant issue a trash picker families make so little that they have to enlist the help of their children which hinders their education and the prospect of a good professional life. My actions have a positive impact as the 5,000$ will contribute a lot to XS projects goals. I think that this activity has made me more caring as I realised the importance of financial supporting such causes

Career contacts reflection #3

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Right now, we are mid-way through our joint partnership with Tribe tours, a tour guide company focused on delivering stories that explore Singapore’s heritage and tradition. These tours focus on establishing a more intimate and personal connection between the tour and the customer. Our task for this project was to evaluate and propose revisions for the marketing campaign of one of their tours which is a Chinatown murder mystery where customers solve a series of mysteries while learning about the history and culture of Chinatown.

So far, I have finished skill week and am arranging a meeting with both my groupmates, mentors and tribe tours to touch base on multiple occasions. This demonstrates my commitment and perseverance in this activity as I am ensuring proper communication between different stakeholder groups and making sure that goals are met. To ensure that challenges and tasks are undertaken, I cross-referenced with a document created by tribe tours to meet the requirements of creating a product.

Collaboration has also been a huge part of the success of our project as there are several stakeholders group that we have to maintain good relations with. For communication, we mostly use Whatsapp and an online chat forum called Slack to communicate with our mentors, groupmates and Tribe Tours. Working collaboratively allows work to be distributed fairly, especially considering that I have school while my 2 local school friends are on vacation. The input of my mentors, Tribe Tours and Groupmates allows us to improve each other’s ideas and gain a deeper insight into the pain point of Tribe Tours.

We also considered issues of global significance such as sustainability as we would communicate online instead of increasing our carbon footprint by physically meeting up with each other and ruling out poster advertising. We are also limiting the number of imported cases by incentivising Singaporeans to participate in domestic tourism instead of going overseas. The “Rediscover Singapore” vouchers created by Klook, one of the main marketing channels of Tribe tours.

This section pertains to Action where I am continuing my service to this SME by researching their context and conceptualising new marketing strategies with my group mates.

Ears of East Political podcast reflection #2

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It has been a week since I recorded my first political podcast for Ears of East which discussed Trump’s attempts to ban Tiktok/Wechat.

{LO6} We had the opportunity to engage with issues of global significance as the ban was yet another example of the power struggle between the 2 hegemons and the pursuit of maintaining the USA’s national security. The fact that both Tiktok and Wechat are largely seen as mediums to communicate one’s ideas, many saw the attempted ban as an infringement on people’s right to free speech. They also saw it as Xenophobia towards Chinese people who have been facing more oppression due to the racist rhetoric that they transmitted the virus overseas. What I learnt about this issues is the varying perspectives on both sides with the USA viewing TikTok as a violater of user privacy policies and an enabler for China’s cyber espionage units whilst TikTok denies any connection to the Chinese government. Participating in this activity made me think about the impact of social media, not only in our daily lives but also in the fragile relationships between countries. It also made me realize the sheer amount of information that social media users give to the apps and how it can be taken advantage of.

{LO5} Working collaboratively when recording the podcast was ensuring that you left an opening in your ending sentence for someone else to jump in and build on it. Each person had a responsibility to ask questions for each other to develop our ideas. Good collaboration was a huge part of having a good conversation because we needed to build on each other’s ideas to develop ideas and have a productive conversation. The people I worked with were all grade 11s so we had the critical thinking skills necessary to have a good political discussion. The challenges that we faced while working together was that none of us had a pre-established relationship so we lacked chemistry which made our conversation stale. It is difficult to overcome these challenges as we are in different grades and different classes so we don’t have many opportunities to form a relationship.

CAS Reflection: MUN #2

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I am about to participate in MUNOFS. I will be representing Turkey in NATO but the issue I will be debating is yet to be announced. But my role as Turkey in a organization such as NATO will inevitably force me to deal with issues that have global significance such as the Armenia-Azarbaijani conflict, Turkey purchasing weapons from Russia which has been seen as NATO’s rival and other disputes. The conference has not started yet so I will not be able to offer a understanding of the issue or know what action to take against it. What I could do is do research on my countries stance in several NATO issues and draft a resolution during the conference.

While drafting the resolution, I will also have to debate the ethical implications of some of the clauses. This will come in the form of amandments where we need to debate whether the solutions outlined in the clauses are ethical, feasible and viable. I will discuss more about the amandments made to unethical clauses or sub-clauses.

In terms of the 5 stages of a CAS, I am currently at the second stage which is preperatio. I already stated my roles and respnsibilities in MUNOFS, which is representing Turkey’s real-world interests. My plan of action will be to develop a country profile, a opening speech and draft a resolution. I have to accomplish this soon as the issues will be released within the next few days. I need to engage my writing, research, speaking, imrpovisation and articulation skills.

The benefits of working collaberatively are that I can gain more opinions and better feedback on my resolution from my sponsors. I can also work witht he oppsoition to compromise on my resolution and produce a document that can satisfy the majority of people.

CAS reflection: Ears of East political podcast

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{LO1} This is one of the new activities that I have joined this year. I joined Ears of East because I am an HL global politics student and hence, had a greater and reinvigorated interest in international affairs. Joining this political podcast group allowed me to collaborate with other people that have the same interests as me. I also wish to develop my communication skills and be able to convey my ideas in a concise manner. Planning the podcasts also allows me to gain insights into political issues that I can reference in my exams and draw relations to Global politics concepts. Having productive conversations with people and raising awareness about political issues is also extremely rewarding for me. Going into this activity, I think my strengths are my research skills, knowledge of international relations and awareness of current events. I have participated in similar activities such as IB Global Politics and IGCSE Global Perspectives.

{LO3} In terms of planning for this CAS experience, we have not begun planning any podcast episodes yet and have so far, observed the style of other podcasts to draw inspiration from. But once we start planning activities, I would like to explore issues such as the US elections and the electoral college, Russian Separatist Alexei Navalny and the Mulan Controversy. {LO6} I think these issues would be interesting to explore as they are extremely significant. For example, the Mulan controversy demonstrates how Hollywood would ignore human rights violations (the systemic imprisonment of Uighur Muslims) to gain access to the biggest box office in the world. But if given the choice to decide on the next political podcast, I would choose to discuss a topic that was relevant, relatively unknown amongst students and significant on a global level.

{LO1} During the planning of these podcasts, I wish to incorporate more wit and humour within the podcast such as playful banter, pop culture references and using subversive comedy which is best demonstrated in the movie “Airplane”. But we must also walk the fine line between humour and cringe. We should also take note of what makes other podcasts such as Joe Rogan’s podcast so successful. One of the primary contributors to their success is inviting guest stars whose opinions are valued audiences. We can replicate this by inviting representatives of services that relate to political issues and heads of grades.