Month: December 2016

CAS has been a fun learning experience for me. I was always inclined a lot towards co-curricular activities. May it be Arts, sports or social service. Before opting or knowing IB, my hobbies and co-curricular activities were things that concerned me because I was afraid that probably I would have to drop them because High school is one of the most important phase in life. But, CAS is like that one requirement of IB that is a stress buster and is fun. It has given me an opportunity to enhance my talent and continue my exploration and learning in the non-academic world. During my CAS Experience, I attended Subroto Football Tournament at district and state level, attended a plantation activity at vasnda, organised a Basketball 3 on 3 event as a part of my project work, became a part of the organising committee in FSMUN in our school, worked as an intern at Span Design Organisation for a month, learnt Corel Draw software, took part in an eye checkup camp affiliated with Rotary Club and spending time with special kids.

Coming to my CAS Experience, it has been great. One of the best achievement and the best learning part was my CAS project. From just an idea to the real event, it was a great journey. I got know about how people really are, what kind attitude we need to have in front of different kinds of people, how a sport event is actually conducted etc. Not only that but I also enjoyed learning different skills in all the three strands creativity, activity and service. Learning Corel draw, Attending an Internship and different service projects. It was a great learning experience all together.

CAS wasn’t just a learning experience, it was way more than that. Our morals, honesty and values were built, knowing what was right and wrong and building of problem solving skills was very helpful and worth. Knowing how much vital role our ethics play in all the situation is one thing I understood which I think is farmost the most important thing you learn in life.

CAS was not only something that was beneficial to me. It benefitted me as an individual, but a society as a whole. The service projects I did, helped the environment and the needy people. Contributing to these random act of kindness as a purpose to finish my CAS requirement, it gave me a feeling of happiness and a proud moment wherein I contributed to an act of kindness to the society. This made me realise that everything is not just done because it is required, there things that are done because they make you happy and proud, probably not at that particular moment, but later in life.

There were many incident which I came across during my CAS experience which I were life long learning experience for me. During my planning for FS 3/3, we were in search of sponsors. In that case we had a deal with one of the sponsors and then were betrayed by them due to some trust issues, that was the day when we realised everytime we trust someone in case of money or business or something like that, we’ve got to be very careful and take signatures in written to avoid problems in future. That is when our ethics played a role, after negotiation with the higher authority from the school asked the assigned person to pay but then, we the tournament directors mutually decided on not taking those money that we were given unwillingly with so much of grudge. There also came a time during the event day when one team raised protest against the other claiming they were above age. So, that was one problem that I came across for the first time but handled it pretty well probably. So incidents like this, build not only my confidence or problem solving skills, but also makes me a better and a honest person. At the end, that is what that counts.

CAS was a overall a very helpful programme set by the IB in order to make us balanced in terms of our academics and extracurricular activities, making all of us good at all the three important aspects that are creativity, activity and service.

After a grand Success of first edition of FSMUN, that is the Fountainhead School Model United Nations, FSMUN 2.0 is back. I was the OC Head for Utilities last year and took up the same responsibility as I recognized it to be developed strength in organising department.

There were some changes in the responsibilities this time. A significant change for me was that this time I had to share my OC Head position with my friend. Both of us, had to work together with more responsibilities. Our goal was to buy the best quality stationery for people participating in the minimal amount of money. Second goal was to make our work as organised as possible in order to save time and make it easier for the logistics and the registration team to do their jobs. I have always been someone who finds ways to keep things very simple. I thought using same skills here to make our work easy. The preparations started 3-4 months before the event.

Both of us, the Utilities OC Heads, divided our work to meet all the deadlines. The director and the secretary general seemed to be happy with our work as we were committed and finished all our work with our efforts and passion. We sacrificed our holiday to finish extra work and help other departments too. It was a good opportunity for me to get exposure of different departments. As I already had experience of my own CAS Project work, I gave suggestions and my own inputs in order to help the OC and also for the betterment of the event as a whole.

We, the whole OC faced challenges like having less count of delegates than expected, crisis in food. I tried my best not to have challenges in my department and make everything go smoothly. As I enjoyed the responsibility given to me, I was ready to do more and more work than assigned. Ultimately, enjoying your duty is what that matters. Then I made a whole CODE SYSTEM to code all the folder and the delegates in order to give them the stationary material as soon as possible when the registrations happen on that day. I learnt different techniques to keep the documents and stationery organised and easy to manage. The code system was not so much complicated so as to the volunteers could manage it pretty well. There were a lot of delegates who did not turn on that day, and to keep the event and the debate going, we had persuade people in the OC to participate for the betterment of the event. That was the  challenges that we faced of having less people contributing than expected, I developed persuasive skills in order to persuade people to contribute. Not only on that day, but also while promoting this event and asking people to participate, i built that skill.

Overall, FSMUN 2.0 was a great experience for me and I wish to take part in it next year as well to develop and more and more.

By now, I had decided what career I wished to pursue. School gave us an opportunity to get an exposure to work with successful people and get to know about their jobs. I had applied for it and got to work with Ar. Abhishek Bhansali and Ar. Minal Bhansali at Span Design Organisation for a month roughly. Overall it was an amazing experience which made me confident to opt for this field and not any other field. This was the first step toward my journey from a student to an Architect. The early days went reading different books and knowing about the field. Getting book knowledge and exposure was one way to learn and open the doors of creativity. Being an anti-reader it was a little difficult for me to go about it. But then, I thought about perceiving it visually and getting to know about different structures, pros and cons of designing children bedrooms etc. After that, I got to do practical learning as well, where I accompanied some employees there to the site and measured all the bathrooms at the site. It wasn’t easy, I had to climb till the 8-9th floor using the staircase as the site wasn’t built and there was no elevator, then walking around all the dirt and cement, water spilled and other fragments lying all over the floor to take measurements.  I learnt to be patient as well, I learnt that when you are learning something, the process won’t be easy, there will be a lot of difficulties that we have to face which requires patience and the zest of learning. Then, I was also taught to read different plans and know some basic terms about the field which are spoken. There, I came across to “Vastu Shastra”, which can regard them as ethics or rules that need to be considered according to the client’s beliefs. The most interesting part was to have interactive sessions with Minal Ma’am and get to know her journey and experience. I asked different questions and she answered all of them which helped me to get a better understanding and vanish my misconceptions and other myth about the field. I went with Abhishek Sir and one of his client for material selection. I got to know different properties of Marble and Granite. How they are different not only by other looks but their properties and purposes as well. We visited a shop where there not other materials like wood, ply, veneer, neolith, mdf etc. which had their unique looks and purposes. After all this, I was given an internship task to design a bathroom space according to the requirements. By the end of the task, I had to prepare a presentation about the experience and also present my idea about the task. There were different flaws that I came across which Minal Ma’am explained me and then I worked upon it and by the end of the task, I realised interiors was my strength at this stage as I got more exposure about it than architecture. Till yesterday, I knew what field I will go in my future. By now, I know what I will be doing in my coming future.