“The Sustainability Drive” is an initiative taken by 5 members (including me) for spreading awareness regarding the incorporation of sustainability in our regular lives to make this Earth a better place to live. This is also our CAS project which was supervised by Utsav Oza sir.
The project name itself reflects the main Idea. To be specific, the project “The sustainability drive” aims to make the surrounding (school, home, society) more sustainable.
The concept of menstruation can be connected with the topic of sustainability. According to facts, a single woman can generate up to 125 kg of non-biodegradable waste through her menstruating years alone, this can lead to health and environmental hazards. Hence I and my team decided to take a session for grade 7 girls and voice the concept of sustainable menstruation and took the seminar on 20th December 2021 for the same. In order to increase our reach, we decided to add one more component to our project which was creating an Instagram page called “the_sustainability_drive” where we posted one sustainable tip that can be accommodated in our lifestyle every day.
The planning of the project started on 1st December 2021, and the project will come to an end on 15th February 2022. While doing this project, I demonstrated the following Los:
LO 1: Identify own strengths and develop areas for growth
While deciding on the project, I knew my strength was great and effective communication, but one area of growth I found was public speaking. I lack experience in public speaking and hence I am not very confident at it so taking this seminar in front of almost 100 people gave me an opportunity to practice public speaking and gain more confidence. That ultimately also enhanced my communication skills. To add on, in MYP we have learned about graphics in digital design and I scored well in that subject but I haven`t made a lot of Instagram posts professionally. Hence, this was the area I could work upon, creating Instagram posts for our project made improved my graphic designing skills, I understood the formating sizes, color combination, how to increase the reach, etc. Hence I worked upon my strengths as developed areas for growth.
LO 2: Demonstrate that challenges have been undertaken, developing new skills in the process
I have never organized or conducted a seminar in the physical setup before. There were so many challenges that I have faced during this project. To start with the clashing of ideas was one of the problems, we all wanted to do something keeping in mind the environment, but some people wanted to do something regarding water conservation and some regarding sustainable menstruation. After loads of discussion, we went ahead with sustainable menstruation as we thought it was a unique topic to talk about. This developed our critical thinking skills as we carefully analyzed both the topics and also social skills as I learned to be more considerate. The next challenge that we faced was to schedule meetings with our supervisor, he had a busy schedule but he cooperated with us and we had to go several times and have a meet with him. One of the major problems that had overcome during the project was to arrange a session only with girls because this topic was not relatable to the boys. It was difficult to arrange a session just for girls but in the end, after talking to various coordinators and with the support of our supervisors we did it! This again developed a new skill. Another challenge that I faced was certain team members were taking the project too lightly, so giving them the work, guiding them on what to do, creating the presentation became too hectic but in the end, we managed it and developed a lot of collaboration skills too. Also, 2 hours before the seminar when we were doing our mock presentation we realized we had so less content, then on the spot, we planned a chit game that we will do towards the end of the session and that actually became the highlight of the show. This on-the-spot management developed our self-management skills too.
LO 3: Demonstrate how to initiate and plan a CAS experience
The idea “Sustainable Periods” was initiated by me also in order to convince my group I created a half presentation for the same. We had planned for more than one month for the execution of the CAS project. For the first component the offline seminar we used Canva, spreadsheet, and google docs for planning. We used to regularly work upon this. I have been responsible to initiate the CAS project. Talking about the second component of creating the Instagram page, I asked my fellow group members to create the Instagram page, we planned and discussed the logo, created two of them, then decided One, we made creative posters, discussed them, made a schedule for uploading the poster. For communication and planning we used Canva, google chats and WhatsApp. The evidence is below:
LO 4: Show commitment to and perseverance in CAS experiences
During the CAS project, I had demonstrated a lot of perseverance. Some of the fellow group mates failed to achieve their responsibilities or the quality and that actually pissed me off, sometimes I just felt like quitting or leaving the group, but I developed perseverance and showed commitment towards the project. Also, the schedule of group members was not matching, hence it became difficult to communicate, and then we chose the break time in schools to communicate and decide. Also while starting the Instagram page, we were unable to reach a lot of people initially, but we stayed committed, posted reels and posters, and reached 3 thousand plays which were overwhelming. The evidence is below
LO 5: Demonstrate the skills and recognize the benefits of working collaboratively
I am usually good at communication but collaborations skills are something I need to develop. Considering this, it was difficult for me to work with others during this experience because of opinion differences, subjects hence meeting issues, time issues, non-matching schedules, etc. However, working collaboratively did make things easier as the workload was divided. For instance, I checked I completed 10 slides of the presentation, we divided 5 working days of the week between 5 people for creating the poster, and hence, the work got easier, more efficient, and quicker. Hence I recognized the benefits of working in a group and developed collaborative skills.
LO 6: Demonstrate engagement with issues of global significance
The entire project is rooted in global significance. The global issue we targeted was the destruction of the environment. We can see that in the month of December where ideally winters should start it is raining, global temperatures are rising, droughts have destroyed economies of Africa and several other countries, the environment is now being looked upon. The concept of sustainability needs more voice according to we the students of FS and hence we are starting up this project. The project involved 2 major components. As previously mentioned the aim of this project is to include sustainability in every aspect of life and hence we post sustainable tips every day, such as switching to metal straws, using cotton cloth instead of tissues, sustainable menstruation, etc. These small changes can create a huge difference! We raised awareness and attempted to change people`s choices and make them sustainable to protect/ replenish the environment.
LO 7: Recognize and consider the ethics of choices and actions
While creating the poster and managing the Instagram page we had a choice to use already available posters on google or other platforms relating to our topic, that would even make out work easier but it was not ethical to use some others’ work and post it without team name. Here our team chose to be ethical, hence we created our own posters from scratch using canvas, gave each other suggestions, and researched a lot. This is when we chose ethics and created our own posters!
I also demonstrated several learner profiles during this CAS project. I was a communicator as communicated my ideas to the group, took initiative, took permissions, coordinated with the coordinators, etc. I was a thinker and reflective while analyzing each piece of information and added to the presentations or the poster. I also reflected on the posters made by my fellow group mates so that we can give the best to our page. I was also principled as we cited all the sources used in the presentation made for the webinar.
The highlight of this experience for me was when teachers appreciated us for conducting sessions on a unique topic, we got positive feedback!
I would love to continue this project in the future, keep posting and keep conducting webinars. Finally, we made it to the end! I enjoyed every bit of it!
Evidences:
