This semester, the Peer Helpers wanted to work on magnifying the impact we wanted to create on the OSC community. We figured that we should be addressing to our school community as a whole, and not only high school students. So we started working towards our new objective by participating in the Tech Talk in February, 2019. This gave us an opportunity to speak with parents and have an open ended discussion about the pros and cons of using technology in school. The best part of this seminar, for me, was when I saw a few parents taking notes of what we were saying. We also led advisories for MYP2, MYP1 and PYP5, where we talked to them about “Active Listening” and “Empathy”. Giving seminars and presentations constantly as a part of the process has helped me work on my communication skills. Also, the age range of the audience really required for all of us to now how to put across our ideas efficiently and differently so that it is impactful. I certainly do feel like I can present my ideas to an audience better than I could prior to joining this service group.

Also, the constant need to think and communicate on the spot has really taught me how to think on my feet. Presentations and seminars have always required us to do something completely unexpected and uncalled for and we’ve always been ready for it and tackled it with grace. And for that, I’m proud of my team and myself. One thing we do need to continue working on is better advertising. We recognized that having issues with mental health isn’t the easiest thing to talk about for students and we need to make ourselves look more approachable and make our aim clear to anybody who is looking for someone to talk to. After Youzhi and Sarah, I want to try my best to take our service group to reach its fullest potential, as the service leader and that, is my target for the next year 🙂