Creativity, Action and Service or CAS is an important aspect of the IB Diploma Program. It is valuable because it ensures that students lead a balanced life amidst the academic rigors of the program. Over the years, I have been involved in many extracurricular activities mostly based on my interests, rather than in an attempt to lead a balanced life. In the next two years, I will gain some new experiences and face some new challenges in the realms of creativity l, action and service. This blog will be the platform, where I will be sharing and reflecting upon these experiences.

Goals are an extremely important aspect of success and growth in any activity. Having no goals is like a plane with an inaccurate GPS system. Without proper goals, one will not be able to achieve anything as there will be no progress in any direction. Therefore, before I started my CAS journey, I wanted to spend some time thinking about what I want to achieve in the CAS program during the next two years. I put these thoughts down into the following goals for each aspect of CAS.

Creativity

I am very passionate about technology and as a result, I participated in many activities to provide my technological skills. Last year, I was the Head of Technology for the Colombo Model United Nations conference, where I maintained the website, points systems and created other digital media such as videos, and the souvenir booklet. In addition to this, I maintained the website during the SAISA Badminton and Girls football tournaments hosted in Colombo last year. I also built two mobile applications last year, one as a solution to the waste management problem in Sri Lanka and one to help improve a user’s algebra skills.

Overall, I am very satisfied with my involvement in creative extra-curricular activities. I enjoy using technology to build creative solutions to problems, and I hope to continue to do so in the future. Specifically for the next two years, I have outlined a few goals for my creative endeavors below.

• COMUN – I will be the Head of Technology for the 25^th session of COMUN in 2019 and thereafter in 2020. In these two years, I want to improve the already established points system through security and functionality enhancements. Two other things I want to complete, is the creation of a database, for all information related to the conference. This will include all information from delegate details, to delegate performance. I have also noticed that a lot of users access the COMUN website from Mobile phones. Therefore, I also want to build a mobile application for the information related to the conference. At the end of the two years, as I depart from OSC, I also have to train someone to take over the technological responsibilities and assets related to COMUN.
• SAISA – Last year, I introduced live scores to the SAISA website and this was extremely successful with thousands over users. I will continue to maintain the SAISA websites in the next two years, with these live scores. I also want to build a Gecko Athletics mobile application as a hub for all news related to Gecko Athletics including live scores.

Action

Action is the aspect of my extra curriculars that is the weakest. I think action and exercise is a very important aspect of a healthy lifestyle as it will improve both physical and mental health. Therefore, I want to challenge myself and participate in a few more active activities in the next two years.

I have been playing Golf for the last five years, but I played the game for leisure rather than competition. I enjoy playing golf a lot and in the next two years, I hope to improve my game as much as possible. I have participated in a few tournaments, but I hope to participate in more in the future. Currently my handicap is in the low twenties, my goal is to reduce it to less than 15 in the next two years. Another goal is to participate in a few more tournaments and place in the top 3 in at least one of them.

Another one of my goals, is to try out for a SAISA tournament and try to participate in one. I have been in SAISA schools for the last 4-5 years, and one aspect of the experience I have not participated in is the SAISA experience. Therefore, I feel like this will be a good experience as it will improve my teamwork skills and physical health.

Service

Last year I was a member of a new service group called Gecko Network, which is built to serve the OSC community with technological assistance and media coverage through videography and photography. This year, I was appointed as the leader of the service group. As leader, I have some key goals that I hope to achieve in the next two years in this group. Firstly, I want to increase the amount of content we produce to a regular production cycle. This will mean that the group works harder, and we engage our audience in a more effective manner. My second goal is to build a functional website, which I hope to complete very soon. This website is very important because it will be the portal to all the content we create, and it has been a major requirement since the inception of the service. If the response towards the website is good, I will also consider building a mobile application for Gecko Network in the next two years.

Another goal I have is to establish a fully functioning Primary Gecko Network. Gecko Network is built to broadcast all the things that happen at OSC. Yet since the Gecko Network is made up of secondary students, a large demographic of the school has been neglected : the primary school. Therefore, I will be working hard in the next two years to build the Primary Gecko Network group as an After school activity to address this issue.