With less than a month to go until I turn the tassel of my graduation cap, at no moment has the nostalgia of the experiences I have partook in over the last two years hit me as strongly. Thanks to the CAS programme, I had the wonderful opportunity to create some fond memories with my grade, push myself as a leader and global citizen and aim to learn how to find the time for myself amidst the rigor of the IB DP program. 

Identify own strengths and develop areas for growth 

Since primary I had enjoyed participating in the galas and productions our school has hosted but since middle school I identified that personally I prefer working backstage over having the limelight. Therefore in grade 9 I took my first role as a backstage hand, helping out in the winter and spring gala. Coming into grade 11 I was able to use the knowledge I had accumulated in my past experiences and adopt the role of being the stage manager. By helping out in galas and the senior musical, Little Shop of Horrors, I have been able to utilize my organizational skills in creating mock stage layouts, annotated scripts and helping the actors calm down backstage by giving them a pep talk (pun intended). These experiences have led me to appreciate the unseen hard work done by stage and tech crew, as the meticulous work that goes into having an event run smoothly is unfathomable to an outsider. However, at the same time, managing backstage has made me aware that it’s impossible to account for every little detail and that spontaneity and flexibility is an important arsenal I need to cultivate. I will never forget the panic right before opening of the second night of Little Shop of Horrors as Akhil informed me he had run out of band aids (an important prop for his character) and the wild goose chase I was on 20 mins before trying to convince the security that I was taking the bandaids out of the first aid box for a decent reason. Or when encouraging audiences who had come in late to the performance, using my in depth knowledge of the script to find the best opening to escort them to their seats. While all these moments were unexpected and caused me a great deal of stress at the time, I acknowledge that each was a valuable learning experience. 

Demonstrate that challenges have been undertaken, developing new skills in the process

One of the most interesting challenges I undertook these last two years was moderating the discussion with Ashok Ferry during the OSC Lit fest 2023. I was immensely honored to be given this opportunity as a student to be able to converse with such an esteemed author and be given the chance to hear his perspective on creating literature. Through this experience I re-read his novels,particularly The Ceaseless Chatter of Demons, in an attempt to foster a deeper engagement with the themes and messages Ferry was trying to convey. Then with the help of Ms. Raina I learnt how to craft thought provoking questions that elicit responses that would be interesting for an audience unfamiliar with Ferry’s work to hear. On my own I had to push myself to watch interviews with authors and research into Ferry’s background. Leading up to the literary festival I was down with an horrendous cold, so learning how to control my voice and place extra emphasis on my articulation and enunciation was a priority. The skill that struck me the most after this experience is even though I had spent much time carefully structuring my questions, the most engaging conversation happened after I put down my notes and treated this official panel as conversation. The ad-libs and subtle humor made for a richer conversation and created a more informal environment that allowed Ferry to give genuine responses. Having gone through the experience of moderating a discussion I was able to view the panel discussions of the Ceylon Literary festival through new eyes. 

Demonstrate how to initiate and plan a CAS experience 

While I have headed several projects throughout my two years in DP, my CAS project of choreographing the Grade 12 Sinhala and Tamil New Year Dance definitely holds a special place in my heart. As with any good CAS experience, I first identified a real life need: in this particular case, sentiments to bring back the tradition of the Grade 12 dance. Once I had gotten the necessary approvals, planning this CAS experience was a breeze. The process could be broken down into three parts: choreographing, practicing and performing. The success of this CAS experience stems from all the help I received along the way especially during the choreographing stage. From Ms. Tanuja and Isa who helped with putting together and practicing the moves to Chirath who helped out with creating the backing track, it was through the collaboration of all the people that I was able to draw out my abilities to the best of their potential. During the rehearsing stage it was up to me to take initiative and find times within our busy schedules to rehearse and push people to learn the steps. In hindsight I would have loved to start this project earlier and create a more complex dance but it was important that I understood the skill level of our grades and created a dance that was within everyone’s comfort zone. Overall I consider my CAS project a success, it was a wonderful experience for our grade to get closer together as we laughed through the practice sessions. 

Show commitment to and perseverance in CAS experiences

Out of all my CAS experiences the one that took the most time and perseverance to complete was organizing and hosting COMUN 2023 as the 29th Secretary General. I was lucky that I was on the EXCO during COMUN 2022 and therefore had a good grasp of exactly how much of an undertaking this project was. Despite that, nothing could prepare me for the amount of time I invested into ensuring the COMUN 2023 would be the best MUN yet as it marked the return to in person conferences. On a week by week basis I organized several meetings including a Monday lunch time meeting with Mr. Russo to touch base, a monday after school session to prepare the OSC delegates and friday after school session to meet with the EXCO members who hailed from different COlombo schools. In addition to meetings there were also times where I needed to go on site visits accompanied by Matthew and Gokul, my head of operations and president of general assemblies, respectively, to check out hotel venues and select awards. In addition to the time I devoted in person, I increased my accessibility within social media as it was the easiest way for non-OSC delegates or faculty advisors to get in touch with me. To prevent repeated conversations I regularly sent out detailed emails to all faculty advisors and student coordinators, alongside establishing and moderating a whatsapp community with over 400 members. As secretary general, one important action I wanted to implement was regularly hosting feedback sessions at the end of each day of debate. I remember that when I was a delegate and even during my time on the EXCO it was a taboo to criticize your chairs but I felt that that inhibited improving the quality of the debate from both ends. Therefore I would place aside 10 mins per a committee to kick out the committee chairs to hear honest feedback from the delegates on their thoughts on the conference. Likewise at the very end I would hear feedback from the chairs on how they felt their delegates were performing. By collecting feedback from both parties I was able to prevent tension from arising due to simple misunderstandings and miscommunications.

Demonstrate the skills and recognize the benefits of working collaboratively 

My time as Hope For Kids’ service leader was when I came to appreciate the results of working together. During DP 1 semester one my service consisted of three other people and therefore I had gotten accustomed to completing a fair share of the work by myself. However overtime we were able to recruit more members and have now grown into a tight knit group that I am saddened to part with, I have learnt to rely on them more and delegate tasks between us. The best example of this was in planning for our annual cricket match this year. It would be the third year I would be organizing it, therefore I took it as an opportunity to place myself in a more supervisory role and allow the DP 1 members a chance to practice leading. I helped out with reaching out to other service groups to participate in the event to make it more like a carnival and on the day helped run our stall which served ice cream and king coconut. In my opinion this very event is the epitome of collaboration as the match allowed participation from all areas of the school, featuring mixed teams of teachers, service staff and students working together in harmony. This year was certainly a lot bigger than previous years and if I had tried to tackle it alone I would not have been able to achieve the same level of success we reached this year. Each member played an important role from marketing, to collecting donations, to keeping score during the actual match that was delegated to them based on their interests and strength. This last year as a service leader has pushed me to look beyond my immediate time as service leader and help cultivate a legacy that younger members can use as a foundation to take the service to new heights. 

Demonstrate engagement with issues of global significance 

My service Hope for Kids aims to help support patients with cancer and their families in any way that helps. This manifests in collecting food rations and donating them to CCC house in Maharagama to when hospital restrictions lessen spending time playing with the kids. Throughout my many visits to the cancer hospital, getting a chance to speak to the administrators have given me better insight into the challenges these families face, especially as most of them come from low-income rural villages. Especially through our partner work with the Roshan Mahanama Foundation and the Indira Cancer Trust we have been given ample opportunity to support the patients. Yet this year my co-service leader, Chirath, and I decided that we wanted to spread our impact to the school as well. Regular checkups with the intent of early detection of cancer is something most adults neglect to do which is why through awareness campaigns we hoped to demystify the process to the OSC community. In particular, we highlighted pediatric cancer and breast cancer awareness day and hosted an advisory session to discuss the impacts of cancer. Lastly, we reached out to alumni members and members of the OSC parent community who were willing to share their own experiences with cancer. These intimate talks allowed our service group members to develop a deeper sense of empathy and helped refine the direction of service projects to be established next year such as creating a database of information in regards to cancer in all three languages (English, Sinhala and Tamil). 

Recognize and consider the ethics of choices and actions 

During my time as secretary general for COMUN 2023 there were several moments in which I needed to consider how the decisions I took in my capacity as head would affect the rest of 350 odd participants and the general flow of the debate. One of the most important decisions I had to make fairly early on was choosing the theme and committees for COMUN 2023 and then approving the individual committee topics. In particular the theme would set the mood for the whole convention and therefore I had to take the time to reflect on what exactly I wanted to achieve through this MUN conference. My priority of reducing the toxic competitiveness that plagued the SL MUN circuits was what helped me create the theme: Bridging and Fortifying International Relationships; Broadening Global Influence. This in turn helped me alongside my secretariat select the committees we felt were most appropriate to stimulate, taking into account the political climate over the preceding year. In the end we decided upon General Assembly One, Three, Four, Arab League, Group of 20, Security Council and International Press Corps. We hoped that this range of committees would allow both novice and experienced delegates alike to find a theme they would be happy specializing in, whether that be humanitarian issues, international security, economic proposals or reliable news reporting. When it came to deciding on conference topics, careful effort was made to draft up the best issues that would not be discriminatory to any delegate or representative country but still relevant and timely that it would open an avenue for rich discussion. My personal favorite topic of the session was the Security Council’s conference topic: Amending the UN Charter. This was something I had often discussed in history class with Mr. Hentz so I was excited to hear the opinions of extremely qualified debaters from around the island.