Final Reflections
How did you increase your awareness of your own strengths and areas for growth?
Overall, I feel that my journey through the CAS process has greatly increased my awareness of my strengths and weaknesses. For one, I have sepecifically discovered how I can best communicate with other people. Participating in CAS required me to meet new people and communicate properly to accomplish a goal. I learned that I work well with others when taking action, however when it comes to being creative, I am not as efficient in expressing my thoughts. I am a good at visual communication but best at verbal communication. Another strength that I discovered is my strong personality to be a leader. As seen from my reflections, most of my time spent for CAS has been where I took leadership positions and spent time working with others, specifically younger teens and youth. I love to encourage others to aspire for their dreams and to work hard in life. As a leader, I encourage others to be caring, responsible for their actions, and respectful towards authority. Instead of asking this directly of them, I encourage them to have character through my example. Although I have found some of my strengths through CAS, I have found many of my weaknesses as well. I have learned that I am not good at keeping things on task and that I tend to procrastinate in some areas. I am bad at time management because I take on too many obligations and overfill my schedule. I also learned that I am not completely extroverted and that I often need some time alone to organize my thoughts and prepare myself to work with others; I can handle stress better when I am alone, rather than when I am in a stressful group situation.
How did your activities demonstrate that you've taken on new challenges?
While completing CAS, there were times where I was challenged to think outside the box to work out a tough situation. While trying to complete my Gold Award project, I was faced with many problems. I was challenged to raise over $300 more than I had originally planned and it held me back from almost completing my project. However, I was able to solve the problem by overcoming this challenge and doing a lot of fundraising. Another way that I took on new challenge was when I traveled to Missouri to be a counselor for a child with disabilities at Camp Barnabas. This was the most challenging week of my life as I my patience and positive attitude was tested constantly. Before I went to Barnabas, I thought I knew that I would have a fun but difficult week, however once it was over, I realized that I could have never prepared mentally for the challenges that I faced at that camp. It was well worth it, and I am forever grateful for the impact that CAS experiences have had on my life.
How were your activities planned and initiated?
For the most part, I got involved with service and projects through school clubs and Girl Scouts. In many instances, I attended club meetings and learned about events that I could volunteer to help. However, to earn my Gold Award for Girl Scouts, I had to plan initiate my own project. This took much more time and effort than just volunteering to pick up trash at the beach with Earth Club or tutor a peer. Instead of adding a specific date to my calender, I had to constantly plan and carry out my project, especially when things that I did plan, went longer than i thought. Either way, serving the community took a lot of time and energy.
In what ways did you work collaboratively with others?
Through sports and volunteering, I learned how to work collaboratively with others. First of all, playing a team sport such as soccer taught me the enormous importance of communication and teamwork. Both on and off the playing field, my coach stressed the importance of being a team and supporting each other through positive reinforcement and mutual respect. We made it a priority to spend time as an entire team outside of the daily practices and games, and this was an essential factor in helping us work together on the field. I learned that it is important to trust your team. I had the amazing honor of being the captain of the JV team my junior year, and I had the best experience through this leadership position because not only did I carry a heavy load of new responsibilities, I also had to be a team player and focus more on the girls, not on myself. It forced me to think for the team and not myself. I was constantly asked to demonstrate and explain plays and lead the girls through warm ups and drills. I felt so thankful for this opportunity to connect to the entire team and even though there were some difficult situations that season, I definitely learned how to work well with others.
How do your activities demonstrate perseverance and commitment on your part?
As explained in my post reflections, cross country was a huge struggle for me this year. And this was emotionally and physically straining on me.Further, because I was the captain I felt that I had an obligation towards the team to finish the season with a strong time and a positive attitude. However, this was definitely not the case for most of the season. This year was my worst season, and I felt tempted to quite the team nearly every day. Practice seemed unappealing to me now, and races were not as much fun as my previous years. I was getting worse times than ever, yet I felt that I was constantly pushing my body to go faster, only to end up getting my worse times ever. I definitely surprised myself that I made it though the season, but I owe it all to my teammates and my family for telling me that I could last the season. I learned that when I give up, it is hard to pick myself up again, but it is completely worth it. By the end of the season I got my fastest time for the season and I was proud that I finished strong.
How were you engaged with issues of global importance?
Both my junior and senior years I took an active role in helping with my school club called Sharing our Humanity. Because of my enthusiasm and dedication to the club junior year, I have had the privilege of being the 2014-2015 Club Treasurer. In Sharing our Humanity, our club decides on a global issue to research and fundraise to do our part to contribute to our global community. This year, we decided to fundraise for Fund-a-field, which is an organization that provides sports equipment for communities in developing countries. I took a strong part in organizing and carrying out our annual dinner to raise money for this cause. From this experience, I have been actively involved in the global community.
In what ways did you consider the ethical implications of your activities?
Over this past summer, I spent a week as a volunteer counselor at Camp Barnabas, and this experience taught me enormously about ethics. Since I was working with kids with disabilities, I had to go through a great deal of training. Right from the start of training, we were taught how to properly address our counselors. The staff worker told us that when talking about a camper who has down syndrome, or when talking about another camper who is in a wheelchair, we MUST learn that it is crucial to say "the girl with down syndrome" or "the boy in the wheelchair" rather than "the down syndrome girl" or "the wheelchair boy". From this lesson, it was immensely stressed that when we talk, we need to be ethically conscious. We must know that we need to address a person by who they are, not a characteristic. As the staff worker clarified, "the wheelchair does not define the boy, the boy can be defined without it and therefore it is said that he is in the wheelchair, not that he IS the wheelchair". These words were life changing, as I have never realized how our words can define a person to that great of an extent. I now look at others with a clearer mind. The differences between me and someone else is crucial to making us unique individuals and it is not appropriate to turn our uniqueness into negative flaws or qualities. I learned to see the beauty not only in others, but in life itself. Volunteering at Camp Barnabas taught me to better respect other people and to treat everyone as equal individuals.
What new skills did you develop through your activities?
There are many new skills that I discovered and matured because of my work through the CAS program. I built confidence in my ability to lead both my peers and younger students through my time as a volunteer at camps, tutoring, leadership in clubs, and leadership in sports. I developed a new skill for organization that I had previously lacked. This skill for organization and paperwork was developed specifically from my time spent working as treasurer of Sharing Our Humanity. I also developed another important skill of public speaking and learning to speak confidently to authority figures. This skill was under constant development from many hours of working with Girl Scouts and teaching a confirmation class at my church. I am now better at talking in front of a crowd of people and I have also learned how to gear my public speaking towards the right audience.