CAS Personal Profile-
Hello, my name is Vritika Patel and I am 17 years old. In my free time, I enjoy reading books, listening to music and playing basketball. Other than the activities mentioned above, my source of satisfaction and happiness comes from playing with/helping animals and exploring different cities and getting immersed into their cultures. I also go on occasional movie marathons (consisting mainly of sci-fi and suspense/thriller movies) or like to binge-watch TV shows (of course, when I am done studying).
I am really good at living a balanced life. Because of the growing responsibilities that come with studying IB, it is really difficult to give importance to the little things that matter. CAS has helped me lead a balanced life as it pushed me to pursue and invest time in activities that I would not have spent so much time doing. Mastering this ability has proved to be really helpful and calming with all the burden that I face during school.
I would like to improve my time management skills as this is really important when I have a lot of submissions and would also help me when I go to college and have much greater responsibilities. It would also ensure I do not have work pending at the last minute and that I can ensure together with working I can also spare some time for my extracurriculars.
I believe life should consist of working on academics and working on things that I am passionate about. Living a single tracked life would stop me from reaching my potential and exploring my interests. Hence I believe it is imperative to know how to utilize this limited time in the best manner. Ensuring that each minute is spent wisely and is spent on learning different things rather than concentrating on one is also very important.
I feel extremely passionate and sensitive about the environment and I believe in giving something back to the society. This pushed me to plant trees, help the underprivileged and put myself in other’s shoes. Along with my classmates, I also formed an environmental club, of which I was one of the leaders, during this time we came up with ideas of building birdhouses and setting up boxes where spare resources could be donated to those who needed it.
One thing I have always wanted to try is to learn how to scuba-dive. I am not afraid of animals, insects or heights, however, I have a phobia of depths and hence I would like to overcome this and learn how to scuba-dive. Learning about the creatures underwater will feed my curiosity about animals too.
CAS Plan-
| Proposed Activities | Description of the activity | Components (C/A/S) | Duration (long term/short term) | Start and end date | Investigation- a. What are your skills/interest and what is your purpose for selecting this CAS experience? b. incase of service- What is the issue you will be focusing on? | Learning Outcomes you aim to achieve | Location (in- school/out -of-school) | Status | Supervisor |
| Savarkundla trip | We will go and build cover for wells so that forest animals do not fall in them. | C/A/S | short term | 7th-10th September, 2017. | I went on the trip because I love animals and enjoy spending time in the nature. In this trip we were able to contribute towards saving endangered asiatic lions and other wild animals hence I selected this activity. | L2, L4, L5, L6 | Out of school, Savarkundla | Done | Falguni ma’am |
| Plant basil and mint | I will grown basil and mint plants for my family and neighbours to use so they dont have to buy the ones which contain pesticides which can harm their health. | A/ S | Long-term | 14th September 2017 onwards | My mother had completed a course of growing vegetables and other fruits for kitchen use and I always wanted to learn that because I knew the ones sold in the market contain a lot of pesticides to make grow faster and look bigger. However not everyone was aware of this, hence I decided to tell my neighbours about this also. But due to their busy lives they did not have time for planting them. So I decided to grow mint and basil leave for them as they as most commonly used. | L2, L3, L4, L7, L6 | Out of school | Done | Minakshi Patel |
| Cooking | I will learn how to cook new dishes and improve upon the ones I already know. | C | 1 year (Long term) | 16th July 2017 to 20th April 2018 | I am keen towards cooking and I was always curious as to how to make new dishes but did not have the time to join a cooking class at home, hence I chose it as my Arts Special activity. I will learn how to cook new dishes and improve upon the ones I already know. This can help me in the future when I go to college as I will have to cook on my own and eating outside everyday is not suitable so to maintain a healthy lifestyle my cooking skills will help me. | L1 L2 L5 | In school | Done | Khyati gajjar |
| Sevice session, basketball | I will teach underprivileged children how dribble and shoot. | A/S | Short term | 16 & 17, 23 & 24 September | The aim of the service session was to provide underprivileged children an opportunity to learn different sports, art or music. During these sessions I was able to interact with these children and use my sports skills to teach them how to play. | L3, L4, L5, L7 | in school | Done | Falguni ma’am |
| Inter school competition | Praticipate and represent my school in basketball competitions | A | Short term | 20th January 2018 | I will represent my school in a basketball competition along with my team and compete with the teams from other school. The aim is to perform up to my best ability and think about strategies to beat them. | L5, L1, L2, L4 | In school | Done | Krushi Desai |
| Learning kick boxing | I will learn how to play kick boxing. This will be beneficial for me as it is a form of self defence and I will be able to learn a new sport. | A | Long term | 2 years | A kick boxing coach will come to my home every day and will help me strengthen my power. I will do cardio, weightlifting and learn fighting techniques. It will also help me increase my felxibility and stamina. | L1, L2, L3, L4 | At home | Done | Surali Ribadiya |
| Arts special- Dance educational programme | Our school provides us an opportunity to learn a new skill or enhance it. This program offers various options like Visual Art, Drama, Dance, Vocals, Keyboard, Drum, Tabla, Guitar. We learn that particular skill for the entire year, and at the end of the year, we perform in Arts Festival to show our skills to our parents. | C | long term | 1 year | When I was young I had learnt bharatnatyam for 2 years and I felt it was fun but then I could not continue dance. The reason I chose to learn dancing again was that I would learn something new (Contemporary dance form) and I can develop a new skill. | L1, L2, L4 | At school | Done | Jay sir (DEP teacher) |
| Cleaning the beach | On the first day of school we went to a beach near our school and the purpose was to reflect on the amount of garbage thrown on the beach. We were divided in groups and tried to put all the trash on the beach in the bag given to us. Even though there were a lot of people we weren’t able to clean out all the trash. It made us realize the amount of garbage thrown by people in public areas. We also felt what garbage cleaners have to go through. | S , A | short term | 07/02/2018 | This activity is both service and activity as before cleaning we also played some games. Our main focus was to collect as much garbage as we could and bring out the truth so that student realise the impact created and spread awareness that littering public places is not a ethical decision. | L2, L5, L6, L7 | Out of school | Done | Tabassum ma’am and Sarika ma’am |
| Lets giggle comedy show | I along with a few friends organized comedy show in Surat | A, S | Long term | 18/11/2017 to 19/06/2018 | I wanted to organise an event that would give me an exposure of how different types of businesses work. I would get to experience about the procedures to be followed and what to keep in mind while running a business. I would also get the opportunity to improve time management, communication and social skills. It is also relevant to my school subjects hence it would allow me to apply my classroom skills in real life. | LO1, LO2, LO3, LO4, LO5, LO6 | Out of school | Done | Neel Choksi |