Bal Mela was a student-led event held at Fountainhead School. My friends and I took the initiative of organizing the event the following year. For this event, underprivileged students were invited from all walks of life and community to celebrate and enjoy different sports, art, and games. They came from the nearby schools and villages to our school where we gave them a chance to learn a variety of activities. With this, they were also given exposure to a puppet show, giant wheel, inflated playhouse, and merry-go-round. This is an opportunity for us to provide space and resources for underprivileged children to enjoy the joys of childhood. Great opportunity to help distribute joy to those less privileged than us! This event catered to help cherish and make enjoy the childhoods of those children who are not able to afford such resources. We provide them with a platform full of fun and activities, volunteers who help them do the activity and the needful resources. These children get really very rare opportunities to involve in such activities, so this is a way where we can showcase our skills and they can relish their times, feel specialized. I was interested to lead this as it made me feel glad and a sense of achievement arose when there were smiles at the faces of those innocent children who lack a lot of resources.
The learning outcomes achieved are as follows:
L1: Identify own strengths and develop areas for growth
Through managing this event I was able to identify my strengths. Since Bal Mela is been done in the school for many years, we had to find some activities which were unique, fun and were not been done in the previous years. Since I had a keen interest in researching and finding such creative activities, I helped my teammates to finish this work quickly. Though there were some parts where I couldn’t work so efficiently, but still put in my best efforts towards the event. It is very important to identify weaknesses but working upon it is a challenging task but I could accomplish it through the event because of my teammates and the main goal I had in mind of making the children happy.
L2: Demonstrate that challenges have been undertaken, developing new skills
There were many challenges we faced during the whole event. Since this event had been conducted by the school for the past many years, marketing this event wasn’t an issue, as everyone was quite aware of the whole event. The main issue we faced was when the volunteers would not turn up, after registering themselves for the event. Due to this, we were short of volunteers, which would make it unmanageable for the other volunteers to handle. Also on the day of the event, one of the bus’s Tyre punctured on its way to pick up the volunteers from their stops. This delayed the timings of the bus, due to which many volunteers went back home and weren’t able to turn up for the event.
Hence at the end moment, we had to reshuffle everyone, which created confusion and an uncontrollable situation. Together we 3 quickly reshuffled everyone and then delegated the work to the volunteers so that they can reach the assigned places. Though we faced challenges we were able to overcome each as well as developed new skills through this process.
L3: Initiate and plan a CAS experience
We had to plan everything from the start, including the activities, the volunteers, the resources and the transportation. The event took place on 22nd February 2019 and we started our planning from 9 January 2019. In the first week, we coordinated with the teacher in charges to understand the requirements of the event and it can be conducted. Since all of us have been volunteering for Balmela for 3 years, we had the idea of how the event was organized. Within 15 days we were done with deciding 36 activities and we sent a volunteering form across our school so that people can volunteer in the event. We even went to all the classes from Grade 7 to 12 to inform them about the event and ask if they are interested in volunteering. We were able to get 96 people to volunteer for the event, which was a pretty great achievement. Side by side, we even created a resource list and ordered all the required materials. Till 5th February, we sent a mail to all the volunteers with their assigned position and responsibilities. We even kept a meeting where we briefed them about all the activities and made the required changes. Also, we had various meetings with the teacher in charge to discuss our progress. By 20th February, we were ready for the event. Although, we faced a lot of challenges on the day, it was a successful event as we could see huge smiles on the children’s faces. It gave us immense pleasure and made us feel good.
L4: Show perseverance and commitment in CAS experience
Since there were a lot of other events that were piled up before Bal Mela. It was very much hectic to manage each and everything. But since I had taken the ownership to manage the event I showed my perseverance and commitment towards it and finished all the tasks we had to do. Though there was a lot of work and we had less time we divided work and finished it all by the end of it. Be it finding for volunteers, adding creative activities and finally arranging the resources was done by us whole-heartedly and to point. This helped our event to be successful and fulfill its purpose. Henceforth since we were committed and persevered towards the event we were able to manage the event and bring happiness to the children.
L6: Engagement with issues of global significance
India has been facing the problem of poverty since ages, which has been increasing day by day. Due to poverty, a lot of students from the government schools aren’t able to explore and enjoy such an event. Many families are not able to earn as much as to satisfy all needs and wants of their children. Sometimes, they are not even able to provide them with education and some basic necessities of life. Keeping this factor in mind, we made sure to keep the event free of cost for all the students. Our main motive was to serve the students and make that day a memorable one for each and every student, attending the Bal Mela. They learn, enjoy, spend time with friends and get exposure to resources which aren’t available to them to make them feel satisfied and happy.
This event also made me realize, how grateful I am, as I have my parents who always take care of all my needs and demands. It made me realize how grateful I am, as I can afford all of these things and enjoy my life. This will be a memorable event where I could incorporate the skills previously learned, attributes and learner profiles into practice. I would surely take such opportunities in the future which helps in the betterment of society. Watching those children having happy and energizing faces had made my day. Sometimes such small things also affect you positively and hence make you learn and explore more about life.
