CAS is one of the central components of the IB Diploma program. It is intended to give you the opportunity to learn “outside the world of scholarship” and provide a “counterbalance to the self-absorption some students may feel within a demanding school program” (IB CAS guide, 2001). It is intended to help you develop creative, physical and social skills by sharing your talents and energies with others.
ISP has a similar philosophy. We believe that you are not just a student of your seven courses, but also a citizen of the world. As such, it is our goal to provide you with opportunities to enrich your life and the lives of those around you. Through such activities you will learn about yourself and others in ways that a purely classroom-based program could never accomplish.
For example, involvement in a community service project such as teaching English to refugee children may help you to learn or enhance social, communication and self-management skills and profoundly affect your attitudes and future actions. Simply studying the worldwide refugee problem in an academic sense would probably not give you the insights that a conversation with a refugee would.
Similarly, there is quite a difference between studying volleyball in PE and playing on the volleyball team. Or listening to music and learning how to play an instrument.
CAS gives you the chance to gain experiences that may well turn out to be of lifelong importance to you. You may never have the chance to use those dissecting skills you learned in biology class, but you will be able to play “Happy Birthday” on the guitar for the rest of your life!
I hope you will use CAS as an opportunity to do and learn the things you have always wanted to, but never quite got around to. Sign up for guitar lessons! Visit elderly people and bring some happiness into their lives! Learn to paint! Try out for the musical! Learn to swim! Above all, challenge yourself, take risks and have fun!