This month, we present the second issue of ‘Meraki’, striving to keep in mind our core theme and ideas. The Newsletter Committee has closely collaborated this time to work within our deadlines and maintain the quality of our work.
On a closely related note, we are happy to welcome a new member into our fold, as a regular content contributor.
Over the course of this month, we were visited by more universities and seek to give you a small insight into the programmes introduced to us. The primary school students have also been involved in a host of activities. Additionally, we are pleased to say that many track and field events took place, and allowed the students to showcase their athletic abilities and sporting spirit.
Once again, we wish to reinforce the significance of our title, ‘Meraki’ and what it means to us. We hope you enjoy reading this issue as much as we enjoyed working on it.
Teacher’s Day is an annual celebration on the birthday of Dr Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, the second President of India. He was an exemplary academic philosopher, and held strong bonds with his students.
To commemorate the event, the Student Council hosted two assemblies for the teachers and students, one for the kindergarten and primary school grades, and one for the middle school and high school grades. They consisted of enthralling dances performed by the student dancers of all ages and amusing games and activities between the students and teachers. In addition, video recordings of the schoolchildren recalling what they loved most in their teachers were compiled and screened, evoking pleasant reactions from the audience.
There was also a large sale of roses and homemade chocolate cookies. At the end of the day, each teacher was presented with small tokens of appreciation from the senior administration.
Daan Utsav, previously known as Joy of Giving Week (JGW) is India’s ‘festival of giving’. This event is celebrated annually in the week of Gandhi Jayanti. Having begun in 2009, it has brought people together to celebrate the ‘joy of giving’; involving people from rickshaw drivers to CEOs of companies, local school kids to celebrities (and let’s not forget our nation’s leaders). Millions of people contribute their time, money and resources to give back to the community by planning a plethora of events of various interests.
In light of this initiative, some ideas we implemented at school include ‘the piggy bank project’. As a part of their CAS, the 11th and 12th graders took part and made fancy and decorative boxes to be kept in all homerooms and students would be encouraged to donate at least 50 rupees sometime during the week. The money collected by the end of the week would be used toward a cause of the school’s choice. Furthermore, students also planned ‘the wish tree’ where a tree or plant is put up and the kids at the local Hullahalli Government School were asked to put down a wish for a basic item they are in need of or simply desire.
These generous initiatives were taken actively by the IB students of the school in honor of this national development.
On October 1st, the day of the Rubik’s competition, I was shaking all over because of the competition. The event was during TFE Time in the last period. I was so scared that I might lose because I had some tough competitors and they were just as fast as me. This was one of the greatest times in my life to show my amazing skill to the school. I started last December after everyone was in the Rubik’s cube trend, it was so hard at first, but then it started getting easier by the day. I learned my first set of algorithms in January and started solving in March but that’s not the point. We started a bit late due to the not fixed date of the competition and the competitors did not know when to get their speed cubes. Luckily Ms Praseeja and I found us a cube so the competition went on.
The competition started with 2 people which got picked from the bowl with all the competitors names, they had to battle by racing with their cubes and the fastest time would gain a point. When it got to my turn I faced Amogh he was tough competitor but the thing that made me most nervous was if I mess up when everyone is recording with their iPads. After the first race I felt more confident because I won and did not mess up. After that I went on to face Amogh again with different cubes I luckily won and I advanced to the finals. My tough competition started to kick in when I went to the finals to face Darshan he was as slick and as fast as me but I had the determination to win. I went first with the speed cube and I solved the cube in 31 seconds, but for me it felt like a minute. Darshan went next and everyone was in suspense when Darshan was coming to the end of his solve. Manan, the host, didn’t reveal our times to keep us in suspense and.. guess who won? Manan finally told us and the times were Darshan
was 35 secs and I was 31 secs. This experience was golden because I was in my first real competition which made me feel like I am on the top of the Rubik’s cube community.
