Community Service Programme 2016
At SOTA, students are constantly encouraged to use their artistic talents to contribute to society. From Years 3 to 6, students embark on various local and overseas community projects to serve the larger community, while learning to appreciate, respect and care for social-cultural diversity to develop a zest for challenge, adventure, and creative endeavours. These programmes also aim to hone students' leadership potential, resilience and adaptability amongst other skills.
As part of this year's Service, Action in Community (SAC) programme, the Year 3 students worked with 11 organisations and initiated three community projects, in areas such as the aging society, special needs, children and education, and the Community Problem Solving Programme (CmPS). Year 4 students have embarked on Local Service Learning (LSL) and Overseas Service Learning (OSL) projects, while the Year 5 and 6 IBDP and IBCP students undertook local and overseas Creativity, Activity and Service (CAS) and Service Learning (SL) projects respectively. Some Year 5 students also went on Global PerspectiveS (GPS) trips, which are extensions of their Year 4 OSL projects from the previous year.
Below are some reflections from the students about their projects :
Photo by Cavin Lim
"My experience at the elderly care was great and very fruitful. I learned a lot about what some of the elderly are going through in their daily life - most of them suffer from illnesses."
- Cavin Lim, Year 3, SASCO Day Activity Centre for the Elderly (DACE) (Telok Blangah Rise), SAC programme
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"While serving at Willing Hearts definitely took a toll on me both mentally and physically, it was through this week that I realised how important it is for such people and organisation to exist. Without them, the needy old people would have nothing to eat. While delivering food to them, I saw how they were all so grateful and thankful for our help. Hearing a "thank you" or seeing them instantly makes us forget the fact that we worked tirelessly just to pack the food for them. It makes what we do extremely meaningful, and also the reason why I would love to do it again should I have the chance. Seeing them happy makes me happy too and I feel that is good service in itself."
- Year 4 LSL Group 2, Willing Hearts, LSL programme
Photo by Nigel Cheung
"The trip taught me how the arts can make an impact on a community, and the ways we can incorporate the arts into education to make learning more effective and engaging for children."
- Russell Chong, Year 4, Vietnam, OSL programme
"The GPS Kandal was meant to be a different overseas learning experience right from the start as the trip was specifically designed for SOTA's IBCP class. There was a very rich artistic exchange between us and the youths from the Cambodia Outreach Services - Immanuel (COSI) and Phnom Penh Secondary School of Fine Arts (PPSSFA).
We were given the opportunity to attend masterclasses with the Cambodian students at PPSSFA. Besides learning Khmer techniques of different art forms first-hand and immersing themselves in the Khmer traditions, we also interacted with the Cambodian teachers and students to understand how they view and pursue the arts. It was an eye-opening experience for both sides, and definitely provided a different perspective for all the students. Exposed to different approaches to the arts, we began to understand the limitations and challenges faced by our new-made friends, who come from a country with a rich cultural heritage but have gone through significant difficulties in the past."
- Year 5 IBCP students, Cambodia, GPS programme
"The theme of the conference was 'Game-changers'', or basically how we as youths could use the element of play and games to solve the issues around us for the future. In our groups, we decided on a social issue that we wished to tackle and developed a game to mitigate it in any way. We all had the opportunity to think about the problems that we were passionate about while exercising our creativity in finding solutions."
- Year 5 students, IB World Student Conference 2016, USA, CAS programme 
"Working with Causes for Animals Singapore has opened up our eyes to the importance of responsible pet ownership and the value of animals, big and small!"
- Lim Shi-An, Year 6, Causes for Animals Singapore, CAS programme