Hello all,
This past week has been a busy one, even though we only had classes for 4 days instead of 5. Friday was an all-day Peace Conference day, where four outside speakers came to the college to discuss their involvement or research in peace missions and peaceful protests in areas experiencing conflict in the past 20 years. In between these lectures, students split up into small groups to discuss freedom within our political systems to gain influence and methods of peaceful protesting. I led a group discussion on the first topic and a workshop in the afternoon with a couple of friends from Hong Kong and China about using social media effectively to organize a protest. The workshop went quite well, and though I was very nervous beforehand, everything worked out and we had a great discussion. I even got some quotes from the guest lecturers to use for my Extended Essay!
Yes, first-years are still being constantly informed about our Extended Essays...some people are still deciding what subject they want to do their research in, but I have successfully gotten a supervisor and a topic, so I am feeling very good about that. My research question will be something along the lines of 'To what extent did the Blackhawk incident in Somalia lead to the US's decision to remain out of Rwanda in 1994?' My history teacher, Kate, will be my supervisor, and I was lucky to get her as my supervisor because multiple people wanted to do their EEs in history and unfortunately there were not enough spots for everyone.
We do have a newly formed Quidditch 'team' at AC---we are registered with the International Quidditch Association and duly named 'the Atlantic College Acromantulas.' There is a large Harry Potter fan base at AC, so I fit right in with that. Our first two practices have been lots of fun, even though it started to rain in the middle of today's practice, though that is to be expected since winter in Wales is not the prettiest of times!
In the upcoming week we will be preparing for another Friday Conference: the Model United Nations conference, which is sure to be exciting, especially as some students from our sister schools in Norway and the Netherlands will be coming to AC to participate as well. We will run a mini-scale version of the United Nations, which should be quite interesting....I don't know yet which group I will be working with (although I signed down for the Security Council, the Internaitonal Court of Justice, or the Human Rights Council), but more on that will come later. I think we all feel better prepared to run this simulation after having the Peace Conference, and we have gained a lot of historical context for some of the issues in the UN today. I hear from our second-years that there might even be crazy events such as terrorists bursting in to the conference and holding members hostage! We shall see how this all shakes out.
This term I have continued singing in the school choir, but I have also started participating in Football for Kids, an activity that involves teaching small children from the nearby area to play soccer. It has been great fun so far, and the kids are so cute! We have to play inside for now, since it is cold and wet most of the time, but as spring comes we will hopefully move to one of the gardens to play. I have also stayed with Dysparity and continued helping kids with learning difficulties practice math and reading on Saturday mornings. Dysparity has been rewarding for the past term, so I am glad to be a part of it.
There's a basic summary of life for the past couple weeks---hope you enjoyed it! Stay safe and happy for the next week!
Madi
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