Project Arnold- Performance

In order to introduce people to Arnold's music, we organised for him to perform at school. He came to our school and performed two of his songs- Heartbreaker and Accident. This was important as we needed to see how people would react to his songs, they really seemed to enjoy it which was encouraging as we then realised that when his album was finished it could do really well. Although it was just a small performace for our school it did require plannning as Arnold is not always in Kampala so at times it becomes difficult to arrange meetings with him, therefore arranging performances requires quite a bit of coordination and communication on both parts. Overall, the performance went really well and this was hopefully the first of many to come. 

Project Arnold-Arnold's first Interview

Radio Interview: 

One of our aims was to gain Arnold exposure, to do this we managed to get him an interview with 97.0 FM RadioCity, this was not only exciting for Arnold as it was his first ever interview but it was also exciting for me as this was an activity we had planned since the beginning and to see him there was quite rewarding. It was a one hour interview and Arnold was on the segment called 'Celebrity of the Day.' He did a countdown of his top 10 favourite songs, the interviewer asked him why these were his favourites and this gave Arnold an opportunity to let people know a bit more about him as he talked a lot about his childhood and how music has always had a great influence on him. We also managed to play a few of his songs on air, this gave Arnold's music exposure as it had never been played on radio before. During this process, it was the first time I had ever seen Arnold nervous, therefore it was my job to keep him calm and provide support and encouragement for him as he was quite nervous to speak on live radio. I'm glad that we were able to be there and support Arnold as after we calmed him down the interview went really well and Arnold spoke incredibly well and enjoyed himself a lot.

                                                   

Project Arnold- Recording Songs

Now that we had the money, we started recording some of Arnold's songs. Personally, this was quite an interesting and exciting process for me as I had never really seen how the recording process was. We went to the studio quite a few times with Arnold while he recorded songs called 'Accident', 'Prayer', 'Heartbreaker', 'A Thousand Ways to Die'. I would also put in my input of what I thought of them. This process of recording the songs required a lot of collaboration with the producer, communication with him started to become quite difficult as he often wouldn't give Arnold the time that he required or the assistance. This lead us to find a new producer that would give Arnold the attention that he needed, this was probably the first challenge we faced in this process as our main priority was to keep Arnold happy and if he didn't like the producer it was necessary to find another one that would put in all of his effort into helping all of us. This again required collaboration with others as we had to consult various people and again work together with Arnold to find someone that would best suit him.

Project Arnold-Fundraising

Fundrasing: 

Once we found a suitable studio and producer, the next step was to get money to fund these. I didn't realise before just how expensive these things would be, so Karan, Eddy and I had to come up with a good idea to fundraise all this money. We thought that having a Christmas themed dress up day would be a good idea as it was approaching Christmas and for the last day of term we thought it would be a good idea for everyone to dress up in Christmas colours-red, green and white. We asked people to bring 5,000 shillings each if they dressed up. This fundraising activity required me to work collaboratively with Karan and Eddy as we had to find an efficient way of collecting the money as it was the last day of term so we had to make sure we got all the money on that day. Prior to the day, we all had to make sure people knew about it, this required us going around to classes and telling them why we were raising the money, this also gave us a good opportunity to start spreading the word about Arnold. Through this particular fundraising activity, I learned good communication skills as well as organisational ones as we did in fact manage to get everyone who dressed up to pay. I think that this was possible because of the good coordination and cooperation between Karan, Eddy and I and through this activity we all learned how to work well with each other and take responsibily for different tasks. This was one of the first times that I had planned and initiated an activity, it went really well as we managed to raise 500,000 which was going to help us a lot in recording the songs.

Project Arnold - Finding a Studio

Finding A Studio: 

The first thing we had to do was to find a studio, this is a bit harder than it sounds as we had a limited budget but at the same time we wanted a producer that would really help us and more importantly help Arnold. We all looked for studios and probably visited about 6 in total, this process required quite a bit of patience as it was difficult to find one that suited all of our interests. We eventually settled on one and met a producer that Arnold had previously worked with called Andre. This process of finding a studio was the first step in the whole project, I began to realise that working in this type of music world required a lot of work as I needed to be patient as well as cooperative with many people such as the producer. I feel that I already started learning new skills as I myself was learning a lot from Arnold about the whole process and how you have to be able to trust the right people that would be able to help Arnold.

Project Arnold! Background

Background Info on Project Arnold: 

For my long-term CAS project, I will be helping an upcoming local musician named Arnold along with two other people in my class-Karan and Eddy. Here is just a brief background on how we met Arnold and what we hope to achieve with him. 
On our school trip to Wobulenzi Town Academy in October 2013, I held a music workshop where students would write songs and perform them for the rest of the group. During the course of this activity, we took special notice of Arnold as he seemed to express a keen interest in music and on top of all that he is an extremely talented musician. He told us that his dream was to be a musician and record an album, he had already recorded one song with a fellow Ugandan musician but he wanted to do more songs on his own. We all decided that we wanted to help Anrold pursue this dream and wanted to continue the relationship with him after we left Wobulenzi.We thought we could really help him as Eddy and Karan are also into music and I could help with the fundraising aspects as well as just providing guidance. So once we got back to our own school, we kept in touch with Arnold and together we came to the goal that by the end of the two years of working with him, we wanted to produce a full album as well as arrange various performances in order to gain Arnold exposure. 

Throughout this project, the learning outcomes I will be targetting are: 

-Plan and Initiate Activities
-Work collaboratively with others
-Undertake New Challenges
-Develop New Skills

Student Council

Learning Outcomes: 
-Undertake new challenges
-Plan & Initiate activities
-Work Collaboratively with others
-Develop new skills 


This year, I was part of my school's student council as I was my class representative. I had never been part of student council but it had always been something that I was interested in doing. Meetings were held twice a week in order to discuss what we were going to do, I feel as though during these meetings I expressed and voiced my  ideas or opinions which I normally don't do that often but being in student council I felt as though it helped me be more expressive of my thoughts and opinions on matters. During the course of the year, we organised several events such as the valentine's dance and selling food & drinks at sports events. For the valentine's dance, I helped sell tickets which was actually more challenging than it sounds as it took a lot of convincing to get people to go to the dance. I also helped out with decorating, this involved working with others and we all had to do our part if we wanted it to be successful. For the dance, we decided to have games so I was in charge of beer pong, in this case soda pong. I had to plan this activity out and in the end it seemed as though the young kids enjoyed it as it was something that we had never done at a dance before. Another event that we held was the dodgeball tournament, this required collaboration between all of us as it went on for a week and since we were dealing with large groups of people it required us to put in work in terms of getting people to sign up and donate. I feel as though throughout the experience, I gained skills such as communication skills, I definitely didn't realise how much time and effort went into being a part of student council as it requires an immense ammount of planning, organisation and more importantly teamwork. Overall, it was a good experience and I am glad that I got to work with others in the school especially kids from the younger years as I don't normally get to work with them, I think that I was able to work collaboratively with everyone which is important aspect of being in student council.

Rotary Cancer Run 2014!

Learning Outcomes: 
1. Undertake new challenges
2. Engage with issues of global importance 

On the 31st of August, I participated in the Rotary Cancer Run; it is an annual event and all of the funds go towards cancer research. I participated in the 5km which started early in the morning. When I first signed up I was pretty nervous as I had never taken part in any sort of run/marathon, so I didn't know what to expect. I'm not much of a runner, so I definitely felt like this was something I wouldn't usually do. However, once I got there I didn't feel as nervous as there were many other people and during the run everyone was very supportive of one another and I ended up enjoying it quite a lot. After I finished, even though it was just 5km, I felt proud of myself as I did something that was outside of my element. This experience taught me that sometimes it is good to try something that you are not comfortable doing, no matter what it is and it will surprise you just how much you might like it. Moreover, it felt even more gratifying knowing that it was for a good cause being cancer research. When I first heard about the run, I thought it would be a small event, but when I actually got there I realised that it was actually quite a big event in which thousands were participating, this helped me put things into perspective and realise the actual cause of why we were doing the run. Overall, I am happy that I took part and it felt good to step outside of my comfort zone.

Piano!

Learning Outcomes:
1. Increased Awareness of your strengths and areas for growth 
2. Show Perserverence and Commitment 
3. Develop New Skills 
 Although I have been playing piano for quite a while, this year I found it particularly challenging as I was preparing for my grade 7 Associated Board of the Royal School Of Music (ABRSM) examinations. I had lessons twice a week for several months, I believe that this took a lot of perserverence and commitment as it was for a long time and at times I found it challenging to balance lessons and pratice with my school work and other activities. It took a lot of commitment because I had to practice everyday and since this was a high grade, practice usually took around half an hour, if not more. In preparation for the exam I learned 3 new pieces, several new scales, sight-reading and aurals. I feel that this helped me to develop new skills especially because one of my pieces was a Mozart piece and I had never played any of Mozart's work before which I learned required a lot of accuracy and particular techniques. This helped me develop new skills I needed to play this piece well. Moreover, I had to learn numerous scales that I had never learned in previous years. The whole process allowed me to improve my weaknesses, sight-reading has never been a strong point of mine but with practice I managed to improve this. I participated in a concert, this was very nerve-wrecking as I have a bit of stage fright and generally do not like playing piano infront of people, however I still took part and afterwards felt a small sense of accomplishment. Overall, I enjoyed playing the piano this year as I got to learn new pieces that I actually liked, although it took a lot of dedication I felt that it was worth it in the end. 

Performing at a piano recital

Wobulenzi 2013

Learning Outcomes: Work collaboratively with others, Plan and initiate activities, Undertake new challenges and Develop new skills

Poetry Anthology

I was the editor of my school's annual poetry anthology, it was definitely a new and interesting experience. I did not realise how much work actually went into it, the poetry evening was just a few hours long but planning all of it and putting the book together took a few months and a lot of hard work. We first had to get all the poems that all the students wrote and put it all together, which is not as easy as it sounds. For the fundraising of the book, I decided to make 110 mini pizzas and sell them for 5,000 UGX each. I took all the orders and made the pizzas (with the help of my mum, of course) and delivered them to each person. A learning outcome I had targetted was to plan and initiate activities and this fundraising for the book helped me meet that as it took a lot of planning and organising to make sure the pizza sale went well. I managed to raise 550,000 UGX from this which helped reduce the cost of the book. As I said earlier, I did not realise how much work went into this, therefore I had to be committed and show persistence and not just give up when it became difficult. I also designed the programme for the actual poetry night, this helped me achieve my target of developing new skills as I am usually very hesistant in designing anything, therefore this allowed me to do something I never usually do. On the actual poetry night, I was in charge of making sure the classes were sat in order and that all students were at the podium when they needed to be. A few people volunteered to help that night, so it also helped me work collaboratively with them as we each had our own tasks and obligations to fulfill. Overall, the poetry anthology was a really good learning experience, it helped develop my leadership skills and in my opinion was a perfect example of how creativity and service can be paired together.

Making Pizzas!

Prom Preparations!

Planning this year's prom was quite the challenge but it turned out to be very rewarding in the end. This was a CAS activity that the whole class was a part of, therefore I feel the most important aspect of it was teamwork. I feel  as though this was hard at first for the whole class, especially when it came to deciding on the theme, everyone had their own opinions which caused some conflicts at times. Luckily, this was resolved quite quickly and the theme that everyone agreed upon was 'The Godfather'. After that was sorted, we then divided ourselves up into 4 teams-Finance, Venue, Entertainment and Decorations. I was part of the decorations committee along with 4 other girls. We were all involved in the fundraising aspect of prom, during the ice-cream sales, I helped take orders as well as sell the ice-cream during lunch times. We also sold breakfast to teachers and students, I was more involved with this fundraising activity as it was particularly for our decorations committee, I helped take orders and made pancakes as well as delivered the breakfasts, this fundraising activity was quite successful in my opinion as it had never been done before in school. This helped achieve one of my learning outcomes which was plan and initiate activities as it was the decorations committee who led this fundraising activity. Getting back to the actual decorations bit, we first wanted to use a designer to help us with all the decorations, we met with one but in the end it did not work out, so we ended up doing everything ourselves which I feel worked out for the best. When we first started throwing around ideas for the whole design aspect of the event, it was quite challenging as all of us had very strong ideas on what we wanted which sometimes caused arguments, however, we all managed to come to an agreement on everything which is very important as this whole activity was based on teamwork as I said earlier. When we all agreed on everything, things became much better and easier as we were all on the same page. We managed to divide the tasks between ourselves, I was in charge of getting all the seat covers and table cloths, getting all the flowers (I managed to get the flowers for free which was quite helpful as our budget was limited) and getting musical instruments. On the day of prom, we were all there early in the morning to start setting up, there was a lot of running around that day and it was pretty hectic but by the end of the afternoon, everything came together quite nicely. All in all, this was a huge task and it required a lot of planning which took us a few months, at times it was very difficult but I feel as though we all learned how to work as a team and that really made things much easier. In my opinion, prom was very successful this year and even though it was challenging, it was all worth it in the end. 

Spray painting top hats

Decorating on prom day

The final outcome