On November 20th Saher Ahmed along with a group of IB students, organized an ‘International Day’ celebration in BISW. Students from Year 7 to Year 13 participated in the celebrations that took place on the second and third floors. The classrooms were divided into regions and decorated according to the different nationalities represented in those rooms.
The English department represented Europe, DT department Oceania, Math department Asia, Science department the Middle East, Art room Africa and the humanities as North and South America. There was a total of 22 countries represented in those rooms.
Students spent the day moving from classroom to classroom, learning about the rich history of each country along with some fun facts. The students then participated in several activities that broadened their awareness of the culture and traditions of different countries.
Saher Ahmed was the student to bring ‘International Day’ into fruition. Afterwards, I asked her what inspired her to run such an event, and how she was able to pull it off.
“As we are an international school, I wanted to ensure that ‘International Day’ was well celebrated. After seeing the lack of festivities for ‘International Day’ last year I wanted to make sure that it was better organized this year. My main responsibilities [as manager] were to delegate roles to my committee members and help them fulfill each of their roles. Furthermore, I spoke at staff meetings and met frequently with Mr. Lee to finalize details and figure out logistics.”
Saher was supported by several IB students and faculty members along the way, Saher quotes “I asked my fellow IB students to join an organizing committee. I was very happy with the abundance of volunteers as it was a common sentiment among students wanting to have a better ‘International Day’ this year. I was very lucky to have such a wonderful team to help me organize the day- I could not have done it without them.”
Saher commented on the success of the day: “I believe the event was successful, and it was successful thanks to the hard work of the organizing committee and the IB students who ran each classroom on the day and the PTA for providing such delicious food. Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves and it was nice to celebrate the diversity in nationalities that we have at BISW.”
Saher also wanted to encourage students to organize events like this and left fellow peers with some advice. “My advice for others wanting to organize [events similar] would be to find a strong team. I was lucky enough to have 15 students who were just as passionate to make the event a success and provided great ideas to make the day more memorable”
The aforementioned activities ended at 11am and students reprised classes before returning to the festivities with an ‘International Day’ assembly attended by all BISW students. The assembly broadcasted the talents and traditions of a range of students of every age.
Natasha Mansukani- a member of the organization committee- spoke to me about the planning that went into the arrangement of the day.
“I was responsible for handling decoration and encouraging parent involvement in ‘International Day’. This also involved emailing embassies and coordinating with Mr. Lee.”
Natasha was excited about the impact that ‘International Day’ would have, and saw the event as a major success. Natasha quotes “I would say [‘International Day’] was really successful because everyone really wanted to be there. Starting with the parents who wanted to showcase their foods and heritage, but also so many young kids who took ownership of their culture and wanted to share it with everyone, perfectly exemplified [in the talent show] through all the traditions performed which was a total celebration of everyone.”
Natasha is a new student and was particularly proud of the tremendous diversity amongst our student body:
“What makes us as a school so unique is that we have 72 nationalities represented. Our school is what the world should look like. We have to celebrate that fact that we are very lucky to be in the school with such diverse perspective”
‘International Day’ was well received by students and faculty alike by successfully educating our community on other cultures and our extremely diverse and international community.
- Minna Abdel-Gawad
Commentaires