Youths for SDGs

In the time span from January to March, the Virtual Youths for SDGs conference took place for high school students. Just as in previous years, �ۿ۴�ý was happy to be involved in this virtual conference, despite the difficulties of Covid-19 pandemic. 

Youths for SDGs is an academic event where students from different schools interact, learn about the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), express their opinions, and tackle real world problems. Although in the past, the conference took place in international schools, due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, the conference took place online as it also did in 2021. Nevertheless, students still gained valuable experiences from connecting with other students online and discussing global issues. In fact, taking advantage of the conference being held virtually, students outside of Thailand participated as well. 

Case Challenge

This event started on January 11th with the Case Challenge. Students gathered in groups of three and were given four issues to find solutions to, based on SDGs. This year, the topics were based on the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic. Students were given until February 11th to work with their teammates to find solutions to the given topics, make presentations, record their presentations, and submit. From there, five groups were chosen to go to the final round, which took place on March 12th. All participants attended the ZOOM meeting online to watch the top five groups present their solutions. The meeting began with the opening speech by Ms. Prim, the founder of Youths for SDGs (also a Wells teacher and a Wells alumnus, Class of 2015), and a representative from UNDP. Then, the selected five groups presented their solutions and answered questions from judges and audience members. Everyone strived to come up with their own creative solutions to tackle real global issues. 

Breakout Sessions

On February 5th, students attended Breakout Sessions onlineto learn and discuss existing global issues and connect them to SDGs. There were ten different breakout rooms for students to choose from, with the maximum of three rooms. The topics varied from technology, Covid-19 pandemic, education, and so on. Youth leaders, who are high school students, took the lead in the Breakout Sessions to present the issues and engage participants in discussion to express their opinions and give possible solutions.

Personal Reflection

As it was my second time attending the Youths for SDGs conference, things went smoothly in both the Case Challenge and Breakout Sessions, as I was more confident in what I was doing. The Case Challenge was more fun this year as there were four topics rather than only one. Because all the topics were related to Covid-19 pandemic, it made me aware of more current issues. My group’s main solution was to make an app, and working on this presentation made me want to have our app in real life. Presentations in the final round of the Case Challenge were all inspiring. I was surprised that the winners were from a school in Malaysia, but it just proved that we are all connected and striving to work together during the Covid-19 pandemic. I learned a lot from the Breakout Sessions as well. I met Youth Leaders that I knew from past inter-school events, and seeing them becoming the Youth Leaders inspired me to also want to be one in the future. In another breakout session, the Youth Leader explained the topic based on her real experiences, which was very interesting and relatable. Compared to last year, I could engage in discussions more confidently, so I was able to interact with other participants and learn much more from them. 

On behalf of Wells, I would like to express my gratitude to Ms. Prim and the Youths for SDGs team for organizing an engaging virtual conference and giving international school students a platform to exchange ideas, collaborate and allow their voices to be heard.

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The conference provides students with opportunities to share and learn from each other about experiences and successful projects engaging with service learning in their respective schools and communities. The conference provides a stage for various adult and student keynote speakers to share their passions, “How-To” sessions for students wishing to teach others based on their experiences, and networking opportunities to learn from NGOs sharing  projects across Thailand. Students are also given the opportunity to collaborate and plan future student-led inter-school service learning projects.

During the conference, students listened to various keynote speakers, engaged in icebreaker activities and games, attended How-To workshops on topics of interest, and collaborated in discussions with students from other schools.

Two of our student leaders in our American Sign Language (ASL) Club, Risa Takahashi and LiHan Sun (Class of 2024) led a How-To workshop to spread awareness about ASL, talk about their club mission and accomplishments, and teach participants the alphabet.

All of the students left the conference feeling enthusiastic and inspired. It was refreshing to interact and collaborate with peers from other schools. Wells would like to thank International School of Bangkok (ISB) for their exceptional job in hosting the first in-person extracurricular event in a long time, as well as the teacher advisors for their engagement and support with this event. 

We are excited to see how these students will turn their inspiration from the conference into action, and how they will make a positive difference in their school and local community with their bright ideas!

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Wells Class of 2020 CAS Showcase

Date: Tuesday, March 10, 2020

Time: 1:30 – 3:30 PM

Location: �ۿ۴�ý On Nut Gymnasium

“A Showcase of Inspiration, Collaboration, Empowerment and Service”

Mark your calendars! Join us on March 10th for a showcase and celebration of the culmination of the Class of 2020’s co-curricular learning journeys! The Class of 2020 has been actively involved in co-curricular clubs, sports, internships and various activities, which have all helped them develop valuable life skills, unique talents, and a clearer vision of their future directions after graduation.

We would like to invite all members of the Wells community to share in our celebration of the learning and accomplishments of our Senior Class. The Showcase will feature an exhibition of student presentations, highlighting their favorite CAS experiences and memories. Guests will also be encouraged to chat with the members of the Senior class about the learning and lessons they have gained outside of the classroom throughout high school. They also have speeches, performances, a video and other treats in store for you!

Update: Due to COVID-19 concerns, we will not be able to accommodate any outside guests for this event as originally planned, but we will be posting photos and videos on our website after the event to share with the community.

More About the CAS Programme at Wells

As a core component for the IB Diploma Programme and Wells graduation requirement, Creativity, Activity and Service (CAS) encourages high school students to be involved in activities as individuals and as part of a team that take place in local, national and international contexts.

Creativity, activity, and service enables students to enhance their personal and interpersonal development as well as their social and civic development, through experiential and service learning and a personal journey of self-discovery that recognizes each student’s individual strengths, talents, and purpose.

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Youths for SDGs 2020

On January 25 & 26, international school students from all over Thailand participated in the second conference hosted at Bangkok Patana School. �ۿ۴�ý, who hosted the event last year, were happy to be actively involved in the planning of this year’s event, and also brought a large number of students as participants and youth leaders. 

Youths for SDGs is an academic event that focuses on the 17 Sustainable Development Goals and strives to be a part of this universal call to action. The event’s objectives included raising awareness to the SDGs, creating a network of youths passionate about making change, and promoting creativity in finding solutions towards current local issues. With those objectives in mind, the event consists of three main activities: the Breakout Session, the SDG Quest, and the Case Challenge. High schoolers from international schools were given the opportunity to network and share ideas, as well as capitalize on their creativity and problem-solving skills. 

The event began with the opening ceremony, where the conference director and founder of Youths for SDGs, Prima Pupornchai (Wells’ Class of 2015 alumna) gave a welcome speech. This was followed by a speech from our guest speaker Mr. Renaud Meyer from UNDP Bangkok gave an inspiring speech about specific actions being taken towards the SDGs here in Thailand. 

Breakout Session

Then the students headed to their respective discussion rooms for the Breakout Session, led by youth leaders. The Breakout Session is an interactive discussion where participants get to explore different themes of SDGs, ranging from poverty to hunger to gender equality and sustainable development and promotion of climate action. 

SDG Quest

The SDG Quest is another youth-led game where randomly-grouped participants can collaborate in exploring fun activities and booths related to the SDGs. In the SDG Quest, students were separated into random groups, with various schools mixed together. They were instructed to earn as many points as they can by participating in the activity booths and completing tasks related to SDGs within a limited time. This fun activity made the students bond and interact with students from other schools.

Case Challenge

Finally, the Case Challenge presents a current real-life local issue to the teams to find creative and feasible solutions to. This year, the challenge focused on addressing sustainable agriculture issues in Thailand. The teams had two and a half hours of case cracking time to find a solution and make a presentation.

The following day was the presentation day, which consists of 3 rounds: the preliminary round, the semifinal round, and the final round. The winner of the Case Challenge was a team from Ruamrudee International School, who came up with an idea to create an app that would educate and encourage Thai youth to better understand farming practices and skills, with the goal of changing perceptions about farm work among youth.

The closing ceremony concluded the event with a and a closing speech from the conference director, Prima Pupornchai, as well as recognition for the support of the youth leaders and Core team. Overall, the event inspired many students to learn more about the SDGs and to create change in their local contexts. It was a very fun, productive, and memorable weekend. This event was truly an event for youths, by youths. 

Special Acknowledgements

Wells would like to acknowledge the hard work, dedication and enthusiasm of the Core Team, Youth Leaders and participants, which consisted of past and present Wells’ students, who all collaborated by combining their passions to contribute to making the event a success!

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Core Team: Prima Pupornchai (Class of 2015), Srishti (Sami) Soni (Class of 2016), Tanisha Arbol (Class of 2017), Natnisha Ahuja (Class of 2018), Hrithi Bhattacharya (Class of 2021)

Youth Leaders: Lina Puthengot, Lucia (Lucy) Lee (Class of 2020), Muskan Gurbuxani, Poorvi Daga, Shradha Silori, Soumili Kar (Class of 2021), Shreyaa Srivastava, and Yewon (Cristine) Jeong (Class of 2022)

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Annual ServICE Conference

From November 15th until the 17th, twenty-nine of our Wells high school students attended the at International Community School in Bangkok. The ServICE conference is a collaborative, student-led event organized by international schools in Bangkok. The aim of the conference is to inspire, connect and empower students to take appropriate and effective service action to benefit their communities and the environment.

The conference provides students with opportunities to share and learn from each other about experiences and successful projects engaging with service learning in their respective schools and communities. The conference provides a stage for various adult and keynote speakers to share their passions, “How-To” sessions for students wishing to teach others based on their experiences, and a community/NGO fair for networking and sharing  projects across Thailand. Students are also given the opportunity to collaborate and plan future inter-school service learning projects.

Day 1: BYB Trips

Day 1 consisted of various service trips, also known as ‘Burst Your Bubble’ or ‘BYB Trips’, including visits to , , . Other activities included painting, teaching English and playing games with younger students, and a community clean up and creation of recycled art with Grin Green International.

Day 2: Keynotes, How-To Sessions & NGO/Student Organization Fair

On Day 2, some of our students were actively involved in promoting and sharing their clubs and ideas with other students in the inter-school community. PAWS, Greenhawks, Love Ocean Life (LOL), and Korean Club represented Wells co-curricular service clubs with booths to share about the initiatives they are undertaking in their community and raise funds for their respective causes. Our How-To sessions included a ‘How to Initiate a Club or Event’, specifically focusing on Youths for SDGs, an initiative in which many of our current students and alumni are collaborating on, and ‘Friendly Life Hacks’. Another student group also hosted a unique simulation centered around the importance of basic human needs.

Day 3: Keynotes, Simulations & Unconferenced Sessions

And finally, Day 3 was focused on reflecting on the first two days and setting up initiatives or action plans for collaborative projects or shared, inter-school interests during what are known as ‘unconferenced sessions’.

Youth Leadership

Thank you to the students who emerged as leaders during this conference and led How-To sessions, and hosted a simulation or a booth: 

Class of 2022: Cristine, Shreyaa

Class of 2021: Hrithi, Poorvi, Soumili, Muskan, Shradha, Sung-Bin, Riddhi, Gia

Class of 2020: Ruby, Lina, David, Su, Annie

All of the students left the conference feeling energetic and inspired. Wells is excited to see how these students will turn their inspiration from the conference into action, and how they will make a positive difference in their school and local community with their bright ideas and initiatives!

The post ServICE Conference 2019 first appeared on �ۿ۴�ý | American International School - Wells.

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On Sunday, October 14th, we held our largest and fourth annual Model United Nations (MUN) conference, WISMUN IV. Only a week after Bangkok MUN, there were almost 200 students from fifteen other international schools in attendance.

The conference began with an opening ceremony, in which our keynote speaker, Mr. Marco Roncarati from UNESCAP, gave a very inspirational speech in which he addressed the importance of our youth being future leaders and advocates for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

This was followed by a speech from the MUN club President, Jira Trinetkamol, and the conferring of the gavels to the chairs.

Once delegates and chairs settled into their respective committees, they began proposing, debating and collaborating towards problem solving and solution proposals to major global issues. There were five committees in total: Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), The Disarmament and International Security Committee (DISEC), Human Rights Council (HRC), Security Council (SC) and the African Union (AU). After our participant numbers increased, two of the committees were duplicated. Topics included the question of reinforcing net security in platforms used to recruit terrorists, reducing hyperinflation in Venezuela and strengthening democratic institutions to foster good governance and rule of law.

Our closing ceremony gave all of the chairs opportunities to reflect and share about experiences in their respective committees. During this time, ‘Best Delegates’ were announced for each committee and for many, it was a difficult decision to narrow it down to one. Overall, it seems that the beginner MUN students were able to gain more confidence, the more advanced were able to guide and lead those newer to MUN, and everyone was able to productively collaborate and have fun at the same time.

A special thank you must be expressed to our keynote speaker, Mr. Marco Roncarati, for his inspirational and powerful message.

Thank you to the MUN Officers, Seniors, and club members for helping to organize the entire event and to those who supported during the event to ensure smooth operations.

And a big thank you to the contributing schools and advisors for contributing to make the event a success!

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Youth Leadership Training

IB Regional Workshops

Youth leadership was highlighted as an important part of IB’s student-centered philosophy in the IB Asia-Pacific Regional Workshops. It also showcased how embedding systems thinking and empowering youth leadership across subject areas and grade levels create a flourishing future through education. As part of this pilot program, the youth leader participants presented inspirational keynote speeches, student-led breakout sessions, and most of them co-facilitated 3-day IB workshops with IB workshop leaders. Students were able to gain a deeper understanding of various IB programs and crucial concepts in education, as well as gain leadership and teaching experience, as many of them led discussions and activities and actively engaged in discussions, providing valuable student perspectives for the purpose of educator development.

Special Thanks to our Youth Leaders

They served as respected youth leaders of our school and demonstrated professional competencies working with teachers, developing their communication, public speaking, collaborative, and creativity skills. Below are some of their shared insights and lessons gained during their involvement in this program

Insights & Lessons Learned

“Definitely, Definitely, Definitely incorporate youth leaders in such workshops. Although the teachers might not think that it will help us, but the information we got from this workshop was so useful. Although the information was not meant for me or my age group but it was really interesting how I can use this information and incorporate into activities I am involved in or use them in the clubs I lead.” – Jai, Class of 2019

“Teachers go through similar struggles as students. Being aware of your well being is important for our education.”

-Amy, Class of 2019

“I learned a lot about teachers, and how hard their lives can also be, how teachers organize their programs and how different schools vary in their programs.” -Sapal, Class of 2020

“It was a great opportunity to think in global perspectives and bring international mindedness to our world. It has given me different perspectives, listening to what teachers think. I gained engagement and appreciation towards my education and IB ESS…now I think more positive about my life and the world. I believe I can make a change in the world!” -Jimin, Class of 2019

“It was an amazing workshop, where our voices were heard, where all participants were able to express and describe towards certain notions…We had a conversation and discussion based workshop. In this way, personally, I feel like it really broadened my perspective. After this workshop, my passion for Education grew and it developed a lot, by interacting with international teachers from different schools, countries, and even programs (IB DP, IB PYP, IB MYP).”  -Ruby, Class of 2020

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