CAS Week Revisited

About 3 weeks ago, our school attended an event called CAS. You may or may not have heard about it, CAS stands for;
Creativity, Action and Service. As students progress through their secondary years and reach about Year 11, they will be required to do CAS, 50 hours for each.

Year groups under Year 11, teachers and staff aim to assist and guide students towards what is coming for them in the upcoming years.

Most of the time, CAS is done as camp; a week from where you leave all of your terrible daily habits; computers, television, telephone, etc.

Camping is a good way to 'promote' CAS, as there are certain skills needed for CAS; such as teamwork, respect, communication, leadership, risk-taking, sacrifice, etc.

During camp, classmates were challenged to do activities such as: Surfing, canyoning, hiking, building camp-fires, developing first-aid techniques, etc.

In these types of activities, you just can't work on your own. You have to use all available resource around you. Every pair of hands help.

At first, my attitude towards this trip was: Why do we have to do this again? We did this last year.. This year it's so much more expensive, and we don't have as much fun... Its unhygienic, etc.

But after I came back, I had brought back with my a whole new set of skills, new knowledge, and a whole new respect for my peers, and the people around me.

Attributes of an Entrepreneur

There are many many many, entrepreneurs who fail. But if you become a successful entrepreneur, you can be a billionaire! But an entrepreneurs journey is painful, and lonely. Are you that type of person with these characteristics? :

Famous inspirational entrepreneurs who I personally  am inspired by are:
•Sir Richard Branson (Known for his own enterprise Virgin)
• Duncan Bannatyne. Net-worth £430m.
• Sam Walton, although deceased Sam Walton started from scratch to build up an empire of Wal-Mart.
• Steve Jobs, deceased, passed away few days ago. He said in one of his speeches, 'Stay foolish, Stay Hungry'.


Even though you may have the attributess of an entrepreneur, are you capable of becoming one? An entrepreneur has to require quite a lot of luck. Lets take Sir Richard Branson for instance, narrowly escaping death 4 times. Once on the Virgin Atlantic Challenger attempting to break a world record of crossing the Atlantic Ocean. On his second attempt on the Atlantic Ocean crossing, in reward for the Blue Riband he successfully beat the world record. His other 3 death stories all come along in a hot air balloon. Once trying to fly around the world in a helium-propelled hot air balloon, and twice trying to cross the Pacific Ocean.

But not only has he managed to narrowly escape his fate, he has also successfully started his company Virgin Airlines, even though previous airline, Lakers Airways was brought to an abrupt failure in competing against (at the time) British Airways. But Virgin Airlines successfully overcame all odds, and astonished the whole world, including Sir Freddie Laker himself.

Justice

What is justice? What is the right thing to do? Do we always have to put moral and ethics in front of us? The video explains a Harvard Professor lecturing students about what the right things are for certain scenarios.



You don't need to watch the whole thing, but just go through 10 minutes of it. After watching the 10 minutes, come back here and post what you would do in the scenarios that were provided.

Personally, there would be 1 scenario I would do differently to everybody else in the lecture. If the cart could be stopped by me pushing a big (no offense intended in anyway) man to say 5 other people, I would certainly push the man down. My reason being would be, because if I could save 5 man for sacrificing 1 it saves more people. But if I save the man who is next to me, I would feel guilt for knowing I could have saved more lives if I pushed him down.

Whereas on the other hand, if you were to ask me to do the same thing in the doctor's scenario, I would not possibly do that. I would be violating the law to take one healthy person (who is only here for a checkup)'s life, to save 5 others' I would not be able. Unless the one healthy person agrees to sacrifice his life to save the other 5.

Comments are appreciated.

Entrepreneurship news article

For English we were given an assessment to create a newspaper article. There were 4 different subject articles we could choose from. And I chose the one that was about a person named Ryan Hwang who has sold his candy recently.

As sweet as candy 

Born dyslexic, defeated in his academic work. Raised in a low income family. Ryan Hwang is destined to become the next entrepreneur of the year with his newly home-made candy

By FUNG 

Published: June 3, 2011

In what could possibly turn out to be another successful Virgin Music brand, a Hongkonger currently seeks to build a triumphant company. He sees Hong Kong as the preeminent place to build a retail business. 

Will there be more space for a new coming entrepreneur this year? 

Yesterday, Ryan Hwang, a possible forth coming entrepreneur and retailer, announced the release of his new candy line in Mong Kok. His candy has sold well the past few days, and Ryan is looking for more. 

Over the span of 4 days, Ryan has sold 400,000 packages of his new and innovative lines of candy. 

Since Ryan was young, he has always had the intention of being in the position of a Founder of a company. He had never anticipated that his life would go this far, but in a matter of time, his dream came not to be a figment. School life for Hwang was not a luxury. He attended City University, and he did not achieve academically good grades, nor did he get a high result for his physical education. He soon found interest in building his own business at the age of 18, growing and selling christmas trees.

“I was academically, and physically not up to the standards. In fact, I was dyslexic. At 18, I wasn’t able to do anything, our family was poor, and I needed to do something. So I dropped out from school to start my own business.”

 Ryan said he never thought he would become so successful in life. 

The release of the new line of candy was introduced in his very own store, The Kandi Stop. He announced it via a loud-speaker on the streets of Mong Kok. For a while, the police thought he was a madman, until the police tried the candy themselves. They were astonished by the quality.

 He says his candy is the most innovative and best ever to have been manufactured on the planet. “Our candy is the most awe-inspiring ever created on this universe! Once the candy has made contact with with your tongue,  it liquefies into a soothing fluid like texture.” claimed Ryan.

 Hwang’s inspiration has come from the successful, 41-year-old British entrepreneur, Richard Branson. Hwang said since his early youth days, he always looks up to Richard as a motivator. 

Richard Branson, states, “There are not many successful entrepreneurs that reach the level of where I am. It takes a lot of hard work. I am proud to hear that Ryan uses me as his inspiration, but he has to have faith in himself. As of 2011, the success rate for entrepreneurs is 34%, and I hope Ryan is part of that 34. I wish the best to Ryan!” 

Franky Ng, vice president of The Kandi Store, said that they hope to expand The Kandi Store internationally around the globe in approximately 2 years and have 79 stores world-wide. 

Since there was only brief details about Ryan Hwang and his new candy. I had to make up things such as his background and his past etc.

Hope you enjoyed this article!

Learning and 'Never Giving Up'

Have you ever wondered to yourself: What motives you to learn? I understand that it is a odd question to ask. But have you ever thought about it?

Just today, whilst at home doing my homework. I received a survey from a classmate, and there were only a few questions. But hard questions. Obviously, one of them including 'What motives you to learn?'

What makes me want to learn and become hardworking. Is simply the fact that I do not want to waste my parents money that they spend for me to go to school. If I don't try hard, that means all the money is wasted. So why not, be happy and appreciate what you have. This also brings me to the topic of appreciating. Many people do not appreciate what they have today.

People who can see this post by me should be thankful, not because I have made my blog, not because you are reading this. It's because you are lucky enough to have a laptop, and spend time to read my blog.

There are many people who are less fortunate than we are. Take a look at Libya, they are going on an outrage, they are fighting against each other. They are having war. But what about us? We our not in harms way. Therefore we should thank and enjoy every moment we have. Look at Nick Vujicic, he has no hands, no legs 'No arms, no legs, no worries'.

Being mistreated

Recently in our English class we had a class discussion about Being Mistreated at school. And I have a very strong opinion and would love to debate with the class.

I believe that almost everyone has been mistreated, no matter from where nor when. Not only at school, but it could also take place at home, during work, during your fun time.

I believe that where most mistreatment occurs is at places where you have to compete against one another. A perfect example is school.
Even though you may have created a really long essay and handed it in on time, I have had another student come in the door and not do their essay. Guess what? Instead of the teacher telling him off, he just said "I'll give you one more day" How unfair is that?

But there are many reasons in school that this will occur, because of politics, favoritism, nepotism, self-interest.

Any thoughts on that? Post below what you think. You may also give examples of where and when you have been mistreated!

Growth Through Adversity

Today we are starting a new unit in English class and it is the Significant Concept Of Growth Through Adversity.

Growth Through Adversity means:
Growth= Physically and Mentally developing
Through= Going to one and another
Adversity= Misfortune, bad luck
Oscar: Having bad experiences when you are young and using those experiences to become a better person.
Fung: To experience bad things, and try to overcome them. And teach others to try and avoid. Also to change the way of others thinking. E.g. If you were a parent, would you put your child through Bad luck? Also having parents who are poor, may lead to adversity, but it can lead to a big dream.
Elspeth: Its when people grow up with misfortune or with difficulties
Maddie: When people grow up and achieve things through their misfortune

Guiding Question: How do we form & shape our Identity?
Oscar: We form & shape our identity is out of our actions and choices.
Elspeth: We form & shape our identities by our surroundings and the people around us
Maddie: We form & shape our identity by our looks, personalities and feelings (You have no control over your identity)
Fung: We try to change our personality, but it is hard to change. E.g. If you are talkative, you can't change that. (At least it is hard to). But we try to change little things such as our attitudes and our mood towards other and things in our surroundings.