Four juniors discuss their IB “Creativity, Activity and Service” projects, which span from junior to senior year
Poetry in Partnership
Manahil Jawaid’s CAS project allows her to dive deeper into her passion for writing.
Jawaid merged her love for writing and poetry to create a writing workshop that will run for two weeks. During the workshop Jawaid and other members will write and produce poetry together.
“So essentially I [will] grab any of the poetry writers, anyone that I know,” Jawaid said. “We all just bring our poetry and edit one another’s.”
At the end of the two weeks, Jawaid said she intends to compile all the works of poetry produced into a collection.
She said she drew inspiration from her longtime love of writing dating back to sixth grade and wanting a way to incorporate her hobby into her school work.
“I felt like it was a way for me to reconnect and a bunch of my friends are like kind of writers,” Jawaid said. “So I feel like it’s my personal payoff that I’m getting for the cost [of the] project.”
Cow-tastic Charity
For Cordy Norris, a drawing of a cow is the perfect CAS project foundation.
Norris said she drew an image of a cow with five legs a few years ago, and since then it’s become well-known among her friends.
“My friends for ages have been saying, ‘what if you made shirts?’” Norris said. “So I was like, ‘you know what? Let’s do it.’”
Norris said encouragement from friends and a desire to create a positive impact inspired her to create a t-shirt organization called ‘Five Legged Cow’ alongside a classmate and fellow junior. They plan to donate their profits to Wolf Trap Animal Rescue.
“I just wanted to do something that was going to be fun and also benefit other people,” Norris said.
If the opportunity to expand and diversify merchandise becomes possible, Norris said she hopes to continue the business post-high school.
“We’ve had a lot of interest about maybe creating other things like hoodies and bags,” Norris said. “So if it comes to that, then I’d love to continue doing it.”
Magic Through Music
Skander Amri and Lucas Gimm united to explore their shared passion for music production.
The pair created the Music Production Club this year with the goal of encouraging collaboration among all musically-inclined students.
“Everyone can bounce off each other’s ideas and create something cool and awesome,” Gimm said.
Amri and Gimm said they hope to reach many people across and beyond the Marshall community to share their passion with others.
“We want to spread the art of making music and the knowledge of it to more people across margins,” Amri said.
Creating and sharing mini-lectures on music production have also been part of the pair’s process.
“After we’re done presenting them, we’re going to watch [the students] do their own example of it,” Amri said. “And through the course of that they’re going to make their own like kind of tracks and then we’re going to compile them to make like an album at the end. That’s our goal.”