Let's Discover!
"...used the leadership skills I had spent so much time perfecting in my past semester to create an amazing day for all of the girls."
PARTICIPANTS EXPLORE RIVER
BASICS OF KAYAKING
HIKING THROUGH LOCAL FOREST
Background Information
Stephanie noticed as she was growing up that there was a lack of outdoor education and opportunities in her community. She made the decision to attend a summer camp in North Carolina based around outdoor activities, involve herself in any family and school outdoor trips, and made the decision to attend the Alzar School. She was able to take all of her experiences, and apply them to create an outdoor program for lower school girls that she felt was lacking where she grew up. Lets Discover! is a project to facilitate the love and learning in the outdoors through a day of outdoor activities for lower school girls in Atlanta. In Atlanta, there is a huge gap in outdoor education for lower school students. Lets Discover! was created to help with this gap and introduce more lower school girls to nature. This project introduced lower school girls to the outdoors and got them outside playing with nature. The overall goal was that the girls who participate in this project will be able to go back home and will have an increased interest in different outdoor activities.
Implementation of Project
Stephanie’s first job was to make everyone aware of her project idea. She started by talking to the girls in her grade through a large group email to gage everyone’s interest levels. From there she created her action team. She chose 5 people who are very reliable and would give their “all” to her project. She had her first action team meeting and explained the plan in more detail. She set the date for her action day and explained how all the other meetings from here on would work moving forward. Feeling confident with her team, she was ready to start getting all of the permission she needed. She started by meeting with the head of her school, and the head of the lower school. They both loved the plan and thought it was a great idea. From there, Stephanie was off to a great start. One of Stephanie’s greatest challenges was figuring out a schedule that would keep the second grade girls occupied all day long. With the help of her action team, Stephanie created a schedule that was composed of three different activities, hiking, river time, and the cookout. Their first activity would be a hike at the Chattahoochee River Park that would introduce the girls to the nature in their own backyards. Then there was “river time,” where the girls were able to explore and experience what their local river was like. Lastly, they had a cookout where everyone cooked hotdogs and S’mores around the campfire.
At first, it was very scary for me to be completely in charge of such a large project. With time, I became more comfortable and used the leadership skills I had spent so much time perfecting in my past semester to create an amazing day for all of the girls.
– Stephanie
Results of Project
Stephanie’s action day went very smoothly with only one minor set back. Her plan was to take a kayak for “river time,” but when they got there, the river was too high and unsafe for the girls to kayak. She ended up just letting the girls play in the river, and then go in the kayak in the pool. Overall, the day was a success and all the girls had a great time. Many of them came up to Stephanie at the end of the day requesting for the program to be longer then just one day!
What’s Next
After Stephanie’s “Lets Discover” Project, she traveled to Costa Rica with her church to lead a mission trip. There she was able to use her leadership skills to come up with and execute projects around the community. Without the leadership practice she had from her project, this job would have simply felt impossible. Stephanie was elected Senior Class Secretary for this upcoming school year. She will be able to use all the skills she learned at Alzar and in her project to create an amazing senior year for the class of 2016.