Free Helping Hands

IB students reaching out in the local community

Sofie Søndergaard Christensen, Olivia Ulrich Poulsen and Dumitru Frumoso are IB students at Grenaa Gymnasium’s boarding school. One of the core elements in the IB Diploma programme is Creativity Activity Service (CAS) which allows the students to develop along other parameters than purely academic ones.

– CAS can be organizing an activity for other people or helping with something, Sofie explains. – For example, right now at the boarding school some teach crochet to others and one is organizing a running challenge with more than 80 participants. Others have an art exhibition coming up very and hope to see many visitors from Grenaa.

– But CAS can also be to do something for oneself like going for a run or decide to learn something new, Olivia adds

– CAS is actually everything, Dumitru says. – It is about contributing to one’s communities and to develop as a person doing so. If I can be of help to someone here in Grenaa, I will learn about Danish culture and I might also learn more Danish than I do during Danish lessons at school.

This is what the three students’ CAS project is about. – We would like to connect more to Grenaa and get to know people outside our school community. So we offer free helping hands to do practical tasks. It might be everything like cleaning, walking the dog or cooking meals, Sofie explains.

Together Sofie, Olivia and Dumitru speak 10 languages, but they are of course aware that for this project Danish is necessary. Sofie and Olivia speak Danish and Dumitri learns Danish ab initio at school. – So to begin with Dumitri will go with either Olivia or me, Sofie says.