The Chincha Service Projects is a service activity organized by Markham College. The school takes students for a weekend to help build houses for families that have been affected by the 2007 earthquake.

 

A day before the trip in May this year, all leaders needed to stay at school to be taught what we must pack for the weekend and be sure that everything required to build the house was in the tool box.  The leaders received the instructions of how the house was going to be built. During this time the teacher gave me the models of how the frames, panels and windows were made and I had to make sure that I completely understood them so that then I could be able to explain to the other students in my group. This was a complete new experience as I was the single leader in my group. 

 

Since the beginning I knew that it was going to be a tough challenge to be leader and be able to direct children to cooperate, work together and actually finish with the outcome of a complete house that is why before going I set up goals for myself. To start, my aim was for the entire group to work together and finish on time. I also wanted to be completely organized in order to not be worrying if some tool was missing therefore the day before going I was really careful on choosing the tools needed. What I also did the day before was to write on a piece of paper the names of the children in my group and divided it into sub groups so everyone knew what they were going to do when we arrived to Chincha and not waste time. With this method I would be able to develop my leadership skills. This experience was different compared to the last year's trip as I was now the one directing people what to do instead of being the one receiving instructions .

 

The next morning at 5 am on May 21st we departed to Chincha and in a few hours we were already in the Grimaldi’s house. The first day was challenging as we had to take all the materials to the working site and when we got there I noticed that the area that was given to my group didn’t match the plans that were given to me the day before. At this moment I started to get worried and nervous as I was the only leader, for my good luck there were 3 Ex Markhamians in my group, and with them I started to think on how to modify the initial plans and make them fit in the new area. I knew that this was going to take sometime and in order to not waste it I told the small kids to start varnishing the wood while the grownups were deciding how to modify the house. When we already had a rough idea on how the house was going to look like we called Mr Hilderbrand for his approval and then continued building. We helped the small kids to finish varnishing and then told the kids to focus on gluing the concrete onto the frames while the grown up focused on cutting the wood. When we had the concrete nicely placed onto the frames we had a break where we ate our lunch and talked with the family that we were helping. The kids started to play with the family's son for a bit and then we started to work again.

 

The next day we focused on painting and some of the members of the family came to help us paint the rooms and the designs that were going to be drawn onto the walls. At the end we achieved the goal of finishing the house besides having at first the problems of the plans not matching the area.

 

I believe that this experience has helped me to improve my leadership skills as well as my perseverance which will help me in life as there will always be many problems. This has showed me that when a problem arises we must not start to panic but instead calmly try to think for a solution.

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I demonstrated the following Learning Outcomes:

LO 1 - Identify own strengths and develop areas for growth --> I developed construction skills and guided my team to finish the house for Sunday. I also strengthened my ability to read plans and take major decisions. 

LO 2 - Demonstrate that challenges have been undertaken, developing new skills in the process--> Being a leader meant taking responsibility of the team and also working towards the deadlines. 

LO 3 - Demonstrate how to initiate and plan a CAS experience --> I wanted to participate in the Chincha Service Council as I wanted to help the families that were impacted by the 2007 earthquake.

LO 4 - Show commitment to and perseverance in CAS experiences--> I went to the leader's camp before the activity and a day before the trip I made the box for my team with all the tools needed.

LO 5 - Demonstrate the skills and recognize the benefits of working collaboratively --> My team and I were able to finish the house on time

LO 7 - Recognize and consider the ethics of choices --> We were building a house for a family who unfortunately lost theirs in the 2007 earthquake.s

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