[IB9 & IB10] Cleaning K. Donelaitis cemetery

Rūta Abramauskaitė -

Before All Saints Day we all remember those, who passed away and to keep connected with them, we visit cemeteries and light a candle for their remembrance. All cemeteries are like the markers of human history; of all the love, joys, tears, toil, triumphs and sweat of the past. They link to family we never know or to people, who were an important part of our lives. They are the sources of our history, reminders and symbols of the best moments spent with the loved ones and they tell us a lot about ourselves culturally and socially. Maintaining cemeteries shows respect and creates an important link with the past. Yet, many cemeteries have been abandoned and fallen into neglect. There is nothing sadder than come across crumbling, decaying and near gone relicts of cemeteries.

On 29^th of October some of the IB1, IB2 students and first-graders organized a voluntary action in which we cleaned neglected graveyards by raking leaves in K. Donelaitis cemetery. We divided into groups of three or four people and each group cleaned different areas of the cemetery. By working in group, not only did we gain communication, team working and organization skills, but also we learned to be more patient. It required a lot of commitment and perseverance, because as we worked, the number of leaves did not seem to decrease. However, I would say that this work was really joyful, we were happy of the results and we felt proud to help to regain the remembrance of people, who passed away and who seemed to be forgotten. Before the work we even asked ourselves: should people ever be so forgotten that the cemetery is no longer cared for, no one visits, no one remembers?

Don’t forget to light a candle not only for your loved ones but also for those, who seem to be forgotten.

Volunteers after hard work

Volunteers in action

[IB9 & IB10] A regular year together with Food Bank

Rimgailė Ruibytė & Haroldas Bagdonas -

Food Bank is a non-profit, charitable organization that distributes food to those who have difficulty purchasing enough food to avoid hunger. The action is being organized all over Lithuania with alternatives to donate not only food but also money. Food Bank and a sister action “Inviting guests” were two main events that IB students aimed to join in October.

„Inviting guests“ action‘s idea is to gather people and offer them treats in return for a donation which later on is sent to Food Bank. This event was held in Didzdvaris gymnasium, initiated by CAS coordinator Ligita Ivanauskaitė and organized by IB students. IB1s was preparing sweet treats for this event – we were baking cookies, while IB2s were preparing savory snacks and the venue. As IB1s we were separated into two groups which baked cookies after the lessons prior the event. This activity was very cheerful and fun, because some of the students were baking for the first time in their lifes. Furthermore, this activity brought us together, we needed a lot of cooperation if we wanted to make tasty cookies. After all the preparation, the event was held. Invitations have been spread to all students and teachers in the gymnasium.

A lot of teachers and students came and enjoyed the cookies and other snacks. During the event Edita Gumbaite, student of IB1, introduced everyone to the Food Bank action, its goals, history and methods. A few students from Didzdavris gymnasium were performing and made the event cozy and calm. The guests were also welcomed to participate in activities that involved creativity. The organizers chose to incorporate autumn together with the Food Bank action, hence to some extent it was a meaningful greeting for the autumn season as well.  For us, IB1 students, it was very pleasant to see that people were donating and eating our cookies, saying that cookies were delicious. There were some leftover cookies from the event, which were sold the next day during the breaks. A total amount of 310 Litas (around 100 EUR) was collected which later was transferred to Food Bank.

That same week, IB1s and IB2s continued their volunteering in grocery stores and collected the donated food for people that are living under a poverty line in Lithuania. While for the IB2s it was a third time participating in Food Bank activities, for the IB1s it was a first time having to volunteer for Food Bank. Comparing this time and previous there was not much of a change, yet again there was a timetable that divided us into a group of 3 people with each group having a specific time to volunteer. Then the groups themselves would assign each person a responsibility – mostly a combo of 2 people that would greet people and advertise the food bank while 1 person would be left to log the products that were donated. The groups also included a supervisor from Didzdvaris Gymnasium – usually a certain subject teacher. Since IB2s had previously participated in the event, some of the experiences and tips were shared to the IB1s in order to make their first time as successful as possible. This included the most basic tips such as reacting to various reactions or how to properly distribute the workflow. However, such feelings as anxiety or uncomfortability were something that IB1s had to overcome on their own, nevertheless the negative feelings faded away together with people inquiring about the Food Bank action. This experience kicked IB1s out of their comfort zones and turned out as a positive experience for them in the future. Hence, the first time for IB1s turned out to be a success as well as for IB2s. For IB2s having to participate in Food Bank for the third time is starting to become like a routine as well, because of the gained experience, it should be easier for the IB2s to volunteer or even organize Food Bank actions elsewhere after having graduated Siauliai Didzdvaris Gymnasium. Due to the success of IB1 and IB2 during the 2 days of Food Bank in Siauliai, over 1000 of food items were collected.

In conclusion, this action has helped the students to develop in many ways. IB1s gained more knowledge about the action itself as well as gaining experience that will help them in future CAS activities. However, most importantly we believe that this action helped IB1s and IB2s to create a stronger bond as fellow IB students in Didzdvaris Gymnasium, which in return should promote better teamwork and probably more collaborated events. Nonetheless, in the end after Food Bank activities every IB student felt happy and a little bit proud that one has done something that can could help other people.

Final preparations before the guests arrive.

Lovely guests putting out "Maisto Bankas"(English for "Food Bank") using autumn leaves

[IB9 & IB10] "Bang Bang You're Dead" - no boundaries for an important message

Simona Jasaitytė & Živilė Matjušaitytė -

            "Bang, bang you're dead" play was never about the CAS, moreover it had a lot of purposes, not only the product. We all shared the same goal to prepare the play, however, the journey we had connected, improved us as more creative and artistic people, and forced us to look at this play's subject, which is bullying, with much more importance and significance.

The main meaning of the play was clear from the beggining - to spread awareness about the current bullying problems in schools and our environments. Furthermore, creating the play also had the same purposes as the idea of CAS. Meeting and making new peers, experiencing and learning something new to you and getting out of your comfort zone, and creating a product that would somehow influence the people around us in the best possible way. Since we are working together for about a year, most of our goals and purposes have already been achieved. We became great friends with not only each other, however, we met amazing students and teachers in the other school. Majority of us had never experienced or faced drama or acting in general but due to this project, we all improved English language skills, learned basics in acting and how to handle the audience and overcome the fear of stage.

            Everyone in the group of young actors were working hard all semester towards one goal - making the play “Bang bang You’re Dead”as effective as possible. We were always meeting twice a week, to try and polish the text, movements, and emotion, which we were aiming to send to the public. After working on this project for almost half a year, everyone of us were excited to share our piece of work with a wider public. The first performance took place in the Didždvaris Gymnasium on the 29th of May. It was shown to the MYP students of the school. Later, in the evening the play was shown to the closest friends and family of ours in the Šiauliai Art Gallery. This September we were informed by the English teacher A. Chvostova, that she is very interested in helping us to share this play that we were working on for so long with other schools and cities in Lithuania. We immediately started the rehearsals, to prepare for upcoming performances. Then we found out, that we do not need to learn the words again, because we could still remember them after the summer holiday, except from one person, who, because of changed circumstances, had to replace one of our actors. We got involved into the process, and when we were finally feeling confident about our acting, the play was once again performed in Šiauliai Didždvaris Gymnasium, for the first graders, on the 23rd of October. The next day was the first time, we ever performed “Bang You’re Dead” out of our home city Šiauliai. Our English teachers A. Chvostova and T. Sviatkina travelled together with us to Panevėžys Juozas Miltinis Gymnasium. The school was celebrating its birthday, and our performance was a part of its programme. Before the play, the actors and directors were given a warm welcome by the school director. After we had finished the performance, there was a discussion between the students of Juozas Miltinis Gymnasium and us about sensitive youth problems, bullying, violence in schools. We also got some feedback on our acting from the director of this school’s theatre performances, about what he liked, and what could still be improved.

            The trip to Panevėžys was a great experience to each and everyone in our group of people. We gained experience from performing in front of people we do not know, also, made the importance of the message, we are trying to send through the play, more clear for us after the discussion with the students. The feedback from a theatre class director gave important ideas of what could be improved. However, this certainly was not the last time we were performing “Bang Bang You’re Dead”. We still have great intentions ahead of us. With the help of teacher A. Chvostova we will be planning performances. One of ideas is to show this play to all the English teachers in Šiauliai. Another plan is to go to a school in another Lithuanian town, Tauragė. Now the only important thing is avoiding letting these goals to only stay goals. All together we can work, communicate, and spread the message of this play to as much people as possible.

The crew before the play

[IB9 & IB10] Volunteering in "Šiaulių letenėlė" animal shelter

Ernestas Lingvinas -

On the 25th of October students from IB1 and IB2 were volunteering in animal shelter “Šiaulių letenėlė”.  The main goal of this organization is to save all animals from Gruzdžiai since they are euthanized there immediately and also to give a shelter for all lost and homeless animals.  However, this animal shelter opened just on August and still haven’t settled down fully so they can’t fulfill their goals one hundred percent.  The main reason for this is that the building is still not prepared and there is not enough equipment so the personnel of the shelter can’t take care of more animals. That’s why every weekend volunteer work is organized.

This Saturday we were cleaning the surroundings of the shelter. Firstly, we carried boards from outside to the inside of the building so that they would not rot. After that we collected all waste that was left in the building and outside. And then we carried those garbage bags to the tractor trailer. After this the surroundings looked significantly cleaner and next time we’ll be able to focus on different jobs that needs to be done. After volunteering, I realized that there isn’t enough support for animal shelters and that without volunteers like us and the directors of the shelter the situation would be even worse. So if you’re able to somehow support this or others shelters please do because there are plenty of animals that needs your help.

A group photo of the volunteers

Trash that were collected during the day

[IB9 & IB10] Bang Bang You're Dead - a play directed by the students

Vaiva Zokaitė -

           CAS has never been about collecting the hours or doing something that has to be done just because somebody says so. The idea which, I believe, all IB students at this point can agree on is to combine having a great time and getting out of your comfort zone, as well as discovering hidden talents. This is what we had in mind when we started putting up posters of “Bang Bang You’re Dead” play auditions on the walls of Didzdvaris Gymnasium and figuring out a plan.

A friend of mine, Zivile Matjusaityte (IB1), once randomly suggested to direct a play at our school. She already had experience working on some plays in Hawaii, so did I – both acting and directing. Without waiting much longer, we talked to some people at Didzdvaris Gymnasium who gave out the permission to carry out the plan to direct this controversial and thought-provoking play without hesitations.  

           It wasn’t too long before we gathered a team of charismatic, fluent English speakers who were adventurous enough to try themselves out in the field of theater or just revive their acting skills. We were all eager to begin taking this bumpy road, which at first appeared a piece of cake to most.

We started meeting several times a week in a classroom after school, just reading out the script of “Bang Bang You’re Dead” out loud. The actors were assigned the task of learning their lines within the first month or so, which, of course, was way easier to say than to do. This appeared to be one of the biggest problems we encountered and it seemed as if we were not getting anywhere closer to our goals. However, slowly but surely, we all started overcoming these obstacles and moving forward, as well as getting closer to each other. At that point we started understanding how important the process is – being scattered and unconfident were the main things holding us back. Even as things were starting to get better, problems would find their way back –we could barely fit into the time frame, there were thoughts of delaying the premiere and so on. The lesson we learned here was how important confidence, teamwork and proper organization are. We often had to encourage each other not to lose the motivation, which was our key to success.

           The week before the premiere of the play, which is often called “hell week” was not too big of a hell after all. We seemed to have gone through the roughest patches, the lines had been memorized, and nobody made excuses or missed the rehearsals. Zivile and I had the job of deciding where and what time we will be ready to let others see and feel what we had been working so hard on for the past several months, what the audience should look like and run all the possible scenarios in our heads.

           The time had come. Thankfully, we had all the support from our teachers and school administrators to show it to some of the students of Didzdvaris Gymnasium during classes. After that, we have been given a hall in the Siauliai Art Gallery and performed to the closest people – friends, family members and such. Both performances happened on the same day and we had never felt closer to each other and more accomplished. We had not imagined the audience, especially at our school, would be so concentrated, serious and understanding during the play. The moment we saw how moved some people were and how much they appreciated our dedication and the actors’ talent, we knew our hard work had paid off.

           After having the summer to slow down, we’re not ready to stop - we’re back at work. There have been some minor challenges already, but this only shows there’s still a lot of room for improvement. At this moment, with the help of out English teacher Alla Chvostova, we are getting ready to give our very best to a school in Panevezys. We have planned a bit more than that, but only time can tell what is possible and how much further we will go, especially with the majority of us being seniors. This year we are striving for a performance more polished and professional, as well as hoping to learn even more not only about theater, but about ourselves, too.

The last rehearsal before the big play. 

The crew after an outstanding performance

[IB9] Voluntary work for the “Food Bank” action ||| Part 3

Anelė Brazaitytė -

Food bank is a charity organization, which collects donation in food products and allocate it to poor families, elderly and other people in need. The aim of this “Food Bank” organization is to provide people with information about those poor families, lonely mothers and elderly, suggest to donate any of long-term products for them, to grow mercy feeling in citizens hearts. As far as I know Food Bank action in our school’s IB history is quite a long time. In this action IB students participate twice a year and annually. Namely our generation, my class mates and I, participate in this action second time.

This and previous time there was a made-up timetable, which divided us into small groups and each group had their own period of time to volunteer. Then when particular group’s turn came up to work they are separated into different roles. Up to two persons share booklets for comers. Firstly they welcome people with nice greetings, then comes suggestion to participate in Food Bank action and in the end answering their questions or other reaction to buyer. Another role of volunteering in this action is to stand with boxes and thank for products that are donated by people. There is needed up to 4 people. One should take products and to sort them in boxes, another should mark what products were donated and third person should thank in appropriate way for products donated.

Personally mine expectation of 2014 Food Bank was positive, keeping in mind that it was my second participation in this action. Had it was my first time I participating there, I would have had more suspense feeling in my heart. I was expected to have opportunity to meet new people, to be useful in collecting food donation for poorer people, to advance self-confidence in encouraging people to be lavish, to spend more time with our classmates in social activities, to improve communication skills. And actually I was successful in taking part in this volunteering event. Next time most probably I would participate for a longer time, not only for several hours, but may be for two days. Not only I would donate more by myself, but also invite my friends to collect some money and to buy any of those long-term products.

Now after those two times I have participated in Food Bank I could summarize several of advantages and lessons that it gave to me. First of all, it gave me an experience on volunteering, gave an opportunity to meet new people, to find out how little do they know about products donated to this action and to introduce them with action more widely. I developed my communication, people understanding, team work skills. I improved my tolerance and debate skills and I believe so did my classmates.  

[IB9] Siauliai Didzdvaris Gymnasium park spring clean-up

Deividas Nekrašius -   

        In the end of March me and my classmates - Anelė Brazaitytė and Gabrielė Baristaitė, were invited to go and help to clean up the Didzdvaris park. We were assigned with different tasks such as raking and taking leafs away, thin out the bushes, pick up the litter from the ground. Over-all we, as a group, did pretty well because after our help in the area we were assigned to, was cleaned out and looked a lot better than in the beginning. Also we have benefited from this activity by learning more about the park of Didzdvaris because there was a person who told us about the park itself. Furthermore, there were supposed to be tea and porridge but it was not there. I think that the next time it could be organized a bit better and clearer. Over-all the whole cleaning up was both – beneficial and fun for us. We got the chance to clean up the park and listen to interesting stories about it.

Taking a picture before the upcoming hard work (we are on the left)