The big 5o!

I have a blog entry from last Saturday to put up, it's just on Chloe's computer! Technical Difficulties!

Sunday

Grandma and Grandpa came for the night! It was so nice to see them, made me unbelievably happy. They arrived at about 3pm and after having a chat in my room (and being blessed with a supply of new food), all three of us went into the dayroom and read for a few hours, with a cup of tea of course. We found their room, Middle Gibbet, on the spiral staircase up twoards the History classrooms. Bunk-beds! And a single, luckily neither of them had to take top bunk. That evening we went to dinner at Il Visuvio (crazy!), with Chloe, Ilisha and Shana as well. It really was an amazing night. Nothing extraordinary, but amazing. We even managed to catch the last 20 minutes of the British National Evening. Though Grandma and Grandpa are far superior Brits to what we were performing.

Since we got split up, Chloe said Shana, Ilisha and her went to 'tuck them into bed' and say thank you that night.
Monday-

I had breakfast with them, and the sadly had to say bye. But it wasn't too bad because I know I will be seeing them in three weeks for my 18th. :)

That afternoon I got to see my third-year, Dmitry. He took a very long detour on his way to University of Edinburgh. Flying into London, train to Cardiff, taxi to AC (then taxi to Cardiff airport and flight to Edinburgh that night). I hope the three hours he got to spend at AC were worth it. We went to Il Visuvio (two nights in a row, and three restaurants consequtively for me!), with Louis and Chloe. Such a lovely time.
Wednesday:
THE 50th ANNIVERSARY!

We missed the code after break to watch Queen Noor of Jordan arrive in her helipcopter.
Then our Student President and Vice President helped her burry a time capsule that will be opened at the 100th anniversary, filled with letters that the students wrote.
 Then the principal of UWC Pearson (in Canada) rode the last couple of km into the Main Arch with students.
There is currently an Assembly going on in Bradenstoke which I am listening to live on the AC website while writing this blog. (Two things at once!)
The climb in in ONE HOUR!

Though I am not climbing until 7pm tonight, I will go for the beginning. Robbie and Rob (two of our instructors) have put a tent up at the top, and are planning to sleep the night on the tower. We stop climbing at midnight and start again at 5am tomorrow morning. Every student has to climb at least 27 times, and the instructors a fair bit more. My slots, with 10 other AOC students, are from 7-9PM tonight, and then 8-10AM tomorrow morning. Illisha and I have promised to be eachother's billayers. I'm nervous... but it will be great! And am so proud to have raised money for it!
Okay, I will get what I did on Saturday up tomorrow. With news of the climbing, the BBQ, the fireworks.. oh so much!
Love,
Abi



PS *apparently the last time Queen Noor was here, in 2003, students wrote EDW on her helipcopter. They got into a lot of trouble for it, possibly expelled.. Just thought it was an interesting thing to know.

AOC FUNDRAISER!!

http://www.justgiving.com/Abi-Drummond

HELLOOOOOO

In order to celebrate 50 years of UWC AC, the instructors and students of this service are climbing the height of Mt. Everest (8,848 m) in 24 hours on the new climbing wall. The climb will start at 1700 on Wednesday 19th September and we will finish it at 1700 on Thursday 20th. We will have to climb the tower approximately 800 times to match the height of Everest!
Your support and generosity would be very much appreciated.
It is hoped that by taking part and completing the challenge we can achieve some objectives for the college:
1. Celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the College with action.
2. Raise some money for the College so that we can continue to support students through bursaries and also through support for activities and projects at the college.
For more information please look at the links below:
http://www.facebook.com/#!/AtlanticOutdoorCentre
http://www.facebook.com/#!/UWCAC


I'm quite sure I've spoken of my fear of climbing at least half a dozen times on this website. Please support my amazing service and school. <3

Abi

FINISHED...sort of.

Finished!

I have finished two of the most laborious, tiring assessments for the IB in the last week. YAY.

On Wednesday I had my ‘Viva Voce’ meeting with Nick, we read the whole essay through together, corrected some of the punctuation and then chatted about the overall EE. I then went to the librarian, Rachel, who put it through Turnitin. What an amazing piece of technology. The EE had 10% other people’s work, but some of the things it picked up were ‘United World College of the Atlantic’ and ‘North of Rhode Island’. So overall I only had to add about 3 more references and reword one sentence which was fine. Since the majority of my EE was from internet sources, which is information from other sources, the actual sources Turnitin found were ones I’d never heard of. Fascinating technology…
Anyways I e-mailed the final to Nick, 4 weeks ahead of the deadline. He made a joke about me going to celebrate with some ‘Lionfish and Chips’. It’s weird to imagine not looking back at it again, but at least I don’t have to worry about it while I’m doing my other work.


Interestingly enough I was more satisfied today with printing off my History IA. Maybe it was holding it in my hands, which I didn’t do with the EE. I truly did enjoy working on it...hopefully it’s worth it.

But as with the IB, when one thing ends another starts. ToK, (which is worth just as much as the EE in points), essay topics came out a week ago. The essay first draft will be due the first week in January, so most students do it over Christmas break. Here is the list to choose from:

1. In what ways may disagreement aid the pursuit of knowledge in the natural and human sciences?
2. “Only seeing patterns can give us knowledge. Only seeing particular examples can give us understanding.” To what extent do you agree with these assertions?
3. “The possession of knowledge carries an ethical responsibility” Evaluate this claim.
4. The traditional ToK diagram indicates four ways of knowing. Propose the inclusion of a fifth way of knowing selected from intuition, memory or imagination, and explore the knowledge isses it may raise in two areas of knowledge.
5. “That which can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.” (Christopher Hitchens). Do you agree?
6. Can we know when to trust our emotions in the pursuit of knowledge? Consider history and one other area of knowledge.

The essay is meant to be between 1200-1600 words. My presentation will be the week after half-term break. I’m working on something to do with women wearing bikinis in Arab countries and women wearing Burqas in Western countries. Hopefully my class mates, and Chris will find it interesting.

Dinner last night [Friday], with Gabi her mum, husband to be , Shana and Dan. We went to Jaipur which was the restaurant that Dad and I went to the first night we came to Llantwit, a lovely time.

Activities:

Children’s Charities – our second activity is going to be spent baking in the Sunley dayroom so that we can sell goodies at Tuesday break time. Should be a fun session 

Ethical Felt Design- Basically making things from the sheep wool we get from the farm. Very excited. I would love to make a scarf, but not sure if I’ll have enough time as there are only four more sessions left. Maybe I’ll go next cycle as an unofficial activity. The person who runs the activity is a professional felter, called Claire Cawte- pretty cool life!


Lots of love,
Abi

Dorm9

The kind of e-mails we get...

Dear All,

It has been randomly decided that tomorrow is going to be Dashiki Day! (keep on reading if you don’t have an idea what’s happening….)

So, anyone who has clothing that looks anything like in the picture below, WEAR IT! (Or if you don’t have a dashiki t-shirt, wear something colourful anyway and be awesome – yes, it makes you look awesome.)
IT’S OBLIGATORY, NOT OPTIONAL.

It’s going to be crazy. It’s going to epic. It’s going to be a Dashiki Day!

Love,
Sarunas and Savannah

*Sadly I can't participate.

Camp Leaders!

Rushed as ever.

This blog entry has been much put off. You know when there’s something to do but it’s going to take sooo much time so you leave it to later, but then it becomes a bigger thing to do? Yeah..

CAMP:

• Learnt the Haka for the first night
• Were a bit too scary to the Firsties coming off the bus, apparently
• Big Booty performance for the Talent Show, half the Second Year girls on our camp
• Bonfire, as lovely as ever. National Songs <3
• Danced on the tables
• EXHAUSTION


Work:
The History IA is complete! All of my corrections have been fixed and I am so glad it’s done. Never before have I spent so long working on something that’s only 2000 words.

The EE is almost done. So close. I have my ‘Viva Voce’ meeting with Nick on Wednesday afternoon where we discuss the last minute detail. I will then put it into the system ‘Turnitin’, to make sure it’s below 15% other people’s words.

Codes started on Wednesday. I’ll briefly say what I’m doing in each:

English Lit- John Donne poetry (he’s SUCH a romantic, I’m obviously loving it)
History- Weimar Germany
Gerography- Extreme Environments
E Systems- Biodiversity
French- Past Tense
Maths- Sets

Fun times all around.

Activities:
Activities have changed this year in that they are running in 5 week cycles, so instead of doing four a year people will do 8. This is really nice! However as I’m leading Children’s Charities for the whole year I only have one extra. I signed up for Arts ones primarily as I haven’t done one this year.

So my new activity:
Ethical Felt design
Claire Cawte
This environmentally sustainable activity uses the college environment as a source of inspiration and materials, including; college sheep fleece, plants and kitchen waste. Global and climactic changes impact the environment and what resources found in nature collected and combined to translate into an expression of our creativity.
Inspiration drawn from recognised issues that can be transformed into a visual language and express in designing a costume for the end if term Fashion Show or site specific art around the AC campus.

The Eco-Rep in me is thrilled!

OTHERS:

My LNAT exam is booked for October 6th. Freaking out, slightly.
Caribbean Bonding last night- jerk chicken (I enjoyed the smell) and festivals with our two Firsties: Ricky from Puerto Rico and Zooey from Aruba. Six Caribbean students, 16 Italians… how?!

House Bonding- had a bonfire in the valley. Synove brought a bowl full of bread dough, we put them on sticks and made bread  The Scan version of S’mores I suppose…

Spent a night at the Cottage with 8 friends, thanks to Isabelle’s amazing parents coming to visit. Had a great time!
Gym is still closed… Abi is itching to work out.

Love, Abi

PS- The First Year show is tonight!