Some of my biggest challenges in Action Project may be actually planning out any creative ideas I come up with. While I usually have a lot of ideas regarding a topic, it will be hard to actually explore them in depth and make them effective when tackling the issue.

On the other hand, I'm most excited about all the innovative projects I'm able to take part in and the end results of realising my ideas in reality. That actual process of entrepreneurship is engaging to me, and taking part in it will make the subject more "fun".

Regarding my Character Strengths, I think my creativity and dedication will be really strong drives in helping with my Action Project They'll aid with coming up with fresh new ideas and allow me to pursue them until they are complete. This might create some issues, such as ideas that are too imaginative to make in real life but I believe I would be able to solve these problems when encountering them.

Additionally, I was able to grow my 5 C's skills, specifically those of Collaboration and Critical & Creative Thinking. The former was a necessary skills for this project, as I was constantly required to clearly communicate with my partner Ayan. We were able to build a strong connection and work well together by bouncing off each others ideas whenever talking. Critical & Creative Thinking was also essential as we needed to create innovative solutions to our partner's problems; by casting aside constraints and expanding our horizons via activities, we could really let our creative thinking run loose in generating ideas.

One difficulty I had when completing this task was formulating a thought-out, in depth plan for my concepts. E.g, my solution for Ayan were to create One-Wheel hoverboard lanes around the school so that he could reach his lockers faster and in a more engaging manner. But it took me more time to get into the specific details of how they would run, what students would need to provide to use them, etc. However, I believe that I can overcome this challenge in the future by taking a more slow approach to formulating ideas; or, I could ask my peers/group members for feedback in thinking out solutions.

Also, we created the following user insight statement in order to clearly display what out target audience seeks; e.g, our goal: Isolated and lonely “John” needs to connect with his neighbours and find people to share/relate his interests to because he doesn’t know or communicate with people in his community, and so has low self esteem and confidence.

People subscribed would receive a parcel every three months where they get resources that let them learn a new hobby. Then people with similar hobbies are put into small groups to form relationships; but, groups switch with every new hobby. This allows relationships to flourish but people can consistently meet others.

Then. after listening to other presentations, I thought that using devices like Forceful Phrases and Expert Opinions were really helpful ; during an advertisement, they would be essential in terms of showing my point to viewers and demonstrating why my arguments were superior.

How could people within a community become more connected via communication?

We fixed this issue by substituting the soccer scenes in our script with the actor having his accident on the nearby outdoors gym. This still conveys this element of realism and has the same amount of emotional impact on the audience.

Also, I was in charge of creating our video's prop, a fake PasTime parcel that helped audiences visualise what our product would actually be. There were no particular challenges during this lesson, so filming went smoothly and efficiently.

Then we began on discussing the wider benefits our idea had on Australian councils and neighbourhoods; this included talking about those deeper mental health issues that are spawned during isolation, and how by connecting with like minded individuals, one can find themselves in a better place. We communicated these ideas clearly to the best of our skills, and with the help of our props.

Finally, Ian and I collaborated when making the final edits of our video where he took the main chunk of the work (due to his expertise in the field); he created the transitions and special effects as well as shading. Then I added finishing touches regarding the music and diagrams. Overall, I am proud of the work our group has done and the advertisement created.

However, I do think we could have made improvements in some of our Collaboration efforts, namely efforts in conversation. During some periods of the project, we focused on our individual sections of the work (whether that was script writing, editing or prop-making), which caused a lack in communication. While this isn't inherently bad, if I had the chance to do a task like this again, I would prioritise more towards conversation.

Overall, I think that our group created a great Spin Off advertisement, which was effective in representing our message of inter-neighbourhood connection. We owe part of this to the persuasive techniques we used, which were primarily emotive words to connect with the audience's pathos; by creating this connection with their heart through our Communication, we could truly display the importance of our product and how it could help those suffering with seperation.

This act deeply resonates with me; I find this act extremely exciting because people in need can be efficiently taught how to help themselves, so that they don't need to rely on big companies. Instead, they can realise the opportunities and resources they own.

This also provoked my Critical and Creative Thinking, a great impact before I would be working on the INNOV8 project in the future. The SolShare project widened my horizons, giving me more of an open mind of how a possible solution could help many in communities. It inspired me to commit to a purpose that would help more of those in societies around me, pursuing widespread problems such as poverty or lack of education.

This was very effective in helping us visualise the daily life and needs of students under our solution, and we were able to use our communication in order to collaborate on this character study,

How is the use of the empathy map evolving our idea? What new ideas or insights have you uncovered from this process?

The empathy map allowed us to 'humanise' the problem by creating a first-hand experience of somebody that suffers all the negatives of poverty. As a result we could uncover many barriers that stand in the way of our current problem, and what our target demographic needs;e.g, how to cater to their lifestyles and responsibilities. An empathy map generally would make our solution a lot more effective.

How is our group collaborating? What can I do to improve collaboration within my team?

Our group collaborates well since we delegate work for efficiency but also come together to discuss lots of details.

One thing that I would particularly like to spotlight is the communication we share, as I particularly have been expressive in contributing some of my ideas in fixing parts of the problem A slight issue is that general productivity could increase but I could fix this by encouraging others during group and holding more people's effort accountable.

What barriers are we currently experiencing?

Because we are all going to be away for Duke of Ed, a big challenge will be managing our time in and out of class to ensure our work is still of high quality. Also, we are struggling with the details of our solution -- how we get sufficient funding and how do we make it stand out from other services via benefits?

What are our next steps?

We need to narrow down all the details for our scholarship program next lesson, then start working on the marketing pitch. I think we shouldn't have a big problem with the marketing pitch, as the spin-off project provided lots of good feedback on how to make our service appealing; what we really need to work on is having a solid solution.

After coming up with this idea, we used further communication with Mr Humphrey who emphasised the importance of our incentives/wow-factor. From this feedback, we built on the importance of our passion-based and need-based, not merit-based system and our mentor program.

We like how it:

• Advanced education for underprivileged students

• Showed the link between applicants and their partner schools

• Has a financial criteria to determine whether students are truly from a low-socioeconomic background

• Is an overall well-connected organisation getting low-income students into elite schools they would otherwise not be able to go to

However it did have limitations regarding:

• Questbridge is only available to US students; we want to make it based locally in SA, before spreading

• Questbridge is very merit-based; we want to make it more inclusive, and based on poverty situations

• Questbridge is to get into college; we want to make our solution for public and private high schools

We re-pitched our idea to Mr Humphray to ask for any feedback before our pitch. He pointed out some concerns about our plan being too classist because of the transition of public to private schools. Instead, he proposed staying with public schools and having our big focus be a program like the IB. We discussed the redesign of our solution: offering scholarships for underprivileged students to move to public IB World Schools in SA to do the Diploma Program. Most of our other details, like the application process and mentor program, would remain the same, but he would have liked us to touch more on how they would actually work.

This conversation touched on 3 of the 5 Cs:

• Communication and collaboration to see what to change from our original idea and develop one that is more positive and effective. This was clear when we had the feedback given to us, and when we were required to work as a team to incorporate it back into the solution.

• Critical and creative thinking to develop the new idea, and brainstorm ways that this could be changed to fit the feedback

• I liked their ideas and their persuasive techniques. Some of the ideas were very unique and how they were conveyed to persuade the audience was very interesting.

  
  

What aspects did you see in other groups presentations that were less successful?

• Presentation skills

  • Some presentation skills I liked were using clips of themselves using their "product". I put product in quotations because they of course didn't have one as it would be a waste of time.

• Communication and persuasive techniques used

  • Some communication and persuasive techniques I liked were the demonstration of the product, but not in real time. I liked the effort put into the videos.

What were the really great ideas?

• Some of the great ideas were the liquid lenses. Although it doesn't really seem possible, it is unique and would benefit people with eye strain. I also liked the idea of self defense classes at school. It would be cool learning how to defend yourself, but with so many students on campus who know how to fight, it would be weir

What feedback have you received from staff and students about your own INNOV8 Pitches? This can include self reflection for improvement.

• Some feedback we received was making our solution clearer and slightly better. Having only 5 students eligible for the scholarship isn't enough really to keep the program going. We should've also addressed the problem clearer and better in general, making it more emotional and such.

Which of the 5C’s do you feel you and your group struggled with the most? Why is this and what could you do differently?

• Although we were able to achieve all of the 5C's during our working process, we may have struggled with collaboration at times. This then lead to a decrease in group productivity, so not a lot of work could be completed. We definitely could have gone more deep into idea analysis and feedback if some of our teammates contributed their ideas more.

  
  

What improvements, changes and tweaks do you need to make before INNOV8 EXPO on Tuesday 20th June?

• We could improve the solution a bit by going more into depth on our solutions, and explain more about how our features will actually work. We could achieve this by working on our case study as well as adding more statistics that can back up our claims.

• Furthermore, our online presence such as our website and social media could have been improved.

I was particularly involved within this process, using my critical thinking to constantly look over the text; I needed to cut any unnecessary words that wasted time, potentially boring attendees, but still keeping it catchy and informational as possible. Our final pitch was:

Don’t you just hate wasted talent, students who could be the next generation of innovation falling short because of their living conditions? Imagine all those students finally able to access a world-recognised education. Full fees covered, no strings attached.  Academo is a scholarship for the talented unfortunate, and every scholar gets a mentor, IB grads who know exactly what it takes to succeed. They'll be the scholar's personal guide, from picking subjects to crushing exams and all in between. This isn't a handout; it's a hand-up, for students and their schools. When a scholar moves on, we help their old school out with donations to keep their academic game strong. Let's make education about talent, not just who can pay. 

• The students who enrol in Academo to study in IB

• The original schools from which students leave

• The partner schools from which students join

In what ways could it be made to be more effective?

• Bigger reach on young generations

  • Advertising Online

  • Radio advertisements

• We have to have a longer impact on the students

  • Maybe stick with them through more of their academic life

• Reach more schools

  • Regional schools → online courses

• Expand mentorship program to include more professionals

In what ways could it be made more ethical?

• More charity work 

  • Expand the donation program for the old schools

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• More benefits for the underprivileged students

  • On top of paying for the IB program fees, we could pay for their extracurriculars

In what ways could it be made more beautiful?

• More advertising

  • A website that is simple and elegant to emulate the prestigious vibe

  • Billboards and more physical advertisements

• ACADEMO MERCHANDISE

  • Fancy acceptance letter and package like colleges in the US

• We can hold a fundraising gala and event

I really appreciated this activity as it repeatedly helped build my creative thinking, by making me think outside the box while communicating with others.

I primarily used creative and critical thinking during the formation of our website, first thinking about all the needs our target demographic had when accessing. Maybe they would have questions about our mentors, wanted to apply or wanted to donate to our growing cause. I gathered all of these creatively thought out ideas, and used critical analysis to see which parts were essential and how I could solve them. This lead to different pages of the website being created such as a Frequently Asked Questions page and a "More on our Program" page. I then finally made sure to make each section well thought out and contain information that we had created, as well as redirects to links from the official websites of IB partners.

My communication had been developed through my Innov8 Pitch, where I could test my presentation and expression skills in order to show the benefits of our solution: a scholarship that allows those in poverty to succeed. My collaboration improved by consistently being productive with my teammates, giving advice to each other’s piece of work to achieve our common goal. My creativity and critical thinking were extremely developed via the thought-provoking activities we were given, encouraging me to think outside of the box. I learnt that my ideas needed to be as unique and varying as possible, before I made them work in reality to create a solution that people would invest towards.

These skills can all be applied into every part of my life, but could prove particularly helpful in future pathways I could take as I plan to follow a career in law. In this area of study, creative and critical thinking is needed to unpack information and think of effective yet realistic solutions to problems in order to create benefits for others. Furthermore, communication will be needed to express my ideas to others regarding the topic at hand and how it relates to the law.

One of the main challenges I faced was the effect of my Duke Of Edinburgh Adventurous Journey, which made our whole team miss Week 2 of school due to a camping trip in the Flinders Ranges. As a result, we got a lot less time than other groups in preparing for our Innov8 Pitch but we were able to overcome this challenge via our consistent collaboration. My character strengths are teamwork, as I made sure we were all organised and working on different topics that could come together for our overall solution. I also encouraged perseverance within our group, so that we were all focused on achieving our goal and putting in our personal best effort.

As a learner, I think Action Project has developed me very holistically, giving me these critical and creative thinking skills which I can put to use in all my other subjects. From maths assignments to science questions, I can still use my divergent and convergent thinking to problem solve in my unique yet effective way. I was also able to improve my character strengths, reinforcing my signatures which I was already proficient in, but also stretching my lessers to make me more well rounded.

On a personal level, I have learnt that I have this passion for presenting and expressing my own ideas, which I have developed to be creative and critical in real life scenarios. I also learnt that I enjoy tackling hard-hitting social issues, and creating solutions for them.