In the early weeks of semester one in 2020, I applied for the position of ‘Semester One Year 7 Service Councillor’, and to my surprise, I received the role. I’ll be honest, when I applied for the role and turned up to the first meeting, I didn’t have much clue what the role would involve, all I knew is that I would be helping others, which was the reason I was interested. I’ve always been interested in the area of service, but I had never known where to start, but as soon as I heard about the role, and saw the application form, I knew I had to apply.
After attending the first meeting, I had more of an idea about what I would be doing in the role and became excited for the next meeting, and for the whole (project) ahead. However, we were then suddenly thrown into lockdown, which made the organization harder. When we had all settled into and gotten used to doing school online, we started holding our meetings over teams. It was a great way for us to check-in and discuss how we would alter it because the lockdown prevented us from doing it the original way we had wanted to.
Luckily, it all worked out in the end.
As the day of the Mountain of Warmth approached, I could see the pile of warm clothes people were donating was getting bigger and bigger. It was a nice sight to see lots of people donating warm clothes they could no longer use. On the morning of the collection day, I got to school as early as I could, so I could assist in helping to move the wonderful and warm pile to the Chapel. Very soon, the service had started, and I watched as Reverend Helen blessed the clothes. When everyone had left, and the Salvation Army van turned up, we started to take the clothes, armful by armful, until they were all in the van. The van was almost completely full of the generosity of everyone at the school.
When we walked away, to go to period 1, I felt extremely happy about how it had turned out, and the large number of donations. As we were walking, I had a quick reflection on my time as a service councillor, because at that moment, my role had expired. As I remembered the fun I had, and the joy I felt from helping the wider community, I knew I had to try to get the role again in year 8. I’ll never forget this experience I had with service at All Saint’s College.