College/ career day

Yesterday we had college and career day. Which meant, I was in charge of planning and organizing the whole day, for all of the High Schoolers. Students were allowed to eart a college t-shirt and jeans, instead of their normal school uniform. We started out the day with students meeting in their homeroom classes and doing devotions. Then, we had an hour in which I talked about a couple important things and then led activities like "the knot."

While this was going on, 30 college reps were arriving and setting up to do workshops for the students. After the activities, each student went to 3 different workshops, which were assigned ahead of time, discussing things like financial aid, the application process, etc. Then, we had a college fair.

After the college fair, students had an hour for lunch, which they were excited about, since they usually only get half an hour. Then, we had parents come and talk to the students about their professions. Most of the students seemed to really enjoy these workshops.

All in all, everything ran quite smoothly. The one big thing that did not, involved the fact that the college reps had all sent materials in advance for the college fair. I did not realize they were for the fair and thought they were simply promotional materials. No one had told me that they were sending these materials and that I should keep them. Therefore, I kept one flyer from each school to put on file and then threw the rest in the recycling. This meant that many of the schools did not have the materials they would have usually handed out to students. Most of the college reps were very understanding and I really think that most High School seniors recieve enough flyers that they never actually look through anyways. =)

While it was a day that went quite smoothly, and many students seemed to gain a lot from it, I am very relieved that it is over and I can now eat and sleep more regularly.

 

Things I love about Singapore

-The food! It's delicious and theirs such a huge variety of it.
-Transportation is super easy.
-Diversity. Where else in the world to the majority of people speak English and Mandarin, do you see Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, and Christians, Australians, Singaporeans, Chinese, Indian, American, Malay, Indonesian, Korean etc. people all on the same bus?
-There is such a great variety of awesome plants in the midst of a huge city.
-The weather is always warm, but not suffocatingly hot
There's lots more, but I would say those are some of my favorite things so far.

God is SO good!

God has blessed me so incredibly since I've been here in Singapore....
... with friends from places that we have lived previously
... a fantastic community of staff to work with
... the opportunity to work with middle school and high school students
... the opportunity to go on service trips to Cambodia and Indonesia
... the opportunity to go to Hong Kong for Christmas for my friend's wedding
... peace that this is where God wants me right now
... reminders that no matter what I have to do and how overwhelming things get, God is with me and is pleased with me. Loving Him is my first priority and everything else can fall into place after that.
... so many ways to get involved in our school community
... our HS principal finally got the paperwork sorted out for the two children he's been trying to adopt for years
... and so so so so so much more!

Please be praying for my eighth grader boys, since there is a lot of bullying and tension in that class. Also, please pray for the numerous high school students out with chicken pox right now.

One month

I can't believe I've been in Singapore a whole month since I arrived here in Singapore. Here I am, going day to day, teaching my wonderful PE classes, trying to figure out what college counseling involves and how to do it effectively and suddenly a whole month has passed and I feel as though I've only been here a few days. There is still so much to learn. Since I've been here, I've eaten fantastic food, including chili crab, stingray, Indian food, fish ball soup, and what is called fried carrot cake, but is actually a ground up root of some kind, I think... I've walked by the beach, gone bike-riding on an island, stayed at work late day after day, gone shopping, played card games, giggled with my apartment-mates, met with most of the Seniors, gone to a kite festival, visited about 7 churches and so much more!
What I am most thankful for in all of this is the peace that God has given me. I don't know what I'm doing, but I feel an incredible peace that the Lord has placed me here for a specific purpose.
Please pray with me that lives of the students here at ICS in Singapore will be transformed!