~:[CH13 - Day 76]:~ Raising the Bar

 
~:[CH13 - Day 76]:~ Raising the Bar

It's great when you program has success, but it's also difficult, because it leads the way to more "disappointments." After a wonderful week, I could sense some disappointment among the students when they didn't get two distinctions. They received an award of distinction for research and award of excellence for debate. In most other years, this would have been cause for celebration, but the environment didn't match what it should have been. In some ways it's good that they're striving for the top, but sometimes when you only see that, you fail to lift yourself up for the things you actually did well. This week I was so impressed seeing the students work in such large committees. The majority of our delegates were placed in very large committees making it a challenge, which they took on successfully. I was proud of them adjusting to the conference layout, as unlike many schools, they only get one shot at attending this conference - junior year. I was also happy to see them be resilient, deal with the challenge of fatigue and ultimately represent our school the way we always hope for - active, diplomatic and substantive. This year's conference was said to be their largest with students from 70 countries around the world and these students took home awards in both categories. I hope that as time goes on, they'll see just how successful they were this weekend, as their accomplishments were definitely ones to be celebrated. In just one week, our sophomores and juniors won the best delegation at Berkeley and our juniors return with both awards from Nationals, a feat many programs would dream of. It definitely reminded me of how blessed I am to be able to work with such a great program, but also today reminded me of the new challenges that come with raising the bar. In our own lives, I hope that as we strive for the greater goals in life, we continue to celebrate those successes that got us here, understanding that feats we overcame in the past, are just a great today as they were back then. Congrats to the amazing efforts of our wonderful junior MUN Dons!