March to Charity

On 19 January, West Coast YEC organised its annual fundraising event entitled 'March to Charity' for the low income families in West Coast. I am the team leader for a group of Kent Ridge Secondary School NCDCC students.

They were really nice and full of vibrance! The students are very experienced in projects like this which required them go go door-to-door to collect old newspapers and clothes from the residents.  They were very polite and were full of initiative. I gave them my trust and split the team into two groups with one student as the leader. This made our collection more efficient and we managed to cover four blocks of flat within the stipulated time.

It was a great day spent with them and I have learnt a lot from them as well! Despite being exhausted, the team continued to work hard till the very end, and even helping other teams in transporting their collection onto the Karang Guni's truck! They told me that they were all from the Normal Technical stream and they had great ambitions as I asked them what they want to do in the future, they had plans for themselves and some are already working part-time to support their families. 

I am really glad that I am provided with this platform to work together with students in an informal and meaning setting.

Induction Programme for New Grassroots Leaders

Many Singaporeans have the habit of pushing responsibilities and blames to our government whenever something went wrong, and they often fail to realise that we have what we have today is because of the effort of our leaders and undeniably, Singapore has one of the most efficient governments in the world.

I was privileged to be able to participate in the Induction Programme for New Grassroots Leaders (IPNGL) which was organised by NACLI on 17th Jan 2014. The most beneficial activity for me was the table conversations. We were asked to go tothree different tables to carry out discussions on three different topics regarding community services and what it meant to be a grassroots leader. This gives me the opportunities to hear from other grassroots leaders from all walks of life and it gives me inspirations for different projects to initiate for the residents in West Coast.

The other activity I liked was the visit to the Grassroots Heritage Centre in NACLI where we saw how PA W

was formed and how it had grown over the years. The PA mission would always be "bringing people together", but its methodologies have evolved over the years to cater to the changing profiles of the people. I am very proud to be part of it now to serve the community and will strive on to bring people together.