Hello 'Ilima

With a couple days left, my final quarter in 'Ilima is soon coming to a close and what a final quarter it was. There were so many big events that happened this year that felt like ages ago. The Leadership events from this quarter were Orientation, Graduation Picture Taking, Recognition Night, 7th Grade Class Day, Dance Competition, Awards Night, and Aloha Dinner. Despite being a lesser amount of events, all of these events required more effort compared to other things from other quarters which made this quarter just more painful. Let’s start with Recognition Night and Awards Night. I want to begin with these two events as they are very similar. Both are night time events that reward people for their efforts throughout the year. Also, both events were major strains on my body as there is SO much standing. Another funny thing to mention is that I had similar roles in both. In Recognition Night, my job was to bring the students toward Mr. Ing so they could hear what he was saying. In Awards Night, I had to control the stage area as students were called up to the stage. Moving on, Graduation Picture Taking. This event spanned across 2 (or 3) days and Leadership was in charge of changing the students and keeping them orderly. Graduation Picture Taking was much more simple compared to the other events, but I did have to miss class which is never good. The final event I want to mention that belongs in this category of long but not hard is 7th Grade Class Day. For the 7th Grade Class Day, the SBG needed to go so that they could take attendance, but that also meant that we could ice skate with the 7th graders in Ice Palace. I was very excited to skate as I could revenge my 7th grade self as I was horrible last year. But I didn’t do that well this year as I ended up falling 23 times and my whole body was bruised. Besides the skating, the actual work of doing attendance was very easy. The next category of events are the ones that took a lot of effort to do. The first one I will talk about is Orientation. This is as the first big event of the quarter and was multiple quarters in the making. The job for Leadership was to provide a memorable experience for the 6th graders so that they could remember everything they needed to know for middle school. My role was as the Pre Show host and my job was to entertain the 6th graders as they were waiting for everyone to arrive. I had a lot of fun being a host for the students as they were always cooperative and energetic. Besides my Pre Show job, we also had to give a tour to the 6th graders. My tours went well every single time and I am thankful to not have any problems. The last thing I needed to do was the fashion show where I was absolutely stunning. Every time I first appeared on stage, all of the students would clap. Moving on from Orientation, the next event was Dance Competition. The Dance Competition required the Leadership students who were not in dance to work the props for the Prodigies. The competition took place on a Saturday and was held at the Blaisdell. I went into a lot more detail about the day I had there in an earlier blog, but know that it was an eventful day. But the best part of the Dance Competition had to come from winning the event. I was just very excited and energized from winning. The final event to talk about is Aloha Dinner. The big farewell for the 8th graders in Leadership, the Aloha Dinner was very fun but also very stressful. I explained every part of the dinner more in an earlier blog, but I'll just go over the biggest parts. The first part of Aloha Dinner I will talk about is the most stressful part, that being the gift giving. The gift giving involved the 8th graders presenting gifts that they made for the parents, hosts, and Mr. Ing and it was stressful because we (the 8th graders) wanted the gifts to be special. We strived to make memorable and unique gifts that would be cherished and it took a lot of strain on all of the 8th graders. But in the end, the gift giving went well which is great. Then, there were the speeches that the 8th graders gave which were our last goodbyes. I enjoyed listening to all of their speeches for the unique perspectives and lessons that were in each speech. Overall, the Aloha Dinner was fun and I enjoyed attending the event. This concludes all of the Leadership events from this year, but there were still so many other things that happened during school. The biggest assignments from this quarter would be SBA testing and the Math End of Course Exam as they had heavy implications for my future in Campbell. The SBA testing happened during one specific week where only 8th graders would go to school on the first two days while the 7th graders went to school on the other two days. During those two days, there were three tests that we needed to take. The ELA test, the Science test, and the Math test. All three tests had their own parts of the day to complete and all of the tests were held in the advisories. To say that I didn't enjoy testing would be an understatement, but at least I got good scores. On the other hand, for the Math EOC, the test would be taking place during normal school in our math classes. This test was different from the Math SBA as the EOC covered the Algebra 1 standards we learned while the SBA was the 8th grade standards. But both tests were difficult and it took a lot of time and patience to finish. Other assignments from this quarter that weren't as big but still noteworthy to mention are the ELA essay and the Science debate. Both assignments took place over multiple days and required either a lot of writing or a lot of research. Overall, this quarter was chaotic.

The first highlight from this quarter would be the 8-3 field trips. During the last couple weeks of school, 8-3 went onto two different field trips. The first field trip that we went on was to Iolani Palace. During this field trip, us students toured the different parts of the historic palace. This was actually my first time going to Iolani Palace and it was a great experience. I got to see so many wonderful antiques that told stories and I walked into many rooms full of beautiful decals and furniture. The other field trip was to Wet n Wild, but I will talk about this in my last weekly blog. The next highlight from this quarter would be the conclusion of many long going ties. From this quarter, we had the last Recognition Night, the Orientation which needed months of practice for, and the Aloha Dinner which all concluded different parts of the year that were started early on in the year. Like seeing the final part of a movie series, it was just satisfying to see all these parts come to a close. The next highlight from this quarter would be the All State Academic Team Banquet. This banquet was for students who had a 3.8 GPA or higher and participated in two or more students. The banquet itself isn't the highlight of the quarter, but the highlight is the accomplishment of making the team. Being apart of this prestigious group of students feels like a reward for all of the efforts I put into school. The final highlight from this week would be the amazing time I spent with my friends. With this being the last quarter of middle school, I've made sure to make a lot of memories with my friends and a lot of memories have definitely been made. I'm glad that I have such a great support system around me and I can't wait to see all of them in Campbell. The first lowlight from this quarter would be all of the stress I experienced throughout this year. This was such a stressful quarter compared to other because it felt like every week there was something new needed to be done. From Orientation, to SBA testing, to Aloha Dinner, there was just always something that I needed to do which stressed me out a lot. The next lowlight from this quarter would be having to leave my 7th graders. While I haven't done this yet, I am constantly reminded that I will be leaving 'Ilima and therefore be leaving my 7th graders. While I wish to stay with my 7th graders and to keep on supporting them, I know I have to go and I wish them the best of luck in 8th grade.

From such an eventful quarter, I have learned a lot of different lessons. But the biggest lesson that I learned from this quarter is that patience and hard work go a long way. Something that I realized during this quarter is that I am very impatient. I get bored quickly with things and I am always trying to find something to do. This impatience can cause my work to deteriorate as I want to rush through it so I can do something else. So what I need to remember is that I need to take my time and work hard so that I can produce the best product. Besides this lesson, I've learned a lot double checking myself and always making sure that I am sure of something before just passing through work.

With this being my last quarter in 'Ilima, I want to think about my potential future and what I am looking forward to. Going into Campbell, I want to be able to find what I like quickly. Right now, I am unsure of my academy so I want to find out what academy is the best for me now before I regret it later. I also want to see what clubs are the most interesting to me as finding a group of people with similar interests to me is very important. I also look forward to seeing my former 8th graders in Campbell. Ever since they left for Campbell when I was in 7th grade, I've been missing them so I can't wait to see all of them once I get to Campbell. Finally, I look forward to seeing how the people around me grow. The jump from middle school to high school is big and I am just personally curious on how my friends change. With that being said, this concludes my blog. I hope you have a great week. Cheers to another day!

Closing the book, I let out a large sigh. Whoever this author is sure knows how to ramble on. I think as I close the book. At least the story was somewhat interesting. I began to close my eyes after a long day of reading.