The nature of CAS

…if you believe in something, you must not just think or talk or write, but must act.”

(Peterson 2003)

CAS is at the heart of the Diploma Programme. With its holistic approach, CAS is designed to strengthen and extend students’ personal and interpersonal learning from Service Learning activities, Physical Education, the Arts, and other Extra-curricular activities done during their early years of school. 

CAS is organized around the three strands of creativity, activity, and service defined as follows. 

  • Creativity—exploring and extending ideas leading to an original or interpretive product or performance 

  • Activity—physical exertion contributing to a healthy lifestyle 

  • Service—collaborative and reciprocal engagement with the community in response to an authentic need 

CAS enables students to enhance their personal and interpersonal development. A meaningful CAS programme is a journey of discovery of self and others. For many, CAS is profound and life-changing. Each individual student has a different starting point and different needs and goals. A CAS programme is, therefore, individualized according to student interests, skills, values, and background.

Aims

The CAS programme aims to develop students who:

  • enjoy and find significance in a range of CAS experiences

  • purposefully reflect upon their experiences

  • identify goals, develop strategies and determine further actions for personal growth

  • explore new possibilities, embrace new challenges and adapt to new roles

  • actively participate in planned, sustained, and collaborative CAS projects

  • understand they are members of local and global communities with responsibilities towards each other and the environment