Now that I decided to create the Jeju version of Penguin Village, I began to search for a village and a link teacher (or advisor in American schools). But finding these two is much harder than I initially thought.
First, I emailed my community service coordinators to confirm if my ideas could be registered as an official community service project. I was extremely nervous at first, because freshman mostly doesn’t make clubs, but join them. So I was expecting a reply such as “Sounds good, but I would want you to start this next year,” but I was surprised to find a positive reply! I could really feel that something had started. He told me that it seemed like a good idea, but I would need a link teacher first.
In fact, I do not need a Link teacher if I were doing this as an independent project, but I need a Link teacher to supervise us if I wanted to register the project as an official school community service project. (Official projects can be registered as one of the school’s co-curricular sessions, and also receive official counting for community service hours)
Trying to find a link teacher, I contacted my art teacher, introduced my project and asked if he could be the advisor for my project. He soon replied that he already is in charge of his own project (one teacher can be an advisor of only one project), and he recommended me other art teachers to ask. I then asked the other teachers, but all of them had their own projects! I contacted every single art staff, but every single one of them were already link teachers of other projects. Nonetheless, the Head of the Art department invited me to her house to give me some tips on how to run this project. Although she couldn’t be the link teacher for my project, she gave me lots of help.
Still, realizing that this is quite different from what I imagined, I emailed my school’s community service project coordinator (who is in charge of almost everything related to community service) to ask if he could find a link teacher for me. He said that he would contact all the other teachers, and I am currently waiting for his reply.
At first, I thought I could easily find a link teacher in the first week, and register the Penguin Village project as an official school Co-curricular Activity (CCA) in the second week. However, only contacting the art teachers took almost a month, so I had to modify my plans. I newly learnt that it is important to consider many variables when making plans.
Update 1 (Oct 23rd)- Good News! Mr Cho, from the University Counseling department, has told me that he could be the link teacher for our project.
Update 2 (Nov 18th)- Now that the project has been registered, I am trying to find a storage place to store our art materials and a village to collaborate with.
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