With over one hundred student delegates from different Nord Anglia schools joining the 2023 NAE-UNICEF Summit on July 12-16, 2023, this year's summit was the largest in history. And the experience was truly immersive, inspiring, and empowering — surpassing all expectations of what it would entail.
During their time in New York, United States, students formed new friendships, joined insightful workshops, and learned more about how we can implement change within our own communities around the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Congratulations to Serena Liu and Suah Lee, both from DAIS Grade 11, on being selected as our NAE-UNICEF Summit Representatives this year. They returned from the conference with many new and exciting ideas on how to engage our students in this important global initiative. Serena and Suah will be working as Service Learning Ambassadors at DAIS/DHS to lead the SDGs in our school moving forwards.
Serena is originally from the United States, she was born in Washington State but moved to China when she was two months old. This summit was a special event for her as she finally got to see what the country she was born in.
For Suah it was the very first time visiting the US, and she felt very excited to see the UN headquarters and meet students from all over the world.
Suah has been studying at DAIS since Grade 3, and her elementary school experience was one of the main reasons she applied to represent our school during the NAE-UNICEF Summit. Her homeroom teacher in Grade 5, Ms. McPherson, was involved in many UN initiatives, and taught her students the Sustainable Development Goals. As the time passed, Suah started to organize and participate in secondary school activities and developed a deeper understanding of SDGs and service learning.
For Serena, DAIS is the place that brought her a wide range of opportunities and facilitated her in becoming the person she is today. But in her fifth year here, she realized that there may not be enough emphasis on the importance of service and on enlightening students to become global citizens. Participating in the Summit looked like a great occasion to inspire DAIS to incorporate more ideas on the SDGs and service. "Since this school has helped me so much in my personal development, I felt that this could be a great opportunity to pay back the chance of change DAIS has provided for me", said Serena.
As a high school junior, Suah already started to think about her future career and decided to major in a STEM field in university. Her favorite subject in school so far was AP Chemistry, and she also runs a Chemiholics ASA for her fellow high school students who would like to dive in-depth into different fundamental chemistry concepts and participates in the Curious Kids program where she leads enrichment activities in math and science for younger students, especially for those underprivileged ones. In the meantime, Suah is comfortable on stage, and she took part and won awards in many Sea Dragon Speech Contests at DAIS in both categories of oratory and impromptu.
Serena found her interest in biology. "It is a challenging course, and there are a lot of concepts to remember. Yet, when I learn more about biology, I understand what happens behind those chemical reactions and how my body works." Her favorite event at DAIS is International Day, and last year they created a booth together with Suah to spread awareness about the SDGs. Serena also works with her friends to support autistic kids as a member of the Star Lighters team.
Before the Summit, both girls never visited UNICEF nor learned how they tackled real-world problems in-depth. New York itself was quite a culture shock for them. After the peaceful and quiet yet rather big Dalian, this crowded city mesmerized them with fast-walking people, countless skyscrapers (made quite a view!), too many fast-food restaurants, and intense vitality. There were homeless people on the streets, which once again reminded students of the importance of the Sustainable Development Goals and the act of service to help them.
Serena (left) at the Summit
Serena and Suah were excited to meet NAE students and see how their schools incorporate service and the SDGs on their campuses. They also made friends – with fellow students from Beijing and Shanghai as well as internationally. Serena mentioned that all students they met were friendly, creative, motivated, and open-minded.
Our girls participated in many workshops designed by UNICEF and learned more about the SDGs, the importance of dialogue and activism. At the end of the Summit, they made presentations about different SDGs they were assigned to – SDG 5 (Gender Equality) for Serena, and SDG 10 (Reduced Inequalities) for Suah. In their presentations, DAIS students came up with multiple solutions that could help the NAE community to develop towards these SDGs.
Suah (4th from left) at the Summit
Serena and Suah said the Summit was a highly informative event.
The 2023 Nord Anglia UNICEF Summit was a truly inspiring and valuable experience, serving as a potent reminder that every individual has the capacity to create a positive impact on our world. Despite the short period of five days, without a doubt, the memories I made in New York will remain throughout the journey ahead.
The Summit filled me with various opportunities to delve in-depth into 17 Sustainable Development Goals, allowing me to realize their complexity and interconnected nature. Especially, as perceiving the current status of 17 SDG achievements and targets as we arrive at the halfway mark of 2050, a renewed desire to take tangible actions sprouted in me.
While workshops and conferences were undeniably meaningful, a definite highlight of the Summit was collaborating with experts in diverse fields and talented students from over 100 Nord Anglia schools worldwide. Regardless of our varied cultural backgrounds and experiences, during the Summit, I felt the strong unification and bond between all of us with a shared commitment and goal. Contacting students in connection regularly, I assure this bond still exists in all of us as we undertake own projects in our local communities.
Suah Lee
DAIS Grade 11
I learned more about the SDGs and how they impact one another. I realized the importance of dialogue and teamwork, and how these can accelerate growth and eventually make plans happen. I also learned qualities from other NAE students. They were very friendly, creative, motivated, and open-minded. I mostly learned my social, critical thinking, and leadership skills from them.
Serena Liu
DAIS Grade 11
Right now, Serena and Suah are working on incorporating what they've learned in New York into our school curriculum. The major goal they have is making DAIS a focal point of the local community where students can work with different stakeholders, from in-school clubs and organizations, other schools, community centers, to the local government.
In terms of the development of the DAIS school community, our young leaders are focusing on SDG 1 (No Poverty), SDG 2 (Zero Hunger), SDG 4 (Quality Education), and SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities). These SDGs require large-scale motivations to create impact, and these are also the goals that our school community can best achieve as an education institution.
As for the development of the clubs and local community, our Sustainable Development Advocates will focus on SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-Being), SDG 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production), and SDG 13 (Climate Action). These goals can be achieved through small campaigns and actions.
Suah and Serena created a mind map formalizing the steps they can take here at DAIS, and most of these ideas were either from other NAE schools or the UN site. Together with the school leaders, they are working towards implementing the SDGs in the clubs and activities in our elementary and secondary school. The girls created a Sea Dragon Spirit program that includes all the recognized clubs in our school, and now those clubs started to document their process in developing towards the SDGs and SWLOs.
Suah and Serena aim to revivify the Share a Dream program where the clubs in our school can note their objectives, reflections, and understandings of service so that students can see in what areas DAIS is developing. Suah and her friend Misa are also creating the DAIS Borderless Broadcasting system – they will share more details with us later.
From left to right: Serena, Suah, Ms. Essack, and Ms. Slough
This Summit experience helped our students develop their social, critical thinking, collaboration, soft skills and leadership skills that they learned from UNICEF and NAE students. Eventually, we hope that everyone at DAIS will adopt the SDGs in every commitment. Ways to incorporate 17 SDGs into our community are infinite and will be developed in all directions. As Suah said, "I am committed to serving a community where we no longer merely 'think' but collectively 'act' to bring changes. I will work tirelessly towards the day when all students can confidently answer 'yes' to the question, 'Can we change the world?' "
Photo credit: Serena, Suah, DAIS, NAE
