In high school, ISM students must complete creativity, action and service hours to graduate. In order to get credit for these hours, however, they need to complete CAS forms. Through analytical and probing questions, the CAS form asks students to carefully reflect upon and reminisce the joyful time spent completing such activities. There have always been complaints from left and right about filling out CAS forms, as the whole process is deemed by most students as simply tedious and time-consuming.
However, this year, Mr. Woods, Mr. Relf and the administration have changed the system. This year’s Juniors, Sophomores and Freshmen are now using Manage Bac, a new and improved system through which CAS forms can be completed.
Manage Bac is not only updated in terms of appearance, but in terms of functionality as well. Manage Bac isn’t only for CAS, but can also be a life-saver for those high schoolers taking the IB Diploma. On Manage Bac, one can organize content related to Extended Essays, TOK presentations and more!
More importantly, Manage Bac has revolutionized CAS forms. According to Mr. Woods, the switch to Manage Bac was not necessarily a result of the old CAS forms being bad; instead, the school wanted to update the system, and with Manage Bac, they discovered they could do that and much more. With Manage Bac, students may first add CAS activities, briefly discuss their activity plan, and then reflect. The reflection process isn’t as tedious as before; rather, it is more creative. According to the Manage Bac website, reflections are no longer limited to being long questionnaires but can be journal entries, pictures and videos, as long as they justly reflect the activity.
According to Junior Jessica Morris, “Manage Bac [is] much easier to use than the old CAS forms. Instead of having to fill in every single box with questions that don’t always apply to the activity, Manage Bac has one box for planning [where] we can write as much as we want and relate our plans for the activity to the various learning outcomes.” Since the high school is currently still adjusting to using Google, Mr. Woods has explained that “we’re not really forcing students into mastering Manage Bac yet.”
Instead they’re slowly allowing students to adjust to Manage Bac, and even plan to include more updates throughout the year. So far, Manage Bac appears to make CAS forms more manageable and, with its new features and creative elements, a little more fun.
Article by: Mari Guzman
