The Requirements
Duration
Your son/daughters CAS programme should begins at the start of DP 1 and continues regularly, ideally on a weekly basis, for at least 18 months without interferences. Your son/daughter will spend roughly 3-5 hours per week on CAS. This includes the scheduled CAS lesson, time spent on planning and undertaking the experience, recording evidence and reflection. CAS is not about counting hours, hour counting is the worst measure of a meaningful CAS programme. |
CAS strands
Throughout their individual CAS programme your son/daughter needs to find a reasonable balance between Creativity, Activity and Service experiences. They will engage in CAS experiences involving one or more of the three CAS strands. A CAS experience can be a single event or may be an extended series of events. Some of their experiences have to take place outside school in the local community |
Reflection
CAS emphasizes reflection, which is central to building deep and rich experiences in CAS. Reflection should inform learning and growth by allowing your son/daughter to explore ideas, skills, strengths, limitations and areas for further development and consider how they might use prior learning in new contexts. Reflection should be an ongoing process, meaning that your son/daughter has to reflect at least 3 times during an experience. This means they will reflect after each stage of the CAS stages framework ending with a self-assessment form. |
Experience & Project
At least one of the CAS experiences your son/daughter plans should be a CAS project. This is a collaborative and sustained experience of at least one month’s duration that challenges them to show initiative, demonstrate perseverance, and develop skills such as problem solving, and decision-making. The CAS project can address any single strand of CAS, or combine two or all three strands. The CAS stages should be used as a framework for implementing the project. |
CAS portfolio
Your son/daughter is expected to maintain a CAS portfolio, on ‘Managebac’, as evidence of their engagement in CAS. The CAS portfolio is a collection of evidence and reflections that showcases their CAS experiences and reflections on the learning outcomes. |
CAS Stages Framework
Your son/daughter should use the CAS stages (investigation, preparation, action, reflection and demonstration) as a framework for CAS experiences and the CAS project Evidence of their engagement in each of the stages should be reflected in the CAS portfolio with evidence. |
CAS interviews
Besides the regular meetings your son/daughter will have with their assigned advisor, there will be three documented interviews that will take place on a more formal basis with the CAS coordinator. |
Learning outcomes
Completing CAS is based on the achievement of the seven CAS learning outcomes. Through the CAS portfolio your son/daughter must provide evidence that demonstrates achievement of each learning outcome several times. |