As the days go by and the excitement rises within the ALA community; first years anticipating the long awaited holiday and second years ready to show off their beach bodies on their Durban trip, one can’t help but wonder why we still have tests and assignments during the last week of school. It was a culture shock to some of us to realise that a school can actually make you feel like the dance goes on until the last beat.
Our past experiences entail us relaxing and having fun during the last week of school, catching up with old friends, watching movies and reconnecting with your inner romantic being, but that does not happen at ALA. This is because instead of packing your bags and relaxing, you find yourself spending your evenings and afternoons in the library, studying for the econ, pure maths and statistics tests which all happen to be on the same day. The anger that had consumed most of students is what provoked petitions and the postponements of tests for other days, still in the same week though so the purpose was still defeated.
However, regardless of the fact that it is so easy to complain, one can’t help but appreciate the habits this school engraves into its students. ALA students working right till the last minute is a metaphor to how the problems in Africa are so large that it is going to take a lot of time, energy and passion to create the Africa we desire to see. Most of us probably won’t be alive to see the beauty of this continent being unleashed but that won’t stop us from working till we take our last breath to build our society. Through this, it has become evident that the mission ALA is trying to accomplish cannot be simplified and often takes a lot of thought into understanding why certain things happen on campus. Which is why a lot of thought has to go into how we perceive the workload we have. Realistically, its ridiculous that we work so hard but for arguments sake, it is these habits that equip us with the skills, knowledge and passion we need in order to make a change on our continent and if a hectic workload is one way to teach leaders perseverance, then bring on the tests.
ALAians Media 