NHS: The Amazing Race

NHS carried out its first event of the year on Saturday, February 21st. We had been planning the Amazing Race for a few weeks, an event based on the popular TV series. In the race there are a number of small teams which compete in a series of small challenges and race to get to the finish line first. There are clues to get to each next challenge, which were organised by groups of NHS members. I think there was a fair amount of doubt and skepticism regarding this event as we started planning it, as it was a huge thing to take on and we weren't sure whether people would even sign up to take part in it or whether or not we would get any profit out of it. However, I feel that everything went extremely well and it is a great tradition to uphold in years to come.

 NHS members at the start of the race

The planning of the Amazing Race involved the separation of the club into a series of small committees - events, PR and finance. We decided to make an advertisement for the race and a couple of NHS members volunteered to film various events and put this together. We put this on the ISK facebook page to spread the word about the race. We also let other clubs sell baked goods and food at the race itself, as there was a small food tent at the start/finish. In terms of the challenges we had about 15, and I worked with another NHS member on the Counting challenge. Our challenge consisted of moving 200 small kidney beans from one container into another using chopsticks only. To make things more difficult the team also had to count how many beans there were as they transported them, and were only permitted to leave to the next challenge if they had ±15 beans from the 200 (as it turns out only 2 or 3 teams actually counted the exact 200). Other challenges included kareoke, one in the swimming pool, a food tasting test, etc. There were also a fair amount of teams signed up by the end of this, and we were pretty happy with the outcome.

All NHS members met at school at 8:30 to set up and Brandon and I counted out 200 sets of beans for each of the 17 teams, which was quite slow. We also set up the plates and other supplies in our station and then helped around with other odds and ends. When the race began we found that the teams were moving much more quickly than we had anticipated and so Brandon and I rushed to our station and began to accommodate for all of the teams coming in. Unfortunately there was a slight shortage of chopsticks at some point and a few teams had a fair amount of trouble counting the correct number of beans, but eventually everyone passed through. It was definitely a test of teamwork, as we both had to communicate whilst rushing around and handing out supplies and whatnot. We also had to keep track of who was finished and who was coming in and hand them the right papers (either instructions or directions to the next challenge station).

After everyone passed through our role in the race was diminished significantly. However we wandered about and watched some of the other challenges and then helped in the clearing up of all the stations. We had to gather up paper to be recycled and get rid of all our materials [etc]. At the end of the race there were pictures and announcements, and then we were free to go home.

Overall I think that this event was a success. I was extremely impressed with the organisation of the race and the way that the NHS members managed to pull things together and collaborate with one another. I could see that people were being drawn together through their participation in the challenges, and the atmosphere throughout the day was wonderful. I feel that a sense of community was definitely created and people were adequately challenged, both physically and mentally, by the race. It's my opinion that this should be continued as a tradition for NHS, as it embodies a great deal of what we're trying to promote at ISK and all funds go to the scholarship that we are trying to get for a local Kenyan girl.
Next year I feel that there should be some changes regarding payment. Some teams backed out of the race right before it took place and should've been charged more to do this, as our profit was fairly low. Furthermore, there were not nearly enough NHS members to run the entire race, and I think that we should enlist the help of students outside of this group itself. There was also talk of making it possible for whole families to compete together. There is definitely a lot of leeway when it comes to organising this event next year, and I look forward to see what our rising seniors come up with.