My name is Sam, and I just recently started my One Stone experience in XLab in the fall of 2020. I really enjoy helping people and growing as a person. One Stone has helped me fuel and inspire my passions by having a top priority of making students better leaders and the world a better place, which also means pushing me outside of my comfort zone. So far in the time I’ve been here, the most impactful moments have been during an event hosted by XLab for redesigning Halloween. Halloween is super important for people to find a social connection and it’s overall, a really important holiday for people to express themselves. Finding social connection and opportunities for self-expression are ways I think I do Good in the world. For me, to be the good is to help people with empathy at my core.
The start of this Halloween experience was a design thinking challenge. XLab split into groups and each group worked on empathy interviews, research, and how people feel about Halloween and the changes with COVID-19. Unfortunately throughout the majority of the interviews and research part of this project, I had gotten COVID-19 and stayed home for two weeks. When I came back, I did my best in supporting my team, giving my input, and helping with the rest of the project. My group designed a station with a life-sized board game for people to play that came by in small groups.
The most impactful part of this experience was the feedback and the accomplishment of doing something to inspire others and have them be grateful. Everyone’s immediate reactions were amazing, and parents would say that this was a great idea, and overall, it looked like everyone was having fun. We also had a feedback whiteboard with some people’s responses that made me feel so happy that what I contributed made a difference. I hope that the way the kids felt about this event inspired them to make others feel that same way, whether big or small.
The artifact I made is a digital drawing of a piece of my costume, a character from a game called Among Us. I watched a lot of YouTubers playing this game when I was stuck at home recovering from COVID-19. It also inspired me to make a little stuffed buddy named Sal that I carried around with me during the event. Most of the kids there recognized my costume and made me feel like what I created was appreciated and good. Having people recognize my costume made me and them feel social connection. This was a moment of doing and being the Good in the world.
