CAS (Creativity, Activity, Service)

The component's three strands, often interwoven with particular activities, are characterized as follows:

 

Creativity - exploring and extending ideas leading to an original or interpretive product or performance
Activity - physical exertion contributing to a healthy lifestyle
Service - collaborative and reciprocal engagement with the community in response to an authentic need

 

CAS encourages students to be involved in activities as individuals and as part of a team that take place in local, national and international contexts. Creativity, activity, service enables students to enhance their personal and interpersonal development as well as their social and civic development, through experiential learning, lending an important counterbalance to the academic pressures of the rest of the IB Diploma Programme. It should be both challenging and enjoyable – a personal journey of self-discovery that recognizes each student's individual starting point.

CAS should involve:

• Real, purposeful activities, which meet one or more of the learning outcomes.
• Personal challenge – tasks must extend the student and be achievable in scope.
• Students using the CAS stages (investigation, preparation, action, reflection, and demonstration) to guide CAS experiences and projects.
• Thoughtful consideration, such as planning, reviewing progress, reporting (done in ManageBac).
• Evidence and reflection on outcomes and personal learning.

By the end of their CAS experience as a whole, students must show evidence that they have participated in at least 21 CAS activities. A student who fails to satisfy the CAS requirement will not be awarded the IB diploma even if all other diploma conditions have been satisfactorily fulfilled.