Grade 7 Changemakers: Small Actions, Real Skills 

Recently, Grade 7 students had two powerful chances to see what real changemaking looks like at WAB: learning alongside community partner, Roundabout, and interviewing High School GCiA clubs. Together, these experiences helped them see themselves as thoughtful, responsible changemakers in our community. 

Grade 7 students visited the Roundabout Thrift Store to explore sustainability in action. They saw how donated goods are collected, sorted, and redistributed, and heard how Roundabout supports people in need while reducing waste. For many students, the visit shifted their thinking from seeing secondhand items as "used things" to understanding them as part of a circular economy and a more sustainable way of living. Back at school, they reflected on what they had seen and how small, well‑designed actions can ripple into bigger impact over time. 

In their Individuals and Societies Changemakers unit, Grade 7 students met with High School Global Citizenship in Action (GCiA) clubs and stepped into the role of interviewers. "We basically learned how the high school students got into groups and then formed like a small organization that they were passionate about and how they actually used the properties of a good NGO and formed this project," Catherine explained. 

They asked club leaders questions about mission and motivation, impact and evidence, sustainability and legacy, money and transparency, partnership and collaboration, and how projects adapt when things don't go perfectly. The clubs they interviewed ranged from environmental initiatives—"We got to interview about how WAB can improve the environment here. So they had an NGO about having bees on campus and rooftop gardens to help like the air quality at WAB and so on," Angelia shared —to clubs that support children with leukemia at local organizations in China, to projects helping elderly people in care homes and mental health support initiatives. 

These conversations helped students see that meaningful action requires planning, collaboration, reflection, and responsibility. Paul noted that the interviews "gave us examples and knowledge about how to do it," while Liam shared a specific takeaway: "They said how they tackled the root causes. We're using that in our own work, it's helped me step back and think about big picture.”  

Using shared criteria, Grade 7 students analyzed the strengths and challenges of different GCiA projects and brought that thinking back into class as part of their curriculum work. Now, in I&S, each class is taking the next step by designing "mock" NGOs or GCiA‑style projects around issues they care about, applying what they learned about mission, impact, partnerships, and sustainability. 

Looking ahead, the field study unit will give students more tools for investigating authentic needs at WAB through methods like media, interviews, surveys, and observation so that future action projects grow out of real evidence rather than assumptions. They will practice how to talk to adults and community partners, how to set success criteria, how to collect and interpret data, and how to adjust a plan when the first idea does not quite fit the real problem. Last year, for example, students who assumed "food waste is mainly students' fault" changed their minds after looking at cafeteria data. 

For Individuals and Societies Teacher and MS Global Citizenship Lead Teacher Ms. Suzie Rampling, what matters most is that students are practicing student agency with support. Grade 7 students are not expected to run everything alone; they are coached through proposal forms, success criteria, and reflection, with teachers modelling how to ask good questions and plan thoughtfully before jumping into action. These habits—communication, collaboration, research, planning, and reflection—are the same ones they will use later in high school GCiA projects, CAS, and beyond. 

The "small actions" that Grade 7 students are taking are helping students notice and respond to real needs around them, and they are quietly laying the groundwork for the kind of informed, empathetic leadership WAB hopes they will carry into the future.