A day off school! This was Year 10's first thought when we heard there was going to be another day, supported by Porsche Mid Sussex, entitled Pushing Your Boundaries.

The day was designed to inspire us to make the most of our opportunities with workshops and speakers. We had school until lunchtime and gathered in Croft Hall at ten past one to obtain our personalised badges and programmes. As Mrs Aughwane opened the day we peered around the hall. There were several other schools involved in the day and Mrs Aughwane welcomed them before introducing Claire Young from the BBC TV programme The Apprentice in 2008, who was the first speaker.

Claire not only revealed the behind-the-scenes gossip from The Apprentice but told us that we could do anything if we set our mind to it. We found out that Alan Sugar was ten times scarier than on television and that she was brave enough to leave him six months after she was offered a job at his company.

Next on the programme, after the inspiring speech, we were supposed to be dispatched to different activities. Oh, if only it were so easy. We soon realised that we had been tricked! Around a week before we had been sent a list of activities and told to put them in order of preference, only to discover on the day, that the school had purposefully organised it so we weren't given our first or second choices. It was explained that the day wasn't called Pushing Your Boundaries for nothing and we were supposed to push our boundaries and try something new.

A few minutes later we found ourselves in foreign territories such as drumming, yoga, post-shoot photography editing, circus skills, debating, car maintenance and bricklaying.

I was put in the yoga group which wasn't too bad considering it had been my third choice and throughout the workshop I found that I was quite enjoying it. I learned that I was not as flexible as I thought I was when we stretched through the sun salutation and I attempted a dog pose.

Gingerly stretching my taut muscles I headed to the Sixth Form block where we were split into different groups to discuss what we had learned. We spoke about opportunities we had grabbed with both hands throughout our school lives and regularly referred to the Pushing Your Boundaries title on our badges.

Subsequently we gathered in SF5 to hear what all the other groups had discussed. It was interesting to hear what other people thought could improve the day for the future. These ideas included holding a first choice workshop and one that was further down our preference list, other people thought that we should hold the conference throughout the day and not into the evening.

Afterwards we trooped down to the dining room and had hot dogs, crisps and cookies. It is my opinion that most people enjoyed that line up. Some people ate quickly and took advantage of the extra time by taking pictures with Claire Young (who we now thought of as a close friend) before we boarded the buses and drove to the Porsche Centre in Burgess Hill.

Many parents came to hear the final speaker of the day, Dr. Louise Makin, although I think some may have come to marvel at the rather flashy cars. Our parents arrived earlier than us to take advantage of the canapes and the Porsches at close view before we all gathered in a different room to hear Dr. Louise Makin talk.

She spoke about different opportunities she had taken throughout her life including a very interesting race called the Three Peaks Yacht Race, which combined sailing and running to race across the highest peaks in Wales, England and Scotland. Dr. Makin talked about how it was a battle to take part in the race and then to win it the second time. Teamwork was the main theme of the talk.

After the speech there was a Question and Answer panel to which some interesting questions were asked including 'Have you ever found it a disadvantage being a woman in the workplace?' The general response was that it actually gave an advantage.

After a very long day the panel disbanded along with the audience. Altogether it was an extremely inspiring day which everyone enjoyed and many thanks go to those who put it together. I look forward to some more workshops in conjunction with Porsche in the near future!

Written by Anoushka Khandwala

08/10/10