U-Lead Day 1: The Team that Cleanses Together Stays Together

With a bit of trepidation and a lot of excitement, we began the conference. We started the morning a bit before seven in the morning, and enjoyed our breakfast before heading out to the hospital to prepare for the day. In natural Operation Smile fashion, it was an organized mess. We quickly put up signs and got everything ready for check in. It was exciting that we were finally getting to meet everyone after working for so long to create this conference. We had 56 students registered and to get everything started off right, Carlos spoke about leadership. To follow it up, we had the wonderful Arlene Arias speak about the importance of volunteerism, and Eugene Alteri, the president of the board of Operation Smile Panama, speak about the 20th anniversary of Operation Smile Panama. We also presented on the pillars of student programs, and got to give presentations on how to present Operation Smile to different groups. We also had students present on leadership, education, service, and awareness. Each group came up with a creative way to present on their topics, and each presentation was unique. Finally, Megan’s hard work paid off in a fun, though chaotic way. The scavenger hunt challenged the students in new and different ways, including asking them to translate from French to English in order to encourage them to experience a bit of the mission process. They also wore bandanas, to simulate having a cleft deformity, and had to see if they’d receive a mission or not. There were also the comical mishaps, such as the flying controller. Jenn dropped it, not only did it fall but also exploded into different parts, the batteries rolling everywhere. The participants were also very gregarious; one memorable student’s suggestion on fundraising was to get "hot girls" to hand out flyers to passing cars. After the conference ended for the day, we worked on an Operation Smile fundraiser that was providing a portion of its profits to Operation Smile. After dinner, we headed to the grocery store for some candy, for the conference, naturally. To top it all off, to end the day, we had a cleansing party, having a competition to see who had the dirtiest face. After all, the team that cleanses together stays together!

On a final note, the Team Panama conference song for 2011 is: Watagatapitusberry. Check it.

 

Our students organizing themselves into "age groups" during the 

pre-op stage of the "What if you were a patient" scavenger hunt