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"Lumos" - Lighting Up Homes
Social Campaign
The Challenge
Bring a cohort of 700 first year students together on a service learning day to give back to their local community.
The Outcome
"Lumos," a social campaign that inspired students to spend their day-off on Singapore National Day 2014 in Macpherson area visiting elderly and connecting with them while helping the elderly clean their flats.
My role
VO's Head of Publicity; Graphic Designer;
Video Editor
MY Big Sweep is an annual collaboration between St. Andrew’s Junior College (SAJC) and Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) in Singapore. Every year on National Day, all first year (JC1) students of SAJC would visit the elderly living in one-room flats at Macpherson. The Saints Advocate (VO), a student leadership organization in SAJC, was in charge of organizing the event.
In 2014, the theme for MY Big Sweep was “LUMOS”, inspired by the lighting spell in Harry Potter series. Thus, the tagline of the event was “Lighting up homes.” As the students visited the elderly, they helped clean the elderly's flats and interact with them.
Promotional materials for "LUMOS" included a t-shirt design for all participants, an informational poster and a video shown at a morning assembly.
The logo consists of two brooms crossing each other to illustrate the sweeping motion. I designed the back of the t-shirt with reference to a real-life photo of Macpherson HDB blocks. (HDB means Human Development Board. In Singapore, HDB colloquially refers to public housing.)
Furthermore, my team created a pre-event video to promote "LUMOS." We aimed to convey the mission of our campaign: a meaningful connection with the elderly to "light up their homes," not just a house clean-up activity.
"Deep in my heart I just know
Right from the start, we will grow
Look where we are, we've come so far
And there's still a long, long way to go
With all of my heart, I will care
I'll play my part, I will share
With family and friends, together we'll stand
And in the end, hand in hand
We will get there."
Stepanie Sun - "We Will Get There"
On the event day, the 700 first-year students gathered at the Macpherson Community Center to receive their flat assignments and other necessary instructions. My team made sure that each group of students had fewer than 10 people to guarantee higher quality interaction with the elderly.
Moreover, we gave each group a black board that already had a big white bulb on it. Students were asked to write their reflections in the white space of the light bulbs at the end of their visits. As members of VO, we believed in the power of self-reflection as it not only helped us see the meanings in our actions and share those with other, but it also inspired us to think outside of the box to improve our experience as participants or organizers of community building events.
As "LUMOS" was held as a part of National Day celebration in Singapore, the event would not be complete without the traditional sing-along session. Standing hand-in-hand and shoulder-to-shoulder, everybody at "LUMOS" sang the all-time favorite National Day song titled "We Will Get There," ending the service learning day with wonderful harmony in voices and in spirit.
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