Slide 1:

Hello my name is Melody David and welcome to a presentation about the two most influential
people during my high school career. I am personally convinced I would not be the same person
without them, if I hadn’t taken their classes.
Slide 2:
These classes being Drama/Theatre Company or you will hear me refer to it as “TC” and my
other class being Video Production. Drama consists of stage acting, plays, all that jazz. And in
video you create entire short films with people.
Slide 3:
The first person I’m going to talk about is Mr. Sidhu, or just Sidhu, “Sid” because we’re informal
like that. Unfortunately I don't have many pictures of him, so I’ll just be using pictures from the
drama program itself.
Slide 4:
Sidhu is very dedicated to his job as a drama teacher, he is chaotic, some might say crazy,
brutally honest. But that’s what I love about him. If you think taking drama is an easy class with
Sidhu, you are very mistaken.
Slide 5:
A lot of people I know would even consider Sidhu scary at times which is technically true but
funny, I promise he’s not that bad. Sidhu comes off as intense because he’s so passionate, he
wants his kids to succeed. And he will do anything to make that happen.
Slide 6:
Not only does Sidhu teach multiple drama classes during the day, he also sticks around after
school on Tuesdays and Thursdays to run TC for 2 hours. TC is like drama class but outside of
the time table, and the class is smaller because you have to try out to get in.
Slide 7:
TC is the best thing to ever happen to me this year, and it’s been a huge mood lifter since covid
happened. I’ve connected with so many people, and we don’t just talk to each other at school.
We’re friends outside of school too. This is the most connected a TC class has ever been with
each other according to Sidhu.
Slide 8:
One of my favourite stories to tell is how Sidhu crippled me in drama class. I ended up spraining
my ankle so bad during our Shakespeare unit that I was in a cast and on crutches for months.
It's okay though, I got Sidhu back by making a monologue about suing him.
Slide 9:
My favourite day in drama history is the opening day ceremonies, it happens every year, we
were told it’s “cult day” in grade 9. And that there would be sacrifices. In actuality it was just a
party the whole class where we danced in a circle and sang along to songs.
Slide 10:
Sidhu’s drama class has shaped me into the person I am today, so I’m grateful that I decided to
take his class in grade 9 and follow through with it. It’s funny because drama is all about acting
as different people, but in his classroom, I finally feel like I can be the realist version of me.
Slide 11:
Now the second person I’m here to talk about today is Mr. Cawdell. Our school's glorious video
production teacher. He has been putting up with me and my friends ridiculous film ideas for four
years now. I honestly don’t know how he does it.
Slide 12:
Cawdell is great at what he does because in his video class you get hands on experience. You
aren’t studying movies and writing essays on film theory. You’re actually getting up on your feet
and producing things like: ads, PSA’s, music videos, narratives
Slide 13:
I love Cawdell because he’s supportive of everything we decide to make. My friends and I are
really into making horror films so we’ve made a lot of dead body props, and gone through many
bottles of fake blood through the years. Here's a photo of us carrying the dead body in public
along the side of a road.
Slide 14:
Cawdell is in fact so supportive that this year when we told him we wanted to experiment with
green screen effects and try to make objects float, he bought us a whole green screen suit.
Here’s some lovely pictures of Bryson wearing it around the school.
Slide 15:
One of the most amazing opportunities we’ve had because of Cawdell is Zoomfest. Which is a
film festival. Basically you get 48 hours to create a whole film, and you must incorporate a prop
that they give you, and your whole video must be about a certain theme that they give you as
well.
Slide 16:
Out of the four years that we’ve been doing this, our group has won a couple of awards. 3rd
best overall, 2nd best technical, and I won 3rd best junior performance in grade 10. As well as
2nd best female actor in grade 11.
Slide 17:
Because of Cawdell, our video class got to go on an awesome trip to LA. We had to do a lot of
workshops, that didn’t really end up being worth the money. But I got to go to Disneyland for the
first time, and to make it even better. I was in Disneyland with my best friends! We also went to
universal studios, and Santa Monica pier.
Slide 18:
Besides all that, Cawdell is just genuinely the nicest teacher ever. You can joke with him, he
always lets my friends and I eat lunch in his classroom. You can message him at any hour even
on weekends, if you’re struggling with video and he’ll help you out. He always wants to see you
succeed.
Slide 19:
At the end of the day, drama and video production are my only motivation to get out of bed for
school in the morning. I’m so grateful I took their classes because I’ve been able to become a
more confident person and meet my best friends. The one word I can use to describe my drama
and video classes is: family.
Slide 20:
Well that concludes my 5 minutes advertisement where I convince you all that you should’ve
taken drama and video class, and that Sidhu and Cawdell are the best teachers ever. I swear I
wasn’t paid to say this. I hope you all enjoyed those little life stories, thanks for listening.