From participation to administration

By: Darshi Shah

March 28, 2016 — Fingers whizzing across the keyboard, I fervently type away at my final term paper. With only two sentences standing between me and a hearty good-night’s sleep, I internally dissect my entire educational career, searching for an acceptable phrase to conclude my piece with. Just as I begin keying in the last few words, an email notification pops up in the top right corner of my screen, an email from:

“Hmm, YJA Daytime Programming committee, what could this be for?” I wonder as I click the small bubble.

Instantly, the screen redirects to a full-size email, listing questions such as “What does Jainism predict about the future of the Earth? Ever wonder what you’re supposed to be thinking about during Pratikraman? If you want to learn the answers to these questions (and more), sign up for this year’s YJA Jain Academic Bowl (JAB) competition!”

These catch phrases were enough for me to feel excited about learning more about Jainism and refreshing upon a lot of the stuff learned in pathshala over the years, and so I signed up.

On April 24, 2016, I received an email from the JAB Administrative team stating:

“Jai Jinendra!

Congratulations! You are one of the lucky 16 competing at the YJA Jain Academic Bowl in July and we hope you’re really excited — it’s going to be a fun, engaging way to delve a little deeper into Jainism and meet others who are also looking to do the same!”

Hesitantly, I took the JAB Preliminary Quiz along with having the fear of feeling/sounding dumb, just to realize from our first hangout team call led by Siddharth Shah that JAB seemed more fun, and nothing like what I was stressing about. After receiving the JAB manual in the mail, I felt like I did not even know 10% of the total content, but that is what motivated me to make reading the JAB manual a little everyday a routine until Convention.

Like me, all of you guys have participated in some sort of competitive Quiz Bowl at some point in your lives. What distinguished JAB from any other regular buzzer game was a sense of accomplishment unlocked through discovering new facts about Jainism every step of the way. The feelings of “wow”, “that makes so much scientific sense”, “following this truly makes me a better person”, “our religion is so rich” etc. became a daily ritual, and those empowering sensations motivated me to read the JAB manual, more than the competition itself did.

2016 JAB Finals

July 2016–12:30 pm was when my team competed in the semi-finals. As much as people would like to imagine the inherent pressure of “competition”, the moderators and the audience are so supportive and encouraging at the JAB at YJA that you forget the sense of “competition” and just really get engrossed in the game. One key advice from my experience in the semi-finals is that more team coordination is equally as important if not more as the knowledge the team members possess all together, because it’s really a game of timing and coordination, as much as it is of knowledge. I will keep the experience of competing in front of almost 700+ attendees during JAB Finals a suspense, because it really is thrilling!

Switching gears and speaking from the other side of the story — my first experience with JAB at the YJA Convention in Los Angeles, CA in 2016 inspired me to be more involved in making JAB happen, and not just happen, but making it happen so it is memorable and inspiring for its participants.

Receiving an email to be part of the sub-committee was the best way to get involved on the administrative part of JAB. (Thanks to all those YJA emails!) The memories of the first JAB call and the first brainstorming Google document is still very vivid in my mind. From countless calls to discuss creating the content summary, game rules, PowerPoint slides, questions, and making JAB interactive for the audience really taught me how much time, energy, efforts, and creativity goes into it. The experience helped me envision how much more difficult it would be to not only organize, coordinate, but also ensure that everything is perfect when it came to making the entire YJA Convention happen.

Though committing to being part of the JAB Admin team was exciting, during the past couple of months, it became difficult to make the JAB calls due to exams, work, extracurricular commitments, but big shoutout to Foram and Parshva (the Co-leads of Daytime Programming for YJA 2018) for being immensely cooperative and understanding. More than that, they had even gone out of their way to have separate calls with me and some other people on the JAB Admin team who wouldn’t be able to make the call during its scheduled time.

The way Foram and Parshva led the JAB Admin team was beyond remarkable and admirable. Their actions were so inspiring that when I led my second JAB call with my team, there was one person who could not make it to the conference call when it was scheduled. It was almost midnight if not past midnight by the time we ended the call and I had to be up by 4:20 am the next morning for my internship. Even then, I did not think twice before going out of my way to have a separate hangouts call with that one person to make sure I provided all the information that he needed to be on the same page as the other team members. I think, maybe, I would not have done that if I had not seen Foram and Parshva constantly going out of their way, accommodating everyone’s schedules, and taking the time to make sure everyone on the JAB admin team was updated!

When I had to lead the preliminary JAB call by myself for the first time, I was extremely nervous. Even coming up with questions seemed difficult at first because I was not sure of the expectations, and getting everything done by the deadline felt like a struggle at times when there were a lot of other things that I felt overwhelmed by. However, what truly made my experience fulfilling, meaningful, and worthwhile was constantly being surrounded by like-minded, understanding, supportive, and caring people who make seemingly time-consuming work, fun and enjoyable! Even just through the weekly hangouts call and working with a partner on JAB rounds started feeling like a sense of community.

From being able to contribute by helping the participants, in the same way I was helped and encouraged as a JAB participant two years ago, felt truly rewarding. It not only helped me enhance my multitasking, prioritizing, organization, and management skills, but also gave me an unprecedented opportunity to connect with like-minded people, and build a greater sense of community. If I were to redo it, I would do it all over again, but just better — I have truly evolved throughout the the journey from being a JAB participant at YJA 2016 in Los Angeles, CA to being part of the JAB Admin Team for YJA 2018 in Chicago, IL.

Darshi Shah YJA JAB Admin Team 2018 YJA JAB Participant 2016