West Ranch held a training day for student leaders on campus on Sept. 22 in the West Ranch Gymnasium. Aiming to develop and foster current and future leaders on campus, the event gave students an opportunity to learn new leadership skills while connecting with peers.
From 8:30 a.m. to 12:20 p.m., West Ranch sports team captains, ASB representatives, journalism and yearbook editors-in-chief and Link Crew leaders attended the leadership session designed to strengthen teamwork and inclusivity.
With leadership being essential all over campus, West Ranch ASB Director Mrs. Priske emphas
ized the importance of the event. “I think the key to a good leader is being flexible, being able to communicate and just good integrity. Those are all important,” Priske said. She also highlighted how upperclassmen can mentor younger students into leadership roles. With collaboration from both upper and lower classmen, every attendee was exposed to different ideas and principles of leadership, especially younger students. By combining all four classes, Priske emphasized that “freshmen loved it and really felt a sense of, ‘Wow, I can make a difference here on campus.’”
Participants joined in groups for drills that focused on the core elements of leadership: collaboration, communication and responsibility. Students were encouraged to create a positive environment as leaders and reflect on their role on campus throughout the year.
Throughout the workshop were a series of activities where each participant got to mingle with other students outside of their group. Among the few activities were “Find the lyrics,” a challenge where teams had to come up with a lyric including a given word and a playful dance with a partner that required partners to interlock their arms back to back. Filled with laughs and cheer, these activities were designed to connect leaders with one another, developing a strong sense of team unity.
Among the students who attended was Senior and Boy’s Lacrosse Team Captain Graden Choe, who enjoyed interacting with other campus leaders. He recounted the plenty of opportunities and times he was able to meet new students. “I thought it was a really good time to step back from your normal friends and find your way to new people. The games were engaging and required a lot of teamwork,” Choe shared.
Leading the workshop was Kim Karr, co-founder and executive director of Digital4Good, a nonprofit founded in 2013 to address the challenges of the online world. “Students kept coming to me with problems, fake pages, hate pages, inappropriate messages, and I started teaching them how to be digital first responders,” Karr explained. Over the years, her mission has expanded to include helping students build leadership skills both online and in person.
In between each activity, groups collaborated on a poster exercise, brainstorming on what the school should continue, stop doing or strengthen to create a safe and supportive learning environment. Once posters began to fill with ideas, Karr invited discussions and proposals, w
here ideas were openheartedly met with applause and agreement.
Karr stressed that leadership starts with believing in one’s voice and actions: “A good leader teaches others that their voice matters, because they are a leader, and their actions matter. They have the power to change and to convince other people to join them.” One area she especially hopes high school leaders improve on is face-to-face communication. By engaging with others with undivided attention, students can create a friendly intimacy, ultimately leading to a healthy relationship with their peers. “If leaders can make sure they’re putting their phones away and actually having interactions, they’re going to be more successful in making things happen,” she noted.
Priske explained why holding the event was meaningful beyond the activities themselves. “I think it’s super important to bring all our leaders together to thank them and for everybody to recognize who the other leaders on campus are. You have kind of a team within the whole school,” she said.
Additionally, ASB junior Jun Kim found the workshop especially meaningful. Having recently joined ASB this year, he found direction on what leadership means and what it can do. “The training day gave me a lot of resources to work with. Everyday leadership may not seem like a big deal, but it requires a huge amount of responsibility,” Kim recalled. “This workshop helped me see what leadership qualities I could and should possess as a student leader on campus.”
When asked about her final message for aspiring leaders, Karr emphasized action. “Everybody can help. The question is will you, what will you do? Everyone is a leader in some shape or form. You have someone who looks up to you, so it’s about finding the problem you want to fix and focusing on that.”
For the Cats who attended this training session, West Ranch looks forward to seeing how students carry these lessons into the rest of the school year.
