By Rachel Phillips
On Friday, February 8th, FVHS hosted its first “Got Leadership?” conference, attended by approximately thirty students and four teachers. Organized by Ms. Marion and Ms. Olaya, the event attempted to access students from all different parts of the school and to bring them together to discuss the school community and how to improve it.
Asked to recommend students who they identified as “leaders,” all participants were nominated by a teacher or staff member who believed they well represented FVHS and embodied the characteristics of a leader. The group of participants represented strong diversity within the school, one of the goals of the conference, including two ASB members, a few senators, at least one cheerleader, several athletes, and theater students.
The purpose was to discuss the impact some students have as leaders in their community and to determine ways in which they can improve their community in order to make it safer, more inclusive, and open-minded.
The students participated in many group activities designed to demonstrate leadership and critical thinking. For example, in one such activity meant to demonstrate the harm of stereotyping, each participant was given some label (i.e. poor, blind, black) and other students were encouraged to treat the other students as stereotypes as they saw fit.
Students also enjoyed a group activity in they were separated into two groups and within those two groups they were given papers with prompts asking about family values, traditions, how one’s grandparents or parents met, family history, etc.
According to one participant Nikki Tran (‘14), “I liked the activity because everyone was very open to telling their story.”
Students felt that the event was a success. Tran said, “The best part of the conference was how it showed us that despite our diversity as a group, we united in the sense that we share many similar characteristics, values, and experiences.”
ASB member Bryan Nguyen (‘13) said, “I loved meeting all these diverse classmates and getting personal and having real talks. We all have in common that we care about Fountain Valley High School, and we all have a unique perspective on the school community we can share.”
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