Students attend Leadership Conference

Students and sponsors from both Falls City Middle School and Falls City High School attended ESU 4 Youth Leadership Conference on Wednesday, October 3, at Peru State College. The following middle school CLOWN Troop members and high school Youth Advisory Council members attended the conference:

The conference started with a keynote speech by Aric Bostick. In the energetic speech, he talked about the affect a person's attitude can have on the direction a person takes through life. Aric encouraged the students to be a positive force in their school and community. Since part of the day would be spent formulating a plan to make positive changes in their school or community, he also encouraged the student to come up with solutions, not to just complain about their situation. The keynote speaker told the attendees to schedule their success – not to be sharing ideas but to actually place completion dates on each activity.

High school students who attended the Youth Leadership Day pose for a picture with Aric Bostick, the keynote speaker.

The 14 Falls City Middle School students and 11 Falls City High School students were given an assigned area to work with a facilitator. They spent the time coming up with plans.

The middle school students had three areas of concern: two of them were ones that affected the school and the third was a community concern. The group was conerned with the general atmosphere at school. They felt the school had too many cliques. Last year, the school participated in a mix-it-up-at-lunch day where everyone, including staff, was asked to sit by someone they didn't normally sit with and enjoy lunch. The students want to expand on that concept and include activities like that for an entire week. The second area of concern was that the group wanted to address adults smoking on or near school property. This spring they would like to paint no smoking signs on the sidewalks at all four buildings and the Jug Brown Stadium entrance. The community concern was underage drinking. The students want to share statistics with patrons through a sticker shock campaign.

The high school team wanted to start a student spirit group to try to increase school spirit and encourage more student involvement in activities. They also were concerned about school climate. They wanted to break down small student groups and encourage tolerance of diversity in the school. The students also wanted to address the possibility of starting a winter formal dance at the high school.

After this working session and lunch at the college cafeteria, each school shared their activities, resources needed, and completion dates. The schools submitted this information to ESU 4 and will report back in the spring on how the plans have progressed.

Linnette Fankhauser, counselor, and Cozy Nutzman, para-professional, accompanied the middle school students. Gale Dunkhas, principal, was the sponsor of the high school students.