Society Offers Leadership Training to Nashville High School Students

Nashville area high school students heading back to school this fall can expect more than reading, writing and arithmetic - learning to lead will also be part of the curriculum.

The new student leadership course represents a collaborative effort between Phi Theta Kappa International Honor Society's Leadership Development Studies Program, Metro Nashville Public Schools, Alignment Nashville and Nashville State Community College.

In an alliance that crosses boundaries between public and private, secondary education and higher education, schools and city, business and non-profit, all partners are working together to make sure high school students have the skills they need to become better leaders while serving their local communities.

Phi Theta Kappa's Leadership Development Studies Program provides emerging and existing leaders the opportunity to explore the concept of successful leadership, and to develop and improve their leadership skills. Two-year colleges with specially certified faculty offer Phi Theta Kappa Leadership Development Studies as a course for students and faculty, and as leadership training for local community and business groups.

Monika Byrd, Phi Theta Kappa's Director of Leadership Development Programs, said that the new effort is an expansion of a pilot leadership program conducted by veteran Nashville educator Tara Brown. Brown has led the pilot program at Antioch High School in Nashville for several years, using Phi Theta Kappa's Leadership Development Studies curriculum. The course is offered to selected students identified as potential leaders who are not already involved in activities or programs such as student government, honors program or athletics, where mentoring/coaching/leadership development is already taking place. These students are enrolled in a two-year leadership program consisting of Developing Community Leaders I and Developing Community Leaders II, for which they receive dual-enrollment credit at Nashville State Community College.

During the second year of the leadership course, students put their leadership skills to work by designing and implementing service learning projects that they believe will improve the culture of their school. Students have completed projects ranging from creating a plan for a daycare center at their school to establishing a teen depression and suicide prevention program. Students are supported by community organizations as they develop and implement their projects.

"Phi Theta Kappa designed its Leadership Development Studies Program specifically for developing leadership capacity at the grassroots level, in the communities served by the nation's community colleges. The Metro Nashville Public School District and Nashville State Community College are following that philosophy in identifying students who are not among the traditional student leadership groups for this dual-enrollment program," Byrd said. "The community partners coming together in Nashville provide a model for maximizing the success and impact of this leadership development effort."

Byrd said that a follow-up evaluation of the program showed that it is changing the school and the surrounding community as well as the students themselves. For example, the students enrolled in the leadership course led Antioch High School's Hurricane Katrina Relief efforts.

Now the director of grades 9-12 for the Metro Nashville Public School system and the 9th - 12th Grade Committee of Alignment Nashville, a non-profit organization founded by the Nashville Chamber of Commerce dedicated to improving public education, want to expand the leadership program to the other MNPS high schools. Alignment Nashville agreed to support the certification of additional teachers and will also be coordinating the relationships between the high schools and Nashville non-profits where the students will complete the service-learning component of the leadership course.

"The high school principals were charged with identifying the best teachers they had to be certified, and we just completed the certification seminar this summer with a truly amazing, passionate, and inspirational group of teachers," Byrd said, "We all realized that these are the people who have the potential to reach students at a time that is so crucial to help ensure that they will have successful, meaningful lives. They are truly on the front lines."

The newly-certified teachers re-convened at the end of July for a meeting with Tara Brown and Susan Ragsdale, a member of the part of the Alignment Nashville 9-12 Grade Committee and Director of the YMCA Center for Asset Development, who has been a key player in the development of the MNPS Leadership Program. The group discussed the lessons learned in the 2005-2006 pilot programs, content for the 2007 program they have chosen to use, and organized the service-learning component of the program.

"This collaboration is building and equipping the next generation of leaders for Nashville and tapping an unlimited source of leadership potential to effect change and enhance the quality of life for the students and the community," said Phi Theta Kappa's Executive Director Rod A. Risley. "Phi Theta Kappa's mission is to recognize today's community college scholars, but our dream goes beyond that - to provide opportunities for growth and programs that will benefit the neighborhoods where community colleges are located."