Since I was very young, I have always been told I am a natural leader amongst my peers. In elementary school, I was called bossy more often than my parents would have liked, as my attempts to be successful and help others do the same were occasionally brash and tactless. As my social skills developed and my skill sets expanded, I continued to gravitate toward leadership roles. I developed my skills informally until I joined the Honors program and took an Honors Mentorship class. In this class, we spent a lot of time evaluating our strengths and the impact of former mentors, as well as different styles of mentorship. It culminated in writing my formal mentorship philosophy. Having done much research on mentorship and spending time developing my philosophy in different contexts made me feel much more prepared for more formal leadership experiences.

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          When I’ve taken strengths evaluations, many of my top strengths land in the “influencing” category. This means I have an aptitude for working directly with people, so I should not have been so surprised to discover how much I love teaching and mentorship. I’ve now had multiple opportunities to develop skills in these areas, especially with my work with World Classrooms and Drama Kids. During the summer of 2021, I was essentially a traveling camp counselor for middle and high schoolers on school trips to Washington DC with a company called World Classrooms. Some of my favorite parts of leadership are interpersonal connections. Spending 24 hours a day for a whole week with each of my school groups, I developed strong relationships with students, parents, and teachers while working, and became an even more flexible and patient servant leader. With Drama Kids, I teach hour-long classes to elementary and middle schoolers throughout the school year, as well as some week-long camps in the summer. These hours are much less taxing than World Classrooms was but working with young children is a very different challenge than the adolescents I've gotten used to. Before assuming this position, nearly all my leadership and mentorship philosophy had been developed by working with peers and people much closer to my age. Adjusting my philosophy to suit the needs of children was daunting at first but proved to be much easier to adapt than expected. I am a very energetic and enthusiastic leader who loves to engage everyone, and I love meeting new people and watching new relationships form in my classes. Leading a large group, especially in Drama Kids and with World Classrooms, has significantly increased my ability to get and keep individuals engaged, even in chaotic settings. This is especially important in theatre, travel, and education- all career prospects that are exciting to me in the near future.

 

          Leadership is not a solo endeavor. In both positions, I’ve been lucky enough to have someone directly beside me as a co-lead or assistant teacher. In the past, I have tended to try to take on too much, physically and emotionally, in my desire to raise other people up. Working alongside leadership partners has made me much more aware of my strengths and weaknesses, allowed me to learn and grow with them, as well as reflect upon my Mentorship Philosophy in practice. One of my biggest challenges as a leader is how emotions and exhaustion can play into leadership, especially when working long hours while running summer camps with Drama Kids or World Classrooms. My patience tends to run thinner as frustrations add up, as I am only human. However, through these frustrations, I learned how to communicate with my partners about these sorts of things, taking on responsibilities for others when they needed the same. These jobs have helped me realize how critical that support system is and how to best use it.

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          Aside from the aforementioned experiences, I’ve held many other leadership positions throughout my college experience. I’ve been a formal mentor to three students in the theatre department, worked as a mentor and counselor with Educational Talent Search at Minnesota State University, Mankato, and served as Production Stage Manager for Next Fall (dir. Eric Parrish and the MSU 2022 Fall Dance Concert and Student Dance Showcase. I was also honored to serve as the 2022 Undergraduate Student Theatre representative. There have been and will continue to be many more, but these specific experiences have been instrumental in developing my overall leadership philosophy. In my eyes, leaders exist to help others achieve their goals. My HighFive results support this greatly, as Coach and Problem Solver are my top strengths, and I believe those are what my style boils down to. I find great joy in supporting other people’s journeys through leadership and developing my style along the way. There is no specific destination for leadership, and the journey through leadership can benefit the leader just as much as the people they happen to lead, be the setting formal or informal. The Honors program has empowered me to continue my development process post-grad, no matter the career path in which I end up.