Lead-On A leadership summit for our student councillors

Two students of class XII, Shubham Airi and Ritwik Arora attended a leadership summit, Lead On on 26th October 2016 at Tagore International School, Vasant Vihar. Lead-On hosts a range of events that vary from leadership sessions with inspiring personalities, to lively activities that focus on those basic aspects of leadership qualities.

The event began with the participants, (most of them members of student councils, of various schools) being divided into small groups. The groups then interacted in an informal session where they discussed steps they have taken and the overall need for continuously strengthening the functioning of school councils.

The theme for this years event was 'Excellence, Engagement and Ethics'. After the informal session, the keynote speaker, Ms. Madhu Kishwar addressed the gathering. Ms. Kishwar is professor at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies and founder editor of the magazine, Manushi: a women's journal published since 1979. Ms. Kishwar began her address by explaining the meaning of excellence, engagement and ethics and their relevance in the contemporary world. She went on to say that older societies were closely knit ones and prompted an intrinsic motivation to work together. Regrettably, over a period of time even traditional societies, like India, are losing the quality. Here she gave the example of Thailands healthcare system and how despite being a small country it has a good system of community medicine. She entreated that we, as young leaders, need to work to generate this feeling again within our communities and bring about the desired change.

Ms. Kishwar spoke about Manushi and the struggle she encountered in its early stages. She spoke about the numerous litigations she has fought for the upliftment of the marginalised. She gave the example of her 20 year long fight for the rights of the rickshaw puller at a time when rickshaw licensing was a menace in the 1990s. She also described her fight for the rights of street vendors. After the talk, we had a question round where Ms. Kishwar answered questions on leadership skills and what else we can do as young leaders, to bring about a change in our environments.

The second activity was ' Values in Hues'. This asked us to shortlist 3 important things in our lives we hold very dear and 3 things which make us who we are and push us to exploit our innate abilities best.

We started the activity by writing 4 things, places, people and memories which we hold dear on small cards. Gradually we exercised eliminations until we were left with only three cards which told us what the three most important things in our lives were!

The third activity was called ' Utility vs Deontology. In this activity, a dilemma was presented to us. Our task was to choose the most practical thing that is, the utilitarian aspect and the morally correct thing that is, the deontological aspect. It was expected that there would be a difference of opinion in the group so both view-points were presented on stage and then defended using logic and arguments. After hearing both sides the audience was to vote based on which side had better arguments the utilitarian or the deontological side. This activity aimed to develop our critical and analytical thinking skills and since, as young leaders we also face many dilemmas, it also aimed to hone our decision making skills. A short lunch break followed before we proceeded to our next activity.

The last activity for the day was the Treasure Hunt. We were divided into groups for this activity too. The objective of this activity was to instil ideals of teamwork within us. First, we had to guess a location inside the school based on a riddle. After guessing it, we had to look for a clue in and around the location and spot it within 3 minutes to get to the next clue. The activity kept us on our toes till the end.

All the activities were well planned and kept us highly motivated.

Ritwik Arora (XII-C)