Dear Parents/Carers,

Being chosen as a student leader is certainly a great honour but along with these positions comes a lot of great responsibility. And so, with this in mind our 38 student leaders attended a student leadership seminar last Saturday, held at school. The aim of this seminar was to assist our students to further develop their leadership skills and to work towards leaving a positive legacy on the College.

Certainly the highlight of the day was our guest speaker, Sonia Macdonald, who kicked the seminar off.

Leading up to the seminar, I did speak with Sonia about my hopes for our student leaders, and indeed for all of our students at Mount Alvernia College. I know many of our students are aspiring to be leaders in the future and leadership qualities do make for being a good human.

Let me share with you my brief for Sonia:

“I really want our young women to be courageous in their leadership, women who are full of self-belief and self-confidence, and women who are proud of themselves. I don’t want them to limit themselves but to really work hard to reach their full potential and to also understand it is their job to build others up, not tear them down, and to build others’ leadership capacity.”

I told Sonia the theme of our leadership seminar: Stand Up, Speak Out, Stay Strong.

And I told her what this meant to me:

“I want our students to have the courage to really stand up in these positions, take initiative and make a positive impact on the school community. Our key value this year is Service and we are really wanting the students to be Servant Leaders. I also really want our students to speak up, that is to have an opinion but also to call out behaviours that are not acceptable. This is tricky and does require students to navigate the more difficult conversations. I also want our students to stay strong – which means they don’t cave in as well as the fact that it is imperative they look after themselves – self-care is so important; we all know if you don’t look after yourself you can’t do your job and/or support others.”

Sonia took these themes and worked them into her presentation, of which her key message to our students was to be courageous, inclusive and kind leaders.

Sonia is the epitome of courageous. Finding herself a single mother suddenly, and living in Singapore where they had moved for her husband’s work, Sonia moved back to Australia. She struggled to make ends meet while she looked for a job. Finally, she secured a job in the construction industry teaching managers how to lead their teams. She fudged her way through the interview, having no real experience to do the job. Sonia explained it to our students as “faking it until you make it”, and make it she did. She started writing a blog about leadership, and today she runs a successful leadership company and speaks all over the country to people of all ages about leadership. She has also written two books, one of which is called “Rock It” – written for her own daughter, it was Sonia’s way of inspiring her to be a courageous, inclusive and kind leader. I love those words … they speak to our Franciscan charism, and to our College values.

Sonia referenced “Fake it till you make it”, otherwise known as the “Imposter Syndrome”. This does not mean you are inauthentic; it is really about putting your best foot forward, advocating for yourself, having confidence, backing yourself in. If not you, who? This was but one pearl of wisdom from Sonia.

As well as our guest speaker, our student leaders also did some work around their personality types, and they learnt how to plan and run assemblies, how to engage an audience and how to navigate difficult conversations. They also began to plan for the year.

Read on to find out what some of our students gained from the seminar, including the impact Sonia had on the team. We are looking to have Sonia come in again this term and present to all of our Year 12 students.

From our College Captains - Niamh & Kate

Engaging in the presentation with Sonia was a wonderful experience which not only brought the SRC team together but showed us how to support each other's strengths and weaknesses. Sonia explained how “comparison is the death of joy” and “speak to yourself like someone you love”. For Niamh and I these two statements really reminded us that leadership really begins with how we treat others and ourselves. Because in the end how will we serve others with kindness if we don’t begin with showing kindness towards yourself.

Another learning we all took from the day was the concept of a lollipop moment, a moment where someone does or says something that has a major effect on your life, perhaps without that person even knowing the impact of their action. These moments are happening around us everyday, and it is sometimes surreal to estimate the impact and difference you can make to someones day. Think about someone that you might want to say thank you for making your day better, and just imagine the impact an ongoing small act of kindness could lead to.

We also had the chance to work with the heads of houses and other members of the leadership team including Ms Hatchman, who we wanted to thank for giving up their time to come in and work with all of us. It is not easy to come into school on a Saturday but we are truly grateful for your dedication to us as aspiring leaders.

A massive thank you especially to Ms Dendy and Ms Macdonald for organising the whole day, bringing a wonderful speaker and working with all of us as we progress on our leadership journeys. There is a lot of behind the scenes work that goes into these events and your dedication does not go unnoticed.

In a short amount of time, we immersed ourselves in all things leadership and the “do more, be more, and achieve more” mindset. Our eyes were opened to the reality that life is a mirror, reflecting not what we want but what we need. Female empowerment was also emphasized as we learned that when one woman stands up for herself, she stands up for all women.

Additionally, we focused on self-belief and the understanding that whatever anyone else thinks about you is not your business, and you should always speak to yourself like someone you love. We accepted that life is not always going to go according to plan and will take us on journeys that we never knew we were capable of. However, we learned that as fear diminishes, energy grows; comparison is the death of joy, and courage exists in the absence of fear. As we worked through group discussions regarding leadership, we were challenged to think about “who do I want to be? What do I want to stand for? And why do I want to lead?” We realized that leadership is about being uncomfortable and doing things for others as service is key.

As a Student Council Representative team, we brainstormed concepts that create a good leader, and the main ideas that resonated with the year 11s were making a change, being a voice, and sacrificing for the greater good. We were told the quote that “great humans make great leaders and great leaders make great humans”; therefore, no matter if you are appointed a leader by the college, you will always be a leader.'

Last Saturday, alongside our fellow student representatives and members from the College Leadership Team, were privileged to attend the Leadership Seminar, where we heard from the inspiring guest speaker, Sonia. Speaking on behalf of the grade 10 student representatives, Sonia’s compelling message on courage deeply resonated with us, through the way it linked to being a good leader.

Sonia’s overarching message emphasised how leadership is not bigger, nor beyond us but within all our reaches. We learnt that courage is an integral part of leadership, and a great leader must be willing to use their voice and take a stand. We came to understand that genuine courage involves acknowledging your fears, moving forward from them, and taking action, as courage isn’t the absence of fear; it is the mastery of it. At the conclusion of her talk, Sonia shared a quote that underlined her theme of courage: “When the whole word is silent, even one voice becomes powerful.” This quote echoes how everybody’s voice can have an impact, especially when combined with courage.

I think all of the student leaders in attendance on Saturday can agree that Sonia brought a new perspective to the table about leadership. She described leadership not as a role, but a characteristic, explaining how by staying true to who you are, standing up for what you believe, and creating a voice for those around you, anyone can lead in daily life. Although we could write an endless list of insights, here are the top 5 tips that really resonated with us all:

A quote by Zig Ziglar “Your attitude not your aptitude, will determine your altitude”. This focuses on the idea that it is not your raw talent which determines how far you will go in life, but your grit and willingness to work hard.
Rule your RAS, the Reticular Activating system, this part of the brain is on the lookout for whatever we decide to focus on, so through deciding to focus on positive things, our RAS will notify us every time it identifies this positive thing in our environment, therefore (whatever we decide to focus on is what we see).
Even the smallest acts of kindness can enlighten the lives of others.
Squash your ants. Ants are annoying negative thoughts, which must not be tolerated, but destroyed at first sight.
Know your why. It is important that you identify your motivation, your purpose, your reason to get out of bed every morning. With direction, there is no limit to how far you can travel.

We hope this has inspired you all to recognise your roles as leaders in our school community, fostering the concept that the ability to lead isn’t granted by a title, but decided by the individual in their everyday actions.

Grow it Forward