Budding Leaders Trek To Nation’s Capital

     Learning opportunities do not end with the school year, just ask Oak Ridge seventh-graders Madeline A. Kilmm and Maggie A. Garrahan.
     The pair just returned from a week in Washington, DC, where they attended the Junior National Young Leaders Conference.
     Maggie and Madeline were among 250 students across the country who attended the conference after being nominated by their teachers.
     The pair were helped on their way to the conference through the financial support of sponsors Barnstable County Sheriff James F. Cummings and the law firm of Flannigan & Perry, based out of Hanover and Hyannis.  
     Sponsored by the Congressional Young Leaders Conference, the goal of the conference is to “help scholars develop and sharpen their leadership skills by examining the leaders of the past and empowering them to make a positive social impact in their community and the world.”
     Throughout the week Maggie and Madeline learned about great leaders in history, either in the classroom or at the actual sites where they made history.
     In addition to learning what men and women like President Abraham Lincoln, Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. accomplished, the girls also learned about what special character traits they possessed that helped become great leaders.
     “I learned the six traits of leadership,” Maggie said. “They were problem solving, character, communication, respect, goal setting and teamwork.”
     The reason Maggie and Madeline were afforded the opportunity to spend the week in Washington learning about those characteristics and those who possessed them, was because their sixth-grade teacher Yvonne M. Hunt saw many of those same traits in her young students.
     “I was chosen because I showed good leadership skills in the classroom,” Madeline said.
     Maggie said she was also taken aback by her teacher’s nomination. “I was really shocked,” she said. “It was a great honor.”
     During the week the young leaders watched a documentary about Sir Ernest Shackleton’s expedition to Antarctica and visited Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, and learned about abolitionist John Brown’s failed raid on a federal armory there in 1859, two years prior to the start of the American Civil War.
     After the visit to Harpers Ferry, the young leaders learned about Mr. Brown’s life and debated his strengths and weaknesses as a leader.
     Maggie said that while Mr. Brown’s may have had noble ambitions, he lacked some of the necessary leadership skills to successfully accomplish his goals.
     On one of their days in DC, the girls were able to visit National Portrait Museum, which features more than 20,000 works of art depicting men and women who have played significant roles in the history of the United States.
     Madeline said that of the leaders she studied during her week in DC, the two she admired most were President Lincoln and Dr. King.
     For Maggie, the paragon of leadership was Ms. Parks, the African-American woman who sparked the Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott when she refused to follow a city code that allowed bus drivers to assign seats according to race.
     “She was a great leader,” Maggie said. “She was brave all by herself.”
     After their week of studying the great leaders, the girls said they have come to realize that they had both always possessed the characteristics their teacher saw in them.
     “After I learned about the characteristics, I realized I was using them already,” Maggie said.
     Madeline said that now that she realizes what a leader’s traits are, she plans on using them consciously from now on.
     “I have been setting goals and using problem-solving skills since I’ve gotten back,” she said.
     Maggie said that in addition to the six traits discussed throughout the conference, great leaders also needed to have a strong belief in self.
     When asked if she had any advice for fellow classmates who wished to grow as leaders, she said that self-confidence and a strong sense of what is right were most important.
     “Believe in yourself and do what you think is right to make your dreams come true,” she said.