Mark Richert

“Creating venues for youth to develop and share visions for themselves and their communities lead to more confident adults with diverse skill sets who are more capable of engaging with a range of people and topics. More importantly, youth who are supported in pursuing action to implement their visions for a better school or community develop individual confidence and a collective understanding that - when issues are carefully researched, shared, and followed through on - change can happen. Even when an ideal end result is not realized, youth internalize the power of process, persistence, inclusion and compromise. By holding a Youth Leadership Summit to take place in four separate sessions throughout the school year, students will explore personal and cultural identity, school climate and culture, and issues of equity. Students will have a variety of individual, small group and whole group activities to cultivate ideas and visions for more inclusive and authentic conversations about what they need to feel save and be successful at school. Each representative group from grades seven through twelve will take the messages and processes back to their own schools and share out. They will have one quarter to share and collect information from students at their schools and return to the next Student Leadership Summit session with information that can be applied to the next series of activities. This cycle will repeat until the students have identified concrete and practical changes they hope to see at their schools.”