Leadership Club Develops ‘Inner Leader’ with Group Fun

Emma Blumreich, Staff Writer, Advanced Journalism

Leadership development is being formed in an after-school club at Notre Dame Academy.

Moira Farrell, a 2006 alumna from NDA, has come back to help current students use their strengths to bring out the inner leader in themselves. Almost every early-dismissal day on the school calendar Moira hosts this club for students.

Many of the activities that the group performs are meant to help them use teamwork to conduct simple, yet hard, tasks that they all have to do together. Afterwards, the group gathers to talk about the challenges that they faced and how they could do it better should they ever have to do it again.

“They have a lot of fun getting active and moving during the main activities, but when it is time for them to come back together as a group to discuss their feelings, everybody brings feedback to the table that another person in the group wouldn’t have thought of,” Farrell said.

Farrell said that she believes it is truly important to teach the social skills that many people may not have anymore, due to increased use of cellphones and other electronics, and to make them stronger by face-to-face conversations and interactions.

At the end of the year there is even an exciting trip that the club members get to experience. They go to the Door County Adventure Center and partake in activities such as ziplining, a high ropes course, and, of course, more leadership activities.

“I am so glad that I joined my sophomore year,” said senior Haley Cullen. ”I wasn’t in very many clubs my freshman year, and my dad suggested I join the Leadership Club.”

The cost of joining is the $10 club fee with an added $25 adventure fee, Farrell said.

Cullen said she believes that the program has in fact developed her social skills and made her more outgoing and supportive of other people. “I didn’t know what to expect when I first joined, but I realized at the first meeting that it would be a fun way to spend my half days,” she said.

“I believe that we should get the student body more involved in the Leadership Club,” said Dr. John Ravizza, principal. ”It is a unique take on teamwork and social development.”

The club members all meet every half day from 1:30 to 3 p.m. after school. Usually, according to Farrell, about 8 to 12 people participate.

Farrell said she spends her summers as the high ropes course instructor at the Door County Adventure Center but during the winter finds herself living in Madison. She comes to Green Bay for the club meetings because she cares so much about the work that she does and the lives that she affects with her leadership training.

Who should come? “Anybody and everybody!” said Farrell. ”Any sophomore, junior or senior is welcome to join us and become a leader.”

“Come have fun with us!” Cullen said. “You don’t have any reason not to join.”