Posts from — November 2011

Welcome to the final installment of my Canadian Conference on Student Leadership adventure! Today’s itinerary (and it’s going to be a lengthy one, so bear with me!) includes: a wonderful trip to Banff and Boundary Ranch, two amazing keynotes and a lesson in “positivism”.

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These updates were meant to be much speedier, but you know how life (the flu, really) just intervenes in all your plans…

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Friday was our first full day of  the conference and perhaps the day I found the least stimulating. We attended five sessions of workshops (one during which I presented a workshop with Kelvin and Wendy) and our first keynote speaker W. Brett Wilson.

To be honest, when Brett Wilson first began his presentation I thought two things: 1) he’s a great public speaker and 2) there is nothing that he is saying that has any relevance to my life. For the first third of his speech he referred a lot to money and profits, topics that I find as interesting as watching paint dry. After the first three presentations, I was worried that this day was going to be a complete write off. But then he started talking about leadership in a way that I could wrap my non-Commerce-like brain around.

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Hello from Calgary!

Wendy, Cristel and I at the CCSL

This is going to sound pretty weird, but sometimes I feel like I’m watching my life from a bird’s eye view. I often ask myself during overwhelmingly inspiring moments that define, shape and change my life: is this really happening? I definitely feel this way after tonight.

I’m currently sitting in my spankin’ new 70s-style digs at the University of Calgary. I’m here in wild rose country Alberta attending the Canadian Conference on Student Leadership. Five of us from UBC (Cristel, Wendy, Kelvin, AJ and I) were selected to attend along with 200+ other student leaders from across the country. The other delegates and I arrived around 3pm here at UofC, and had some time to check out the campus. We didn’t explore too much outside because it’s a tad too cold for some of the Vancouverites (Ontario winters have me prepared). The five of us ended up at the Student Centre (their version of the SUB) and had some delicious dinner and checked out their bookstore. Their Student Centre is very mall-esque but I feels way bigger than our SUB. We hung around until registration, and swung by earlier to spy on how the other delegates were dressed (c’mon, we couldn’t be in jeans if everyone else wasn’t!).

We eventually made it to the Opening Reception and that’s when all the inspiring, motivational fun happened. Cristel and I (now dubbed “the two Kristals”) were at the same table and we had some really great conversations with a graduate student from the University of Manitoba, a residence life coordinator from UVic, a high school attendee, and I got to spend time with some of my fellow Ontarians from the University of Guelph, McMaster University and Wilfred Laurier University. It was great to be able to connect to other student leaders across the country and see what they are getting up to on their campuses, what their doing differently and how we’re the same.

We were welcomed by UofC’s President, Dr. Elizabeth Cannon and Mayor of Calgary, Naheed Nenshi. Mayor Nenshi reminded me that “everyone is an expert in their own life”. No one else is able to live our lives for us, nor do they know every aspect of ourselves that make us who we are. No one else can make our decisions for us. As student leaders, our job isn’t to dictate the lives of others, but to draw them into a conversation or a discussion and make them a part of the decision making process. So many students see a disconnect between the institutions (governments, university administration, student government etc.) and the dreams, hopes and fears they have. They often forget or don’t see how these very institutions can both hinder and support us in our goals. Somehow, as a student leader, I want to give back in a way that helps others help themselves, to achieve their goals and be confident in their own ability to be a leader.

My absolute favourite part of the evening was our round table discussion on student leadership, its definitions and its forms. We discussed everything from superhero qualities leaders embody, whether or not the word “leadership” is glorified and overused, who inspires us to be leaders and how to we define leadership and leading without borders. Some very interesting questions came up during our discussions: How do you define leadership? How do you define change? What does it look like and how do you know that you’re changing anything at all? I don’t know the answers to these questions just yet, but I’m working on it. I couldn’t be more excited to see what tomorrow will bring and how I can apply that to my own style of leadership and involvement. Tomorrow’s the day to grab the proverbial bull by the horns and see where it takes me. It might be somewhere completely unexpected. Leadership is such a game of chance, and using those chances to your advantage. Sometimes you don’t end up the winner, sometimes you do. But like Mayor Nenshi so eloquently stated: “who said leadership was easy?”

For all of you looking for some a study break/background study music, I present to you:

O Children by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds (one of only two bands that had a song with lyrics featured in the Harry Potter series).

I hope your long weekend was fantastic and you got more work done than I did.