Growing Leadership: SM East’s Women in Leadership program now allows juniors on their leadership council

The SM East chapter of Women in Leadership is allowing juniors to be on the leadership council for the first time this year, a new change from the all-senior council in the past. Juniors Vada Walsh and Tori Roland were selected for the council alongside four other seniors.

WIL is an organization offered at all SMSD high schools that provides opportunities for girls in any grade level to gain confidence and develop leadership skills with their peers. The leadership council is a select group responsible for organizing and planning the meetings. The first one took place on Oct. 23. 

Building sponsor for WIL Kelsi Horner saw that other schools had juniors on their leadership council. Horner decided to let juniors apply for the leadership council to keep up with what the other schools’ programs were doing and to help create a smooth transition from council to council each year. 

“When you go to do stuff next year, there's not necessarily that transition of knowledge, so having a junior on that council kind of ensures that forward motion and that the mistakes or whatever we learned from last year don’t get carried over to the next year,” Horner said. 

Including juniors on the council this year also provides the opportunity for them to potentially stay on the council again for their senior year. They’d be able to help teach the new members the roles of the council. 

“I applied not really knowing for sure if I would get it or not, because it’s typically a senior thing, but then I ended up getting it, and it was really exciting to be one of the only juniors chosen,” Walsh said. 

Walsh and Roland were both unsure if they would get the position, thinking it would only go to seniors, but were pleasantly surprised to be accepted onto the council. 

“It feels really cool,” Roland said. “I mean, [Horner] picked people with different activities under their belt that can bring in different perspectives.”

Walsh and Roland have stepped right up to the job, working with the four seniors on the council to plan meetings and coordinate new additions to the program, such as WIL families. The families are a new initiative this year where upperclassmen are paired with lowerclassmen to help build relationships. 

“We heard from other schools that they had [families], and it seemed to help attendance, but also just having someone different to depend on, and we tried to group them with their career interests,” Roland said.

WIL members can also go on field trips, giving them opportunities to visit local businesses and make connections with professionals. These connections can then help members learn more about potential careers.

Another aspect of the program is the senior mentorship program. Almost all seniors in WIL participate, where they’re assigned a professional in their career field of interest to keep in touch with throughout the year. In the spring, there’s a breakfast with all the WIL seniors and mentors. 

“We reach out, and we find mentors in your specific career field that you want to go to,” leadership council member and senior Emma Carolan said. 

Carolan works with Walsh and Roland, as well as the other seniors on the council. They have meetings monthly to decide which two will run the next meeting. 

“Each meeting has a general theme, and we decided recently what those would be, then two people plan each meeting and lead that [meeting], but everyone's facilitating it,” leadership council member and senior Ava Carroll explained.

All of the council members, including the additional juniors, are excited about the new changes to the program and the large number of students who joined this year.

“I really love the community it's created,” leadership council member and senior Chloe Harmon said. “It's really fun to be around such a nice group of girls that are so supportive.”