9th Annual International Student Leadership Conference

March 27 and 28, 2009

"Faces of Leadership"

Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Theresa, Mohatma Gandhi, Desmond Tutu...these are but a few faces of leadership that immediately come to mind. This conference will encourage the participants to recognize the attributes of these great leaders and to identify similar attributes in themselves. Thus, since the conference, when participants are asked to identify the faces of leadership, they are challenged to recognize either own faces.

The 2009 conference was attended by over 225 participants from schools as far away as The Bahamas and California.  Due to space restraints at JMU, the conference was hosted at Blue Ridge Community College’s Plecker Center. The center was decorated with poster-size pictures of various world leaders, chosen for their diversity of nationality, discipline, gender and personality. On Friday evening, each ISLC participant was given a smaller picture of one of those leaders, attached to their backs. Using yes and no questions, the participants ascertained which leader they were assigned, and gathered into groups.  Once gathered, the groups created and performed a 3 minute “movie trailer” about the life of their leader.  

Following a continental breakfast on Saturday morning, students participated in a series of activities designed to demonstrate aspects of leadership, as defined in the article, “Mandela: His 8 Lessons of Leadership,” By Richard Stengel.  The keynote speaker for the conference was Michael Tapscott, the Director of the Multi Cultural Student Services Center at George Washington University.

Participants has this to say about their experience:

• Thank you very much for organizing such an inspiring event filled with knowledge & fun. Everyone hosting the workshops and the...staff that helped was upbeat, welcoming, helpful, friendly & enthusiastic...I loved the conference and plan on attending next year!!!
• It was nice to meet people from different countries who share common interests.
• It was a great opportunity for me to attend and will encourage international students to participate actively in student activities in order to get a chance to participate in such an excellent program for self development and become an asset to the campus and the community as a whole.
• I learned a lot more about being a leader during this conference, but the one thing I would take back is being able to strengthen others to act as a team by motivating them.

And the best things about the conference?

• Just meeting all of the different people from different cultures.  I am an African-American and was a minority at the conference as well. Which was a beautiful thing. I loved hearing all the accents around me, and learning differences as well as similarities.  The leadership conference was wonderful. I learned countless tips in order to enable me to become a better leader as well as a better person.
• The entire gathering of peoples of different nationalities who accepted their fellow students as they are. There was no hesitation to mix or greet each other. To see the expression on the faces as they learned of each other's culture and ethnicity was unforgettable.
• I truly enjoyed the activity where we had to stick "the faces of leadership" to the backs of the participants, and then to make up a quick play.
• I met so many great new people that I am still in contact with even though we are back at our different schools.

Historical ISLC Overview

This successful conference has been in existence since 2001. If you would like to see an overview of past conference schedules, keynote speakers, schedules, etc. click here.