Leadership Programs
2020 looks to be an exciting time in Leadership Programs. We have received all applications for the Wagga School Leaders Program and will announce the successful candidates in the coming days. Committee for Wagga will be supporting the following programs.
Charles Sturt University - Graduate Certificate in Community Leadership and Resilience
GHD Smart Seeds Program for Riverina
For more information about how your organisation can be involved in Smart Seeds, contact us at info@smartseeds.org
Wagga School Leaders Program
The School Leaders Program is a Committee 4 Wagga initiative and supported by local businesses and the Charles Sturt University. The Program was launched in 2016 and is in the process of selecting students for the fifth year, with the objective of developing young, aspiring high school students into positive, successful ambassadors for the city. Students participating in the program attend six single-day and one evening module across the course of the year, with each module of the curriculum designed to achieve different learning outcomes. The Program engages students in a series of challenging exercises including workshops, lectures, regional industry excursions, physical activities and mentoring sessions to develop their capacity to become successful leaders and community representatives.
CSU/Illuminate: NextGen Challenge
In a nutshell, the challenge allows students to develop solutions to issues within their community and the world, through exploring the root challenges and researching them, brainstorming and refining their initial concepts, investigating the financial viability and community license for their solutions all the way up to presenting their solution and asking for investment to launch – with all of the skills introduced and workshopped during the week. In alignment with the core values of illuminate Education, we recognise that young people will not only use these skills in starting businesses or driving community change, but these are fundamental to young people being prepared for the changing world – and finding their feet to meet the potential that they have within themselves.
The challenge is designed in a way that allows students who have never completed an experience like this before to learn all of the skills and frameworks required to excel in the program – meaning there is no requirement for schools or teachers to provide students with additional content or teaching. This is important as many of the communities we go to students have not had an experience with business or entrepreneurial subject matter, but for those who have, the style of delivery allows existing information to be reiterated from an industry perspective – and the opportunity to apply it in an authentic environment with a competitive element is a great motivator. With programs hosting anywhere between 20 and 400 students, the mixture of abilities from different schools and even across a single school makes for a rich experience that students will remember and draw upon for years to come.
It is from this perspective that the challenge is also aligned to the Australian Curriculum across the General Capabilities as well as various subject areas, as well as the Australian Blueprint for Career Development. Designed for Year 9 and 10 students in the first instance, the challenge helps students grow in confidence in the big decisions that young people are making in choosing their future education and employment pathways – but is customised to suit the cohort of students coming through, the community and values of the partners involved. To ensure that the learning environment can deliver upon all of these skills and the engagement required for students to excel throughout, the challenge is delivered in person with illuminate Education’s skilled facilitators coming into the community. This means our facilitators coordinate with the community to deliver all of the content, guiding students through the submissions and deadlines and supporting teams to grow and succeed. Everything is fully planned and all resources are prepared upon arriving in the school – making the challenge an impactful solution for the region without requiring significant time investment from schools.