Student leader

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A student leader is any student who influences their peers in a positive manner. A student leader acts beyond their standard academic responsibilities in ways that influence their school or community. Leadership can be developed in students of any age. At the elementary age, leadership skills can help young students navigate lifestyle occurrences. At the secondary and collegiate levels, leadership skills guide students in long-term decision making processes. Students may seek leadership opportunities in extra curricular clubs, sports, academic support, or private organizations. These outlets place students in age-appropriate scenarios in which they can observe, practice, and execute skills as they lead their peers.

Contents

Leader development

Developing leadership among student populations is important because it encourages student agency in their academic and extracurricular pursuits. By increasing engagement in academic and extracurricular pursuits, student leaders are more likely to see a positive gains in their academic performance overall. [1] In addition, effective student leaders who represent various ethnic groups may influence stronger identities and relationships among their communities. [2]

Without proper guidance, students' leadership may fall short or cease to be continued after graduation. In order to guide student leaders to success and efficiency, they benefit from individualized mentoring as opposed to a broad leadership development approach. [2] Students who engage in more leadership development and engagement have greater social awareness, self-control, and have greater chances of pursuing higher education. [3]

Ideally, mentoring student leaders will provide them with more transferable skills. Specifically, students who have held leadership positions should have a greater locus of control. [3] With such skills, students will be more willing and able to reflect on their actions and practices in order to make more beneficial choices for their futures.

Elementary level leadership

Leadership development can begin as early as the elementary level. Even small children can fill classroom roles such as line leader or engage in student-led conferences. [4] Educators may utilize techniques like cooperative learning and Social-Emotional Learning practices or programs such as Leader in Me to establish students' leadership skills. At this level, students can develop foundational leadership skills such as communication, goal-setting, and teamwork. [5] These skills not only provide individual young students with tools for academic and behavioral success, but could also enhance learning environments by creating a more positive school climate. [6] As students mature they will be able to apply these early foundational skills in future leadership positions.

Secondary level leadership

Upon entering secondary school, students are placed in environments where have greater autonomy and responsibility. Through their academic pursuits, students may be able to develop the leadership skills of active listening, collaboration, and problem solving. If given the opportunity to participate in extra-curricular activities, they may then take on more formal leadership roles such as athletic team captains, club leaders, or class presidents. Through such positions, secondary students can develop more collaborative leadership skills such as task management and putting others first. [7]

Post-secondary leadership

At the collegiate level, students may pursue leadership positions through a variety of methods. Some may be paid, such as Resident Assistants (RA's) or Teaching Assistants (TA's), while others are unpaid, such as Greek Life or Student Government leadership. Some student leadership positions are made available through an application process. At this stage, students should master their ability to manage tasks and peers, collaborate with others, and produce innovative ideas and projects. These leadership positions can be a gateway for many students as they enter the workforce.

Examples

A student leader could be any of the following roles:

Primary or secondary school

Colleges

See also

Related Research Articles

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Mentorship is the patronage, influence, guidance, or direction given by a mentor. A mentor is someone who teaches or gives help and advice to a less experienced and often younger person. In an organizational setting, a mentor influences the personal and professional growth of a mentee. Most traditional mentorships involve having senior employees mentor more junior employees, but mentors do not necessarily have to be more senior than the people they mentor. What matters is that mentors have experience that others can learn from.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Curriculum</span> Educational plan

In education, a curriculum is broadly defined as the totality of student experiences that occur in the educational process. The term often refers specifically to a planned sequence of instruction, or to a view of the student's experiences in terms of the educator's or school's instructional goals. A curriculum may incorporate the planned interaction of pupils with instructional content, materials, resources, and processes for evaluating the attainment of educational objectives. Curricula are split into several categories: the explicit, the implicit, the excluded, and the extracurricular.

The buddy system is a procedure in which two individuals, the "buddies", operate together as a single unit so that they are able to monitor and help each other. As per Merriam-Webster, the first known use of the phrase "buddy system" goes back to 1942. Webster goes on to define the buddy system as "an arrangement in which two individuals are paired .”

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A student council is an administrative organization of students in different educational institutes ranging from elementary schools to universities and research organizations around the world. These councils exist in most public and private K-12 school systems in different countries. Many universities, both private and public, have a student council as an apex body of all their students' organisations. Student councils often serve to engage students in learning about democracy and leadership, as originally espoused by John Dewey in Democracy and Education (1917).

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Student affairs, student support, or student services is the department or division of services and support for student success at institutions of higher education to enhance student growth and development. People who work in this field are known as student affairs educators, student affairs practitioners, or student affairs professionals. These student affairs practitioners work to provide services and support for students and drive student learning outside of the classroom at institutions of higher education.

Residence Life is the comprehensive program that surrounds the experience of living "on and off campus" in a residence hall at a college or university. Residence Life is usually structured with planned events, a code of conduct and ethics, and a relatively large array of staff.

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Cooperative learning is an educational approach which aims to organize classroom activities into academic and social learning experiences. There is much more to cooperative learning than merely arranging students into groups, and it has been described as "structuring positive interdependence." Students must work in groups to complete tasks collectively toward academic goals. Unlike individual learning, which can be competitive in nature, students learning cooperatively can capitalize on one another's resources and skills. Furthermore, the teacher's role changes from giving information to facilitating students' learning. Everyone succeeds when the group succeeds. Ross and Smyth (1995) describe successful cooperative learning tasks as intellectually demanding, creative, open-ended, and involve higher-order thinking tasks. Cooperative learning has also been linked to increased levels of student satisfaction.

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Student engagement occurs when "students make a psychological investment in learning. They try hard to learn what school offers. They take pride not simply in earning the formal indicators of success, but in understanding the material and incorporating or internalizing it in their lives."

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elementary schools in the United States</span> Primary education in the United States

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References

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  2. 1 2 Rehm, Dr Christopher J.; Selznick10.12806/V18/I2/R4, Dr Benjamin S. "Measuring Leader Self-Efficacy Among Youth". Journal of Leadership Education. Retrieved 2024-03-01.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  3. 1 2 McCullough, PM (1994). "The effect of self-esteem, family structure, locus of control, and career goals on adolescent leadership behavior". Adolescence. 29 (115). ProQuest   195935237.
  4. Berger, R., Rugen, L., & Woodfin, L. (2014). Leaders of their own learning: Transforming schools through student-engaged assessment. John Wiley & Sons.
  5. "Standards and Curriculum in Elementary Physical Education". Elementary Physical Education Teaching & Assessment: 53–54. 2005. doi:10.5040/9781718210431.part-002. ISBN   978-1-7182-1043-1.
  6. Gage, C., & Thomas, S. (2019). Elementary Teachers' Perceptions of Social and Emotional Learning and Its Effects on School Climate, Student Behavior, and Academic Achievement. Alabama Journal of Educational Leadership, 6, 41-51. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1327616.pdf
  7. Crocco, Oliver; Stojanović, Maja; Whitley, Melissa; Davis, Kimberly; Climek, Michael; Costello, Gina; Henry, Rachel; Braud, Vani’Tra; Tepe, Andrea; Bryant, De’Jerra; Molleno, Catherine (2022-07-15). "DEVELOPING STUDENTS WHO LEAD IN THEIR COMMUNITIES: A Mixed Methods Case Study of Three Municipal-Based Leadership Programs in the United States". Journal of Leadership Education. 21 (3): 1–16. doi:10.12806/V21/I3/R4. ISSN   1552-9045.