Amanda Garcia
Prairie photographer
The Leadership Board will be leaving for the Sipapu Leadership Retreat on Feb. 20.
Being a part of Campus Organizations, Resources and Entertainment Center (CORE), the Leadership Board’s purpose is to develop students socially, culturally, educationally, recreationally and intellectually.
“Through the CORE’s different departments, such as the Leadership Board, we support the University by turning out marketable graduates,” Skip Chisum, director of the JBK Student Center and CORE, said.
Aside from various workshops set up throughout the semester, the Sipapu Leadership Retreat has been an annual WT tradition specifically used to build up generational leaders.
This retreat is designed to help existing student leaders, or those who would like to be leaders, improve their skills to enhance their organizations.
With the retreat being located in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in Taos, N.M., there will be plenty of opportunities to ski and shop.
However, the focus of the weekend will be to equip students with valuable leadership material and knowledge.
The seminars will mainly concentrate on good communication in organizations, but will also highlight other issues such as overcoming apathy amidst colleagues, officer training and how to set goals.
“When I attended the Leadership Board Retreat several years ago as a freshman, the information I was given helped me develop as a individual and become the person I am today,” Kelsey Tucker, WT graduate, said.
I am now able to go, once again, on this retreat and help other students advance in their growth as individuals and encourage them to get more involved on campus.”
Former stand-up comedian and current national consultant, Dave Kelly, will be the guest speaker throughout the weekend.
According to his repertoire, Kelly has had much experience motivating and advising students, businesses and communities in the issues of leadership.
For more information, visit his website at www.gonzospeaks.com.
Along with the beneficial advice from Kelly, students will be broken into small groups and assigned a task.
In previous years, the assignments dealt with real issues such as reinventing Buff Branding and allocating fee requests for Student Services.
At the end of the retreat, the teams present their finalized proposals to the entire group.
“Though the tasks are merely used as exercises to motivate students to brainstorm and work together as teams, some of the presented ideas have actually been used by the University,” Chisum said.
The two-day trip is $60 and there are still openings to attend.