Developing Leaders

Challenge

How might we assist in the process of identifying a real problem of suitable difficulty that serves as an opportunity for junior and senior secondary students to develop leadership skills?

Context

Learning to lead is a process of learning by doing. By focusing on a real-life problem, we intend to engage students in a set of activities that require them to work in teams to solve the problem.

Figuring out what needs to be done, who needs to be involved, when should action steps be carried out, and how to do them provides the training laboratory for leadership development.

Other stakeholders, including parents, teachers, administrators, and community leaders are planned to be part of the effort. This means that students will need to learn how to reach out to others to get help where needed.

Approach

All students will be introduced to a tool -- ShuraForAll -- that is designed to help them bring people together to decide on a course of action to take as they address an issue of importance to them.

They will be provided an opportunity to learn how to use it to meet the challenge of this shura. Additionally, insha'Allah, they will be provided with resources to enable them to get access to a computer and the internet.