The Griffith Jr./Sr. National Honor Societies hosted the annual Leadership Conference on November 26, 2024 in the upper gym of the high school. Leadership speaker Ted Wiese came in to speak with middle and high school students throughout the day, bringing with him valuable skills and stories, and making memories that would stick with students.
At the conferences, there were activities such as partner nametag creation (one-on-one conversational skills), team music trivia (sharing of knowledge), team tower building (effective communication, physical collaboration, and delegation of responsibilities), and team synchronized balloon popping (communicating and agreeing on a solution), which all fostered elements of teamwork and individual leadership. The students also listened to Wiese tell his personal experiences of leadership, within himself and within students he’s met in the past.
The students were shuffled and spread out across different tables by the sponsors, in order to prevent friends from sitting by each other. In an interview, Honor Society co-sponsor Mrs. Cindy Leber said, “To be a leader, you have to be able to talk to a whole wide range of people, not just the people that you hang out with every day.”
However, that didn’t stop the students from taking part in the activities. While there are always some who come into the gym with a little hesitance, Honor Society co-sponsor Mrs. Marty Jarmula said, “Every year, I am amazed by how quickly our students become actively involved in the tasks and challenges. Even though they may not all know each other well, the students almost immediately begin working together to be successful.”
A week before the conference, students from inside and outside of the honor societies received permission slips in their advisory classes for the event. To have received one of these invitations, students must have attained a 3.4 GPA after half of their previous school year. Sixth graders and freshmen weren’t invited in order to provide a break between the programs.
After the permission slips are turned in, they are considered by a faculty selection committee comprised of five to nine volunteers from within the Jr./Sr. High School; there are new members on the committee every year. These members come from anywhere between the departments (SROs, math, special education, to name a few) in order to get the widest perspective on the students.
From then on, each application is reviewed for pillars of student excellence, including being involved in the school, being a leader inside and outside of the classroom, and good behavior. The committee will not select a student who has only good grades and none of these pillars.
Every year, the Griffith Education Foundation provides a full or partial grant to the honor societies to hire Wiese. The partial grants always award more than half of the cost, and the fundraising done by NJHS and NHS (such as the middle school socials and the high school trivia nights) pays for the rest. As of this time, it cost $2,000 to bring him in for the morning and afternoon.
For 26 years, Wiese has travelled across the country to facilitate student leadership workshops, seminars, and staff professional development. His primary goal is to teach valuable skills pertaining to leadership and collaboration, but what sets him apart from other speakers is how he runs his programs.
“I like the fact that Ted teaches leadership skills in a very fun way. He’s not just speaking at you; he’s involving you, you’re having a good time, and you’re realizing that it’s fun to meet people that you usually don’t hang out with,” Leber said. “We couldn’t find anybody else like Ted in the area.”
Wiese has spoken at the middle school for over a decade and at the high school for over five years. He was hired to speak to the middle school before Leber or Jarmula took sponsorship of NJHS/NHS, and the original sponsors operated independently with NJHS and NHS. However, the high school was later added after Leber took sponsorship, deciding that the conference would be useful to high schoolers who would be entering the real world in less than four years.
When asked what his passion was, Wiese said, “The students. I love working with the students. That’s what my purpose is, that’s what my passion is…I just believe that all students can make a positive impact if they choose to do so. I feel that part of my job is to help them see that.”
