Leadership

 

Doon Leadership pupils at SELMAS conference on Friday 17th September 2007

At the start of the session the school was invited to participate in the Scottish Educational Leadership Management and Administration Society conference at the Murrayfield Conference Centre in Edinburgh.
SELMAS is comprised of head teachers, members of HMIE and directorates throughout Scotland. The main speakers at the conference were Fiona Hyslop, Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning; Graham Donaldson, Senior Chief Inspector for Education in Scotland; Dr Janet Brown, Chief Executive of SQA; Mathew MacIver, Chief Executive and Registrar of the GTC; and Edinburgh Labour group Leader, Councillor Ewan Aitken.
A group of 17 pupils – all graduates of leadership programmes or the school’s citizenship project – worked on their presentations on Wednesday or Thursday afternoons, after school for the last few weeks.

Proceeding to the conference, the pupils were introduced by Anne Wexelstein from Columba 1400. In her introduction Anne spoke very warmly about the achievements of Doon leadership pupils.
Grant Conway was the first speaker and he set the scene with a brief and witty description of the school and community.
The rest of the pupils who were in the first group to attend Columba 1400 recounted their experiences on Skye and their activities after they graduated. The pupils involved the delegates in one of their problem-solving activities and quickly established a lively rapport with the audience.
The Columbans handed over to a group of graduates from Doon Academy’s own  Leadership Academy. They explained how their course was organised; showed a video of some of their activities; and set their listeners a teamwork challenge.
Again the response from the audience was very enthusiastic.
The third group to take the stage were representatives of the Citizenship group. They took turns to describe the aims of the programme, and their DVD diary was informative and entertaining.
The pupils had been invited to leave the audience with a question or a challenge. Lynne Gibson asked them if, having seen the pupils in action, they could afford not to support leadership development in schools.
As the conference ended many delegates waited to thank the pupils and told them they had made a huge, positive impression on everyone.
Mr O’Rourke has received a letter from one of the conference organisers. The writer says the pupils ‘were an inspiration to everyone’.

The pupils who represented the school were:
Jordan McCrone                                                         Lyndsay McCreath
Andrew Anderson                                                         Louise Gormanley
Jordan Brown                                                               Melissa Napier
Richard Dunlop                                                            Ashley Thomson
Lee Orr                                                                        Tammie Drynan            
James Willison                                                 Amy Fairbairn
Grant Conway                                                 Caroline Crosby
                                                                                    Lynne Gibson
Laura Sloan
Kelsey Dunn

 

 

Skye October 2006

 

 

 

 

One of the key areas of Doon Academy’s bid to be a School of Ambition was the provision of training in Leadership skills for pupils and staff.
Through participation in the Columba 1400 Ambassador’s programme, and the school’s own Leadership Academy we will ‘develop our awareness of ourselves as leaders and realise the opportunity to shape the culture of the school. Pupils will have raised self-confidence and self-esteem, and heightened ambitions, goals and optimism’.

12 pupils and 4 members of staff graduated from the Columba 1400 Ambassador’s programme on the Isle of Skye in October 2005. While they were there they learned about Columba’s core values of Leadership. These are Awareness, Focus, Creativity, Integrity, Perseverance, and Service. The core values were retained in the design of the school’s own Leadership Academy.

 

Our own first residential trip was led by graduates of the Ambassador’s Academy,  Mr MacKenzie and Mrs McLay,  assisted by 5 pupil leaders, and involved a total of 15 pupils and 3 staff in a week of activities which replicated the aims of the Columba experience. The venue for the trip was the PGL outdoor centre, in Perthshire, and this took place in March 2006.

Last session another group took part in the leadership course at Columba 1400 in October 2006 and a second Doon Leadership Academy was delivered successfully at Dalguise in May 2007. To date 49 pupils and 15 of our present staff have attended leadership courses.

In the next few years Leadership training will have been rolled out to a significant percentage of the school community through visits to Skye, Dalguise, and via other planned short events.

One of the challenges the school faces in the coming months is to provide opportunities for leaders to use their training in service to the school and the community. So far leaders have been involved in a large number of presentations to different audiences on aspects of the leadership project. These have been well received and have brought great credit to the pupils and to the school.
Meeting the expectations and hopes of the leaders and the school is another challenge for which the school must plan and prepare. The ideas and energies of the whole school community will be welcome.

 

Mr MacKenzie