Stepping Forward

Halfway through our first week at Brown, the Women and Leadership class is getting very close. I am starting to understand why past ILCers like Ava and Adrianne said the program was so amazing. Every young woman in this class has thoughts and opinions worth sharing and I am so lucky to be in a course where we all feel comfortable enough to talk openly about these.

Today was monumental. We spent the majority of class with Professor Jen Madden, an expert in public speaking. We went over all the do's and don'ts of public speaking. We practiced correct posture and how to answer questions. All of this was in preparation for our final presentation next week when we have to present our Action Plan. All the advice our instructor had for us was so helpful and I only wish I had learned it sooner.

After lunch, we put our new found speaking skills to the test in an exercise that required us to preform an impromptu speech on an unknown topic in a minute. While this exercise seemed intimidating in the beginning, I realized how comfortable I had become with all the girls once I got up to speak and found myself to be steady and confident in my speech.

Our closeness became even more clear when we re-convened for Community Hours after dinner. Today's topic was diversity. We spent the first hour talking about what diversity means in school and society. Coming from a very racially diverse high school, I found it really interesting to here from the other students. Some girls go to private schools, others go to all girl schools or even a school out of the country. So, each person had something unique to bring to the discussion. Then we went on to the next part of the meeting in which the Leadership Fellows read off a list of statements and if one applied to you, you would step forward, in to the circle. This is was a very revealing and sensitive project for us so I'm not going to go in to too much detail but I will say, we left a closer community than when we walked in earlier that evening.

Tonight's exercise also reminded me how special this opportunity is. I couldn't have met all these wonderful people and learned so much with out the help of the Ivy League Connection. I'm going to bed tonight, grateful and excited for the ropes course tomorrow!