Students gathered for the district wide Club and Organization Leadership Training (COLT), which took place in the Student Center at STLCC-Meramec on Jan. 29 and 30.
Paul Lauer
– Staff Writer –
The goal of COLT is to provide students who belong to campus organizations and clubs an opportunity to learn or improve their leadership skills and to meet other students from Meramec and other STLCC campuses. The speaker for this year’s event, Troy Stende, three-time recipient of the “Best Campus Speaker Award” from the Association for the Promotion of Campus Activities, engaged the students through lecture and focused on interactive activities. Referring to this style of teaching as “experiential learning,” Stende says that students will learn about being a leader “on a deeper level.”
These activities focused on developing leadership and teamwork skills but also provided students with an opportunity to learn about themselves and open up to others emotionally. “He made a really safe environment,” said Michael Roman, president of the Student Governance Council. “People shared a lot.”
At first, COLT was only for those who attended Meramec, but 10 years ago it was changed so all STLCC students could attend.
“To be able to interact with [students from other campuses] is really good,” said Patrick Peroutka, member of Phi Theta Kappa and Student Governance Council. “I think we had a really strong group dynamic.”
Though most activities had students interact with each other, Stende spent time lecturing and personally interacting with each student. In an activity called “Leadership Dogs,” which was developed by his wife, Karen Malkowski Stende, he assessed their leadership styles, comparing certain styles to certain breeds of dogs.
The point of this exercise, said Vince Hayden, vice president of communication for Phi Theta Kappa, is to “help you realize your strengths and work on your weaknesses.”
For the final activity, Stende directed each student to write an obstacle that he or she faced in life on the top of a wooden board, and the results of overcoming the obstacle on the bottom. He then showed students how to break through the wood using their palm. While by-standing students provided motivational support, others would break through their board– and their problems.
“You could tell people got an amazing release by breaking the board,” said Peroutka.
Having lasted a half-hour longer than expected, the event came to a close at 6 p.m. Saturday. Whether Stende will come back for next year’s COLT event is yet to be determined. He did say, though, that he had enough material to do it over without repeating anything.
“The COLT thing was just too short,” said Hayden. “[Stende] knows way more. He could have gone on and on.”
