High schoolers from underserved backgrounds gained leadership skills, college readiness, character development, and confidence at Hillsdale’s first Frederick Douglass Leadership Seminar in July.
Tori Petersen ’18, who works part time as assistant director of special recruitment for the college, and Associate Director of Admissions Jolie Ballantyne hosted the free leadership seminar at the Allen P. Kirby Center for Constitutional Studies and Statesmanship in Washington, D.C., from July 11-15. They aimed to show teenagers who had experienced the foster care system, grown up below a certain income level, or would be first-generation college students that attending college is possible.
“I hope this program shows students the heart of Hillsdale College and the heart of Christ,” Petersen said. “We hope they see the character of Hillsdale and they’re attracted to the college. But to prepare them for college and have them interested in Hillsdale, we first have to be invested in their character. Caring about them as a person has to come first.”
Petersen recruited rising ninth graders through high school seniors to attend the seminar by building relationships with high schoolers and their parents and asking community-based organizations for recommendations for the program. Petersen said she wanted students to learn service is part of leadership.
“The most important qualities in a leader are selflessness and servitude,” she said. “To be the best leader, you have to be a good follower. You need to serve others.”
During the five-day seminar, students toured the monuments around the National Mall, visited museums, and listened to interactive lectures from a variety of speakers, including Dean of the Van Andel Graduate School of Government Matthew Spalding and author Charles Love. The students also did mock interviews to practice for college admissions interviews.
“The program was designed to help students from underserved communities understand what education at Hillsdale would look like, and the different opportunities they would have as part of our school community,” she said. “We brought in speakers to help empower the students to education.”
Love, whom Petersen said was one of the students’ favorite speakers, addressed students about the classical liberal arts understanding of truth, and the difference between truth and assumption.
“There’s a lot of information out there, especially now with political partisanship,” Love said. “But people need to understand and learn how to disseminate and take this information and splice it and put it in a way that it makes sense.”
Petersen said student survey responses at the end of the week encouraged her.
“One student wrote ‘I realized that I can go to college, and it really is possible for me to accomplish my goals,’” Petersen said. “That really accomplished what we wanted out of the seminar.”
Ballantyne and Petersen agreed students left the seminar with a positive impression of the college and the resources it offers.
“We showed them people who came from situations that were similar to them, giving them a vision of what their future could look like,” Petersen said. “The overall feedback was just gratitude.”
