George Washington. Mahatma Gandhi. Albert Einstein. For a young student, these leaders seem to have reached legendary status. But the qualities that defined their leadership aren’t as unreachable as they seem. The Lower School Leadership wall cultivates deep-rooted character traits that will eventually allow these young leaders to bloom, helping them aim for the same heights as the likes of these icons.
The Lower School Leadership Wall is an integral part in the path to manhood Lower Schoolers embark on. In a way, the Leadership Wall is the very beginning of the journey, setting role models for the Lower School students to emulate.
“The leadership wall was started by a past Lower School head,” Marion Glorioso-Kirby, current Head of Lower School, said. “Her name was Barbara York, and she wanted there to be a visual representation of leaders for our young marksmen to be able to see and then study their leadership qualities and the history of what they had done.”
Each year, students in the Lower School nominate historical figures they believe embody the values and qualities of leadership that the school upholds.
“It’s a meaningful and powerful tradition that we have that cultivates leadership and character in our young Lower School students,” Lower School instructor Tracey McKenzie said.
The process begins with guided discussions in class during community time, where students explore what makes a great leader. Teachers help facilitate these conversations and direct students toward relevant resources, encouraging them to check out books from the library on leaders in various fields such as mathematics, history, politics and wartime leadership.
“We want to give our boys role models to reflect a wide range of leadership styles, because leadership styles (vary from one person to the next),” McKenzie said. “It’s not all just cookie-cutter, they’re all different.”
After gathering information, students compile a shortlist of potential nominees and conduct further research, often involving discussions with their families about the characteristics they admire in leaders. Once they have refined their choices, they make a formal nomination. A group of selected students then undertakes in-depth research projects on the nominees, culminating in an assembly where the chosen leader is honored and officially added to the leadership wall.
“Our first appointee to the leadership wall was the first leader of our country, George Washington,” Glorioso said. “So that is how the wall began, and then from then on out, students in the Lower School nominated men and women from history that they felt best represented our school’s qualities and values of leadership.”
These first graders walk by the leadership wall and both physically and metaphorically look up to the people on the wall. It’s a constant reminder to the young students of the importance of leadership and character.
“Who would you want little boys to look up to and to read about?” Glorioso said. “Who would you want visitors who don’t know St. Mark’s to learn about and read about? And what do you value in a leader that you want represented on that wall?”
When consulting family, friends and teachers about what the community values, the students themselves can understand the community on a deeper level. It’s a practice that unearths the deep-rooted values that the community holds.
“And I think that that takes a lot of thought and a lot of time,” Glorioso said. “If you were going to appoint somebody to the leadership wall, who would you pick? So you have to think about it for yourself first, and you have to think about it with your family.”
In addition, the leadership wall, in its essence, is a retrospective exercise, allowing students to understand what leadership means to them specifically.
“And if you have to start answering that question for yourself, then you will also start to think about how you can embody those things,” Glorioso said. “If we start that in first grade, and every year after that, I’m asking you the question, ‘What qualities of leadership do you value? What field of study do you want to see represented?’”
To answer those questions, the leadership wall is used to teach Lower Schoolers how to apply the knowledge from the figures placed on the wall into their lives.
“What I think is great is that we connect the values that the leaders have back to what the boys have in their own life to inspire them to lead with heart, purpose and wisdom,” McKenzie said. “We try to give them empowering messages and try to impress upon them that you can be a leader at any age. We want to see those same qualities come out of them at this age.”