The 1st class of Youth Leadership Columbus recently graduated. What a great group, a great project, and an encouraging look into our future! Here’s a quick video retrospective on this year’s class:
Youth Leadership of Columbus-no music
The inaugural grads of YLC are: Hannah Allen, Brook Behlen, Elizabeth Blaser, Sam Blaser, Gracie Borer, Savanna Denton, Reagan Gausman, Paige Jeffryes, Mira Liebig, Aspen Luebbe, Lucas Miller, Hallie Parker, Kelli Schoch, Nathan Schumacher, and Britney Stock. If you know any of these young people, then you know just how well they represented themselves, their families, and their schools.
They have been engaged, active participants. They’ve learned about their hometown and also learned about themselves. They had great role models for community service in the YLC organizers. The Leadership Columbus class of 2016-17 organized YLC as their class project. What a great example for these students to follow!
Speaking of the “adult version” of Leadership Columbus, this coming week will be graduation for the 27th graduating class of Leadership Columbus. This is a large class of 21 leaders and they will bring our total to nearly 350 grads in the history of Leadership Columbus.
The class includes a diverse set of participants: a variety of professions, ages, positions, and backgrounds. I’m sure that has created some robust dialogue and great opportunities for learning.
Congratulations to this year’s graduates of the program:
Amber Miller – Samson, Inc.
Tara Vasicek – City of Columbus
Melanie Knoepfle – Thrivent Financial
Kristine Line – Columbus Physical Therapy, P.C.
Bonnie Esslinger – Columbus Area Chamber of Commerce
Scott Ditter – Columbus United Fed. Credit Union
Aaron Leimser – First National Bank
Quelbin Izaguirre – NeighborWorks Northeast Nebraska
Chase Burgess – Burgess & Associates, LLC
Greg Sander – First National Bank
Karina Perez – Centro Hispano Comunitario De Nebraska
Amanda Henry – Loup Public Power District
Kimberlee Went – Bank of the Valley
Dave Whalen – Columbus Motor Company
Carrie Mausbach – Black Hills Energy
Kirsten Husmann – Union Bank & Trust Loan Production Office
Nicholas Whitney – Central Community College-Columbus Campus
Korie Whitmore – Columbus Community Hospital
Dorothy Bybee – Columbus Community Hospital
Julie Baumgart – Columbus Community Hospital
Kimberly Eisenmann – Columbus Community Hospital
This group has tremendous potential to impact our region, just as the grads of Youth Leadership Columbus. The research is clear that volunteer leadership is today one of the key determiners of a rural community’s future. So programs like these become pretty clear impacts on our shared future and as such we are grateful that these individuals and their employers/schools committed the time, money, and energy to allow them to complete these leadership programs.