Watervliet students develop leadership skills

March 14, 2012 

 Four Watervliet Junior-Senior High School students sharpened their leadership skills by attending a four-day leaders conference this month in Colonie.
    Ninth grader Brian Delaney and eighth graders Robert Brazee, Anna Pluckrose, and Charles LaBelle were nominated by Watervliet science teacher Stephanie Randall to attend this year’s National Youth Leaders State Conference held March 1-4.
    The program, themed Courageous Leadership, aims to help students take an introspective and highly-personalized assessment of their leadership skills and abilities. The program, presented each year by the nonpartisan Congressional Youth Leadership Conference, was slated to be held in 30 cities across the country.
    Students say the program featured intensive team building workshops and student led events all of which taught them a great deal about leadership and their own potential.
    “Different people lead in different ways and sometimes you have to change your leadership style,” said Brazee, who is also active in football and Character Education.
    Pluckrose said she was most moved by the program’s diversity workshop.
    “You have to accept that everybody is different and people have different values,” she said. Pluckrose is active in volleyball, Character Education, National Junior Honor Society and swims at the Cohoes Community Center.
    Labelle said the conference exposed him to different people with different experiences and he learned the value of being outgoing.
“Leaders have to be open with people,” he said. LaBelle is a wrestler and football player and also participates in the Chess Club.

"I learned to speak up but I also learned a leader needs to listen most of all," Delaney said. Delaney is a wrestler, a Delta Force singer and a member of the National Junior Honor Society.