On September 4, 109 student leaders met at the tri-annual Leadership Summit to hone their leadership skills and to plan new inter-club collaborations for the upcoming school year.
Upper School Director of Equity and Inclusion Melissa Lawlor founded the summit four years ago in partnership with former Dean of Students José Ruiz and the Office of Student Life “to give student leaders the tools for success” as they navigate their posts. A year later, responsibility for conducting the event was transferred to the Head Monitors.
“The student body responds to their elected leaders in really powerful ways, and so the Head Monitors have the capacity to drive change,” explained Lawlor.
During this past summit, Head Monitors Nemo Sanon ‘26 and Pati Pogorzelska ‘26 emphasized the school’s “Four Pillars” of student behavior to promote respect and integrity within the student body. To engage with the pillars’ concept of respect, student leaders were asked to reflect on their own experiences with good leaders and set goals.
“Reflecting on your own past experiences can help you understand the power you have to affect others in both a positive and negative way,” explained Pogorzelska.
Amy Khaing ‘27, an attendee of the event, agreed. “Reflecting made clear to me why I want to be a leader and what leader I want to be.”
Towards the end of the event, students participated in a Shark Tank activity where they were encouraged to interact with leaders of other clubs, affinity spaces, and sports teams to brainstorm potential collaborations.
Jacob Matalon ‘26, a Varsity Soccer captain, found the activity to be a highlight of the event, as he was able to brainstorm a potential Student Activities Association and Varsity Soccer collaboration for a soccer-related fundraiser on the quad. He also discussed with the captains of the Football team an idea to host combined soccer and football recovery sessions following some Saturday games. Khaing used the opportunity to plan with fellow club heads a potential fundraiser with Amnesty International, the human rights club at Milton. Many of these collaborations may soon become realities, as Sanon and Pogorzelska hope to do their very best to help the student leaders implement their ideas.
However, while some attendees appreciated how the event yielded good opportunities for clubs, some believed that the summit should have been instead split into sections based on leadership duties. Matalon commented that, “Leading a club is about making your space enjoyable and attracting new members, versus a sports team, which is about getting the best out of everyone and keeping team morale high throughout the entire season.”
The event also struggled to get attendees to come when confusion surrounded who was and was not invited. Lawlor stated that she intended to invite all club leaders, along with members of the Self-Governing Association, affinity space leaders, sports captains, and other important student leaders in the Milton community, but due to a lack of information on which students are “club leaders” and ambiguity surrounding which positions qualified for an invitation, many deserving individuals were not included.
Pogorzelska and Sanon have said that they intend to invite all club leaders to future Leadership Summits. Jiner Huang ‘28 expressed her support for an even broader expansion initiative, stating that “it could be beneficial to expand the attendance to club board members so that they can get an early idea of what it means to be a club leader, and so they can learn how to best allocate their time towards achieving the role of club head.”
On the other hand, Matalon prefers the smaller, tight-knit summit. “More leaders will provide more perspectives, but a tighter group creates a sense of security and comfort.”