Does College Demand Leadership Skills? by Rosie

Does College Demand Leadership Skills? by Rosie - March 2015 Scholarship Essay

Leadership skills are talked about often in our culture. From going to leadership camp in high school to reading about “born leaders” in the newspaper to constantly having to submit to leaders in our homes, on the job, or in our country, we are flooded with a leadership mentality. Often, however, leadership is portrayed in the wrong light. Many see leadership as the ability to control people or the skills to put one’s self at the top of the proverbial totem pole, but true leadership is the ability to put others before one’s self and practice true humility. I believe that leadership skills are necessary for college because of the roommate’s that college students always end up with, the teachers that college students often disagree with, and the words that Jesus said.

Living in on-campus housing, aka dorms, means roommates, and with roommates comes all sorts of horror stories about the ones who won’t shut up, the ones who party all night, or the ones who steal your stuff. While some students go away from college best friends for life with their roommates, that’s often not the case. It isn’t hard to get frustrated when one has to share her own personal living space with complete strangers who aren’t at all like her. However, just a dab of “leadership” (humility) will solve many problems. When one puts her roommate ahead of herself and says to herself, “hey! I’m probably really annoying, too,” things get easier. When we start looking at our own failures, others’ failures won’t stand out as much.

Leadership skills are also important for college because college often comes with being preached at by people with conflicting worldviews. It’s hard to sit through class after class being taught by professors whom one doesn’t agree with. Sometimes it may be all a student can do to sit in his or her seat without exploding while the teacher teaches. Here, again, some leadership, or humility, will save the day. Humility will give the student the ability to appreciate what the lecturer is saying, even if he or she doesn’t agree with the lecture. Having some humility will make college a much more enjoyable experience.

Not only are leadership skills necessary for college because college means roommates and conflicting worldviews, leadership skills are necessary because Jesus said that they are. While I think that Jesus was God and the whole Bible should be taken literally, most people don’t. They think that Jesus was just a really great guy, a great moral teacher. Whether Jesus was God, or just a great moral teacher, you can decide, but either way, I think we should take what he said pretty seriously. Jesus said things like “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6 ESV) and “Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted” (Matthew 23:12 ESV). God takes humility seriously. Basically, Jesus said that to be great, we need to be humble. I want my college years to be great, so I am going to try to be humble. 

Talk is cheap. Students need to step up and start behaving like true leaders by practicing humility instead of just talking about “leadership.”