Leadership in College by Taylor

Leadership in College by Taylor - March 2015 Scholarship Essay

Personally, I think leadership skills aren’t explicitly necessary for success in a college environment, but they certainly help. College is much different from high school; if you don’t take initiative, ask questions, and seek out extra help when you need it, there’s a very good chance you will fall behind. In high school, everything was spelled out: due dates, homework assignments, activities, even lessons were presented in the easiest way possible. In college, you have to go in hoping to get 75% of the material that the professor covers that day, but knowing that in reality you will get closer to 45% of it. Lectures are presented at supersonic speeds. Reading is mandatory, and if you don’t do it before hand at home, you really have zero chance.

College isn’t all bad. For example, I recently had a test in my World Literature class. I had been sick for a few days and had missed class and the oh-so-valuable discussion. I really wasn’t prepared for the exam. However, I emailed my teacher and she met with me the morning of the test. We went over every question in detail and I ended up scoring one of the highest grades in the class. If I hadn’t had the courage to ask her, or even if I hadn’t known there was a test because I wasn’t paying attention, I would have failed, and that definitely isn’t good for my GPA.

Last semester I took Sociology. About half-way though the semester, we did a project called “Create-A-Society”. Basically we had to come up with a new society from scratch. And it was a group project. Those are always fun… Anyway, I was in a group with four other people. I have always been a leader, so it’s difficult for me not squelch that natural instinct if someone else in the group is also a natural leader. There was a lot of work to do for the project, and we divided it up equally. We each had to write an essay about the part of the society we came up with and they all had to go together, that is, not contradict. We also had to create a powerpoint and present this new society to our class. We tried to meet several times, but no more than three people ever showed up. I was there every time. In the end, I came up with pretty much the entire concept, wrote most of the five essays, created the entire powerpoint, and presented the society to the class by myself, because my group members hadn’t participated at all. Our grades were dependent on each other, so if I didn’t want to fail, I had to do the work because no one else was going to. Group projects will always be like that: one person does all the work because everyone else can’t be bothered to get their act together. But my leadership skills helped me tremendously when I actually managed to get my partners to contribute. Without them, I would have gotten really upset about their lack of participation. Ultimately, we all got good grades on the project and I had the ‘good- leader’ reputation rather than the ‘will-do-all-the-work-but-gets-mad-about-it’ reputation.

Leadership skills are an invaluable asset. They help in all facets of life, not just college. In the working world, as well as the college world, those who eventually rise to the top are the leaders. The leaders are the ones who get the most out of their lives, and ultimately succeed.