‘Leadathon 15’: Grooming future leaders through innovative learning process

Edopia School arranges three-day leadership conference for children

ISLAMABAD:

An innovative training session aimed at exploring the leadership potential of children of age between five and 13 and giving them an opportunity to learn the best skills concluded here on Saturday.

As many as 110 students from 12 schools, including Preparatory School Islamabad, Headstart, Froebels, Khaldunia High School and 20 Edopians participated in the three-day ‘Leadathon-15’, arranged by Edopia School in collaboration with Hi-Five magazine of The Express Tribune.

The event culminated on a colourful fun-filled programme and certificate distribution ceremony.

On the last day, an activity of a mystery box challenge, on the theme “Where kids take charge” was also held where children had to guess random stuff in the box by touching it.

At the TED talks, aimed at polishing entrepreneurial skills of children through creation and connection, the participants as young as five gave presentations about their passion and interests on subjects such as cooking, poetry and robots.

Musa Ahmed, a poet, told the audience that from the very young age he was interested in writing and reading. It was difficult in the beginning for him but eventually he started getting better at it and ended up winning several competitions.

Asma Mustafa Khan, a trainer who has been conducting such events for the last 13 years seemed satisfied with the outcome.  “It was amazing; we achieved our objectives,” she told The Express Tribune.

Vaqar Habeeb, one of the participants, said “being an educationist this is the first time she has seen an initiative of this kind”. She wished that such events should be held with regularly.

Jaweria Sethi, the founder of Edopia, said that the overall experience was overwhelming as “we were able to achieve something even we did not anticipate”.

We hope the students will take the flavour of Edopia with them, she said.

When asked what motivated her to take the initiative, Jaweria said that a lot of children come to her often saying they do not want to live in Pakistan because there were no opportunities in this country.

“I always felt shocked to hear this because Pakistan is a land of opportunities for those who can find them.”

Our school system doesn’t teach us how to explore opportunities. “Our kids are always too scared to communicate and collaborate with others. The textbooks bog down creativity and critical thinking and definitely don’t teach how to take initiatives. Here we try to bring out that creativity,” she explained.

Parents of the participating children also seemed satisfied with the results of the conference.

“The whole atmosphere, created by Edopia, must live on in their (children) minds”, said Mehnaz Ansar Khan, the mother of a student.

“It was great to see a platform where small children mingle with their peers and students from other institutes, perform in front of each other, form teams, learn to create mechanism focused on common goals, work under pressure,” Khan said.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 28^th, 2015.