2006 class of Leadership Gilroy ready to engage the
community
The latest class of Leadership Gilroy is embarking on a
nine-month journey that will enrich their understanding of the
community as well as their role in the leadership of the city.
The 2006 students are a unique bunch, as is usually the case.
This year’s class is the largest yet, with 25 students, and
includes a bank manager, a bus driver and a senior pastor.
2006 class of Leadership Gilroy ready to engage the community
The latest class of Leadership Gilroy is embarking on a nine-month journey that will enrich their understanding of the community as well as their role in the leadership of the city.
The 2006 students are a unique bunch, as is usually the case. This year’s class is the largest yet, with 25 students, and includes a bank manager, a bus driver and a senior pastor.
Deanna Franklin, a native of Gilroy, heard about the program when she moved back to town five years ago after living in Fresno.
“I heard about the program and thought this was something that could benefit me personally and in my career at the bank,” said Franklin, a branch manager at Community Bank. “I heard from people who had gone through the program and talked about it and how great it was.”
Franklin, who attended the orientation and a weekend retreat in January with her fellow students, said she already feels she has gained from the program.
“I am really learning about my personality and how I react in certain situations,” she said.
The weekend retreat included a variety of team-building activities, one of the most important being that the students broke into groups to brainstorm about a class project.
The Leadership Gilroy class comes up with one project to complete by the end of the year that they feel will leave a lasting effect on the community.
“We are putting our energy into our kids because they are the leaders of the future,” said Rebecca Scheel, another classmate. “We understand that the issue needs to be dealt with and its good that people are recognizing that we need it.”
The group will decide between two final project proposals in February, both dealing with youth. The students look at the pros and cons of each project, deciding which will best help the community and which they will be able to pull off in nine months. The 2005 class held a car show and dinner fundraiser at Bonfante Gardens to start a music program at Mount Madonna Continuation High School.
The program costs participants $900 and Leadership Gilroy gave out six $450 scholarships this year. Their employers, such as Scheel who is a school bus driver for the Gilroy Unified School District, sponsor some classmates for the program. She discovered that GUSD regularly sponsors up to two employees for the program each year so she approached Superintendent Edwin Diaz about sponsoring her for the 2006 year.
“I am the first classified employee that they have sponsored and that reflects well on Edwin,” Scheel said.
The cost of the program does exceed $900 per student for the nine-month course, however. In order to continue the program, the board of directors is constantly coming up with new ways to fundraise to defray the costs for participants, such as their Nov. 25 fashion show.
Carol Peters, the current president of the board for Gilroy Leadership, understands the draw of the program for its students. She joined the board five years ago, signed up for the class and hasn’t looked back since.
“It was amazing,” said Peters, a retired Gilroy High School art teacher. “I’ve lived in Gilroy all my life, but you really get to understand how all the components of our city work together.”
Since entering the program, she has signed on as an arts and cultural commissioner for the city.
“You learn how to dialogue with other people and find out where your strengths are and how you can fit better into the community,” Peters said. “You ask yourself what you can do now.”
A key component of the Leadership Gilroy program is learning what makes the community run. The class has one day a month set aside for different topics – from education and public safety to history and local culture. Each day-long session brings the students into contact with the people who run the city. On public safety day, they ride along with police officers or firefighters and meet with the heads of each department. On media communications day, the students hunker down in a local newsroom and do their own reporting and writing for a day.
“What’s important to me is getting a bird’s eye view of the city, getting right to the heart and the pulse of Gilroy,” said Gerald Harris, a current classmate. “It will help me understand who the team is and become a part of the team, bringing what I have to bring from the faith-based arena and put that on the table.”
The program drew Harris, a senior pastor for Bethany Community Church of God and Christ and the president of nonprofit Bethany International Ministries, in when he learned he would be able to see the community from many different angles.
“We put a lot of time into it,” Peters said. “Our board is so great and puts so much effort into putting the days together.”
The board of directors contacts guest speakers and plans on-site visits pertinent to each day. This year, they have added an evening session to discuss regional and county issues.
“We had local government and we had state government, but we felt we were missing that component,” Peters said. “South County and Hollister, it’s all connected.”
