How Leadership Influences Students

Posted on July 21, 2012 by Mark Jacobs — No Comments ↓

Predicting Success in College and Beyond

What are the best ways to predict success after college? When we look at how leadership influences students, we not only see the benefits of being involved on your campus, but the benefits of being a leader among your peers.

There is evidence of how leadership influences students to improve their academic performance. We’ll also see how leadership influences students to make them feel more adjusted to college life, and not constantly homesick. Finally, we’ll discuss how leadership influences students to pick up on things that you won’t easily find in the classroom—friends, diversity, and all that good stuff.

Conquer the Curricula, and then Your Career

Being a leader is demanding. You must balance schedules, sharpen your memory, and be proactive in finishing your projects. It’s no surprise that students who practice these abilities are able to turn around and then use their organization and time management skills for school work.

Leadership comes with great job-related benefits as well. Listing your leadership position and any specific accomplishments will help your résumé stand out to prospective employers. You’ll also outperform all the others when it’s time for your job interview. Any practice you have speaking in public before large groups will come in great handy here.

Settling into Your Second Home

Another point in how leadership influences students is in making the campus a more welcoming place. As a leader, you’ll be much more in tune with what’s happening on your campus, and you’ll feel more familiar with the vibrant, but sometimes intimidating community that we know college to be. Rather than lying around, feeling bored and unaware of what’s happening around you, you’ll have a reason to leave the dorm, experience the environment, and begin exploring it. You’ll have the chance to navigate the college’s hierarchy and develop a network where you can get things done.

Leadership also gives you a productive channel for your stress. The closer you get to your midterms and finals, and as the pressures of school grow on you, you can stick to the routine that you’ll develop around your commitments. This will keep the stress in line. Having a leadership role fosters healthy habits, and this too will help you when the workload gets to be challenging.

Your Big Break

We’re not promising instant fame, but there’s no reason why your campus shouldn’t know you by name when you finally graduate. As a leader, you’ll get to meet a lot of people—students, other leaders, professors, and administrators. And this means more than simply being popular. These are people you get to collaborate and learn alongside. Interacting with so many people, you’ll have a greater appreciation for diversity. You’ll meet others with different backgrounds and other perspectives about life. Your time as a leader, partnering with many others over the course of college, you’ll be more comfortable mediating conflicts and resolving differences. These aren’t just skills you can boast about on a résumé: they’re essential to living your life. So if you’re still wondering how leadership influences students, the answer is: in more ways than you can begin to imagine.

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