Leadership Courage

When reflecting on past leadership opportunities that I have had, I examined my courage as a leader. Receiving an 8, I realized that I have a strong set of values that I stand up for. I often stand up for tough decisions that I know need to be made.

This came into play on Wednesday, February 22, 2012. As it was announced that UNI would be closing the Price Laboratory School, this was a true test of leadership courage. While the initial reaction among students was not positive, I felt as though I was one of the few that were willing to stand up for the decision. I know it is not a decision that was made lightly, but one that was necessary. It is not a decision that was made to make people happy, but one to sustain the university that we all love.

While I have never had to make decisions this courageous, I have had to stand up to decisions that were not liked by the majority. While changing the Northern Iowa Student Government (NISG) Election Rules, I pushed to make some major changes. I advocated shortening the election season and cutting the amount that candidates can spend. Some people were against this, they wanted to keep the election season and not cut it in order to candidates to reach out to student groups. However, past history hasn't shown that candidates use the entire amount of time to reach student groups. Also, not very many people took into consideration the effect of campaigning on not only the candidates, but their teams as well. This was an extremely unpopular decision, but in the midst of campaign season, no one really notices and all of the current President and Vice President Tickets don't even know what they would do with 7 more days. The money wasn't as big of an issue, but with the current state of higher education, it is something that will be looked at it, and if a tough decision needs to be made to help students be able to run for these positions, that decision will be made.