Student Fellows Program July 2005

Carolyn W

When I first got involved with the SEO, I'll admit that I definitely had my doubts. I was a bit of a pessimist when it came to changing my school community and, to be perfectly honest, the idea didn't really sit too comfortably with me. I figured that whatever other people did and however other people acted was completely their business and I should just keep my opinions and morals to myself.

So yes, when I first got involved with the SEO, it could easily be said that I was absolutely clueless as to what I was doing there.

Having lived through an entire year of serving in Lake Braddock's SEO, I can safely say that not only has my opinion of my school changed a great deal, but I've also gained more confidence in the belief that I can do something to change it. Just being surrounded by people who have some of the same beliefs and goals that you do is enough to make anyone feel unbelievably more confident in what they're capable of doing.

The SEO not only gives us the opportunity to really make a stand and say, "This really isn't okay for all of us to be doing. Gangs, cheating, bullying? Are you kids crazy or what?" but it also lets us bounce ideas off one another all the time, figuring out ways to spread our different messages across the entire student body. Through posters, flyers, and SEO sponsored activities, the school is slowly but surely starting to become more and more aware of our presence in it.

When I was invited to go to St. Louis, I was absolutely thrilled. Even though it meant cutting my vacation at the lake a little short, I was completely ready and willing to do it just because it meant talking about my experiences to a crowd who actually wanted to listen and who genuinely cared about ethics in the school community. Granted, I'm not what I would call the best public speaker, so when it came time to really make the presentation, I was practically falling over my obnoxious high heels as a big bundle of nerves.

One of the things I discovered through flying all the way out there and getting up in front of that audience, though, was that a lot of schools are really interested in trying to promote good character and ethical values in their students. It honestly made me just want to start asking people what on earth was stopping them from making an SEO of their own. If all these schools right around DC are popping up with their own ethics programs, there's absolutely no reason that other schools across the nation can't do the same.

It may be viewed as "geeky" or "weird" by some, but for me it's not really about that at all. If anything, it's simply trying to promote an overall goodness in a student population that kids of today really need, because ethics are one of those things that you really have to have a good grip on in order to go out there into the real world. The SEO is all about promoting those ethics and getting our students ready for that real world so that it doesn't all come crashing down around their ears the moment they step into it.

Sher Afgan T.

I joined my school's newly built Student Ethics Council because some of the social behaviors that I observed in my school were concerning to me. Those behaviors were hurting the school from providing its best education in a pleasant, comfortable, and ethical environment. Since Washington-Lee has a vigorous and challenging curriculum, many students (including the bright ones) are pressurized to cheat on tests; not because twenty-four hours per day is insufficient to study, but because those students get involved in various other activities which hinders them from presenting their academic skills. Secondly, I have seen a minority of students bullying others in places such as the cafeteria. Activities such as these make it extremely harmful for students of all kinds but especially for foreign students who also have to cope up with many cross-cultural challenges. It results in students hesitating to come to school because the school community does not provide the warm-hearted welcome they require. Finally, the most recent problem that has grown enormously in recent years in our school is the act of stealing and damaging school and student's properties. I plan to help start solving these problems by gathering my peers in a cooperative manner.

My experience at SFP has prepared me to become an effective leader to help my school with the challenges it faces today. As a leader of my SEO, I intend to build my club an everlasting home for students who will join W-L in the years to come. I will inform my peers why it is even more important for students to be ethical leaders of tomorrow rather than only having A's on the report cards. Lastly, I plan to help start solving the problems that I have mentioned above by gathering my peers in a cooperative manner. I know I will face many challenges in winning all my goals, but the training provided to me by the SFP makes me say, " I am confident, I will succeed!" I show my gratitude and appreciation to the SFP for taking the difficult but valuable task of building leadership skills among the promising students in so many schools. We, the students, will make them proud!

Student-led ethics is necessary because today's young adults have the responsibility to purify societies (large and small) from political, financial, and social unethical activities. Those of us who were trained by the SFP were all young students. As we grow older, we will all choose different paths and different occupations. We may not remember everyone by face or by name. But we will all know each other in some way because every one of us present at the conference will be promoting ethical values throughout the world. Some as lawyers, some as teachers, some as doctors but all of us in some way will be ethical role models for everyone. Everyone!

Mark G.

First, I wanted to get involved in my school's SEO because it seemed like a club that best truly reflected my personal beliefs about the way people should come to view the world and should come to view their interactions with other people. You have to have some sort of moral guiding light to prevent you from continually making mistakes or treating others in ways that violate that lovely Golden Rule of "Do unto others as you would have others do unto you." As I used to try to implement this philosophy in my actions before the SEO, I guess I felt that now I would not have to do that alone anymore if I had the backing of a club behind me, a group of students that could support in my convictions to go the extra mile and never to take the easy, unethical way out. Plus, I was nominated for the SEO; it was not as though I applied to get into the organization nor as though I consciously wanted to be a part of it, but rather than someone else wanted me to be included in the organization, a little reversed way to think of joining clubs. Due to this special way of being selected and valued, I felt that the club might just be worth my time.

Second, at the SFP the main experience I recall is that of bonding immensely with my fellow SEOfficers at my school. I mean, sure there were quite enlightening bits about how ethics is exercised in the professional world or how to institute an effective SEO in one's school and especially this last time, at the second annual SFP, because we really focused on concrete ways to make a difference in our school community with real projects our tangible changes in the structure of our SEO, but I would have to say that the overall feeling that I took from my attendance at the last two SFPs was one of solidarity and increased familiarity with those SEOfficers from my own school.