Leadership & Character | Cherry Hills Village, CO

A group of Wake Foresters gathered over dinner in Cherry Hills Village, CO on July 10, 2018 to discuss Leadership & Character.

Some key words from the evening included: listening, community, sacrifice, empathy, love, selflessness, service, thoughtfulness, and empowerment.

Common themes from the conversation:

• There exists a unique struggle between the tension of justice versus space for engagement of differences.
• Character oftentimes involves going above and beyond oneself.
• Character regularly requires sacrifice and involves someone who has suffered or is suffering.

A few other key highlights of our conversation:

• Students on campus need to be more open to taking risks without fear of failure or staying in a box all the time.
• Student service requires sacrifice of privilege to lift others up. Students need to learn to connect with both the global community with their own local Wake campus community.
• Empathy is the foundation for character. Character can be taught, but it’s a large umbrella. Character is a muscle – it can be strengthened through practice, or equally weakened through inactivity.