Leadership Academy Celebrates Year 14 With New Format

By Jennifer Burris

On April 16, the Richard A. Baddour Carolina Leadership Academy celebrated its 14th year of programming as well as the unveiling of a new leadership framework and programming structure which is wholly unique to Carolina. To reflect this reboot, the recognition reception took on a new format as well to celebrate UNC student-athletes and their commitment to developing as leaders.

Shelley Johnson, Director of the Leadership Academy, explained the changes to the recognition reception. "The Leadership Academy reception used to be a banquet-style event, but this year we changed the setting to the 5^th floor in the Concourse Club for a more intimate evening," she said. "The end of the year is banquet season, and we wanted to provide a more relaxed, casual, and interactive environment while still celebrating the accomplishments of our student-athletes. To achieve this, we offered attendees the chance to mix and mingle while popping inside the photo booth or providing a video testimonial or engaging in the interactive activities or enjoying food stations scattered throughout the venue."

Members of the Carolina Athletics executive staff were on hand to distribute graduation gifts to the student-athletes who successfully had completed a level of programming in the Leadership Academy. This set-up gave the student-athletes and staff an opportunity to interact and reflect on the year.
"The Leadership Academy continues to provide outstanding educational experiences for our student-athletes," said Senior Associate AD Rick Steinbacher, who attended the event. "The reception was a great celebration of all of the accomplishments within the Leadership Academy this past academic year. It was a reminder that Carolina student-athletes are among the best and brightest young leaders in the world."

More than half of all UNC student-athletes committed to developing themselves as leaders by participating in at least one level of Leadership Academy programming in 2017-18: 220 in Carolina NAVIGATE, 68 in Carolina CULTIVATE, 80 in Carolina ACCELERATE, 38 in Carolina INCUBATE, 27 in the Football Leadership Council, and 52 in Carolina ACTIVATE. There were 52 workshops throughout the year, which totaled 3,428 hours invested in the leadership development of Tar Heel student-athletes.

Caitlin Beakes, a senior on the rowing team, is just one of the student-athletes who has reaped the benefits of the leadership workshops over her four years at Carolina and was happy to speak about her experience.

"The Leadership academy has given me many valuable opportunities in my time at UNC, and I was incredibly appreciative to be able to celebrate my experiences and my peers at the reception," Beakes said. "I thought the new 'Me/We' framework for the Leadership Academy was a great focus because it helped us to better identify what characteristics we needed to develop within ourselves to then be able to implement the desired actions for the team as a whole. I had a great year in ACTIVATE working with other captains to learn how to be vocal leaders, and every year I was a mentor in CULTIVATE. I had a great experience teaching freshman student-athletes how to lead themselves."

In the fall, the Leadership Academy will begin its 15th year of programming. Throughout the year, it will celebrate its 15 years as the premier leadership development program in collegiate athletics.

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