My Key Leader Experience by Eleni (Maryland)

I attended Key Leader at the end of my junior year of high school. I had heard about a few people from my club going before and it seemed like a good idea to go. Truthfully, I was scared about the whole situation, knowing that during that weekend I would be separated from all the people I knew and I would be forced to go through things with total strangers. I have always been a reserved person; I'm pretty shy, but I know that as I have become very involved in clubs at my school that I need to break out of my shell and try new and maybe scary things. I have always cared too much about what people think of me and that has stopped me from doing things. But going to this event where no one knew me or had predetermined thoughts about me meant I could be myself and I didn't want to worry about what they already thought. Being a twin, I have always just done everything with her beside me and if I don't feel comfortable doing something I just push for her to do it. Recently I've realized that it is not always going to be like that so I need to branch out and do things on my own. So walking in that first day, I was one of the first people there, I instantly felt welcome. We had to go in and get people to sign our papers so we were all forced to go around and talk to each other. Everyone was so nice and being in that same situation, everyone is very open to making new friends so I shouldn't have been scared. We were put in a neighborhood and instantly got to work, working together. I got a lot out of Key Leader, I learned a lot about myself as a person and a leader. I learned to have confidence in what I do because I was lacking before and to stand up for myself and my ideas. I learned to use groups effectively and how to work with a lot of different kinds of people. I also made a lot of friendships that I will have forever and met the most inspirational person, Mrs. Jane Erickson, and many other adults involved in Kiwanis. I will use what I learned there in the rest of my high school experience and beyond. I believe that everyone should attend a Key Leader event because anyone can benefit from it. I don't believe that anyone could walk away from this experience and not be changed. They also will walk away with a drive to do anything they can to help people and be that inspiration to others because you never know-a little thing you do could really change someone's life. Whether it's some help, a smile, or just a friendly thought or a hello, we all leave handprints on everyone we meet.

There will be 3 Key Leader Weekends in 2012 and registration will open for these events sometime in January 2012 -- May 27-29, at Arlington Echo, Millersville, Maryland; April 18-20, at Jamestown 4-H Educational Center, Williamsburg, Virginia; and November 9-11, at Northern Virginia 4-H Educational Center, Front Royal, Virginia. For more information, please contact District Chair Nicole McDermott (Kiwanis Club of Tysons Corner/McLean, Virginia) at capitalkeyleader@gmail.com or 703.829.5481. For more information about Key Leader, please visit www.youtube.com/CapitalKeyLeader and watch live student testimonials about the quality of the program. The students featured on our YouTube Channel are all local Capital District students. Also, search "Capital District Key Leader" on Facebook and like it or visit key-leader.org.