Building better leaders a collaborative effort in Council Bluffs (2024)

June is a culminating month for leadership programs in Council Bluffs.

It marks the annual offering of the Southwest Iowa Leadership Academy for area middle schoolers as well as graduation for youth and adults in the Council Bluffs Area Chamber of Commerce’s leadership programs.

For more than 30 years, Southwest Iowa Leadership Academy has provided the building blocks for middle schoolers to explore leadership skills and roles. Similarly, the chamber has long offered opportunities for leadership training throughout the community.

Around 100 students attend the academy each year, spending the week staying in the Iowa School for the Deaf dorms and working through curriculum as well as enjoying team building activities and bonding experiences.

Students come from schools throughout Pottawattamie County, including Council Bluffs, Lewis Central, St. Albert, Underwood, Treynor and sometimes Tri-Center and ISD.

“We try to catch seventh graders going into eighth grade to learn how to be better leaders in the community,” said Dustan Kern, a teacher with the Southwest Iowa Leadership Academy. “We go through different leadership styles, how to set goals and try to prepare them to go out into the world and become better leaders.”

The goal is to show them “they can take on whatever they want,” Kern said.

“We love seeing some of the kids getting into leadership roles in Council Bluffs, in the community,” he said.

The Council Bluffs Area Chamber of Commerce offers Youth Leadership Council Bluffs, a nine-month program and curriculum that aims to help youth form relationships in the community that will encourage them to seek employment in the area later.

For adults, the Council Bluffs Chamber of Commerce offers Leadership Council Bluffs for community-minded individuals to enhance their own leadership style.

As the executive editor of The Nonpareil, I have personally spent the last nine months participating in Leadership Council Bluffs and will graduate in a few weeks.

There are similarities throughout all three programs, including a focus on teamwork and communication through various activities.

“Most of the activities we do, we do them, like, working together, socializing, being leaders and figuring out problems to solve,” said Payton Engel, who participated in this year’s academy.

The Real Colors Personality Test, designed to categorize people into different groups based on personality traits, was used by both Leadership Council Bluffs and the Southwest Iowa Leadership Academy.

I found this activity particularly enjoyable, and it helped me identify categories for friends and colleagues to understand how to better communicate with them.

“It’s really nice being with friends and making new ones,” said student Wrigley Pirie, who completed the Southwest Iowa Leadership Academy this year.

Southwest Iowa Leadership Academy students learned about decision making and goal setting, while Youth Leadership Council Bluffs and Leadership Council Bluffs participants spent months getting to know area leaders in government, business, education and more, getting a look at how leadership works for them.

The different programs also placed an emphasis on volunteerism. Leadership Council Bluffs participants split into trustee groups to coordinate on various projects throughout the community— later this month, the group I worked with is planting a pollinator garden at Trolley Park.

Southwest Iowa Leadership Academy student groups worked on volunteer projects at various area sites on Thursday, some working at River’s Edge, some at Habitat for Humanity and some at Horses Help, a new nonprofit in the community focused on equine therapy.

The students at Horses Help were cleaning up fields for the horses before they worked on grooming.

“I wanted to socialize more, and I knew that you could go to leadership and meet a lot of good people who are very nice,” Engel said.

Horses Help Southwest Iowa will hold a ribbon-cutting ceremony and grand opening with the chamber Tuesday from 4 to 6 p.m. at 14679 230th St.