Converge equips students for a future of leadership
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The Office of Residence Life offers Converge, a leadership development program, to train up students to become successful leaders in their future.
The Office of Residence Life has led a leadership development program for the last three years, but this semester it gets a shiny new title: Converge. Farrington said there are a number of other programs in Lynchburg with the same basic description, and Residence Life wanted to give Liberty’s a name showing how it stands apart.
Senior Resident Director Sheldon Farrington is excited to relate how people have been impacted by the Residence Life workshops. One, he said, was a girl who came to them while dealing with a frustrating job situation.
“She said, ‘I probably would have lost my job on Friday if I had not sat at your workshop on Thursday,’” Farrington said.
“We came to (the name) ‘Converge’ because we have always brought different people together… with different stages in life, different experiences in leadership,” Farrington said.
“We came to (the name) ‘Converge’ because we have always brought different people together… with different stages in life, different experiences in leadership…” – Sheldon Farrington
In the program, students meet in groups of six to eight hosted by their resident director and attend workshops on topics related to a specific leadership competency. Last semester the theme was diversity. This fall the focus is self-understanding, and in the spring it will be responding to change.
Rachel Post, a student, went through the program last year, when it was simply called the Leadership Development Program. She feels the program has helped her prepare for a future career.
“It gives us so many resources to look back on,” Post said. “I have so many notes from last year that I can use when I get a job one day.”
Participants stress that Converge is for all students, not just for those who want to become resident assistants, or even just for those who live on campus. It is for anyone who wants to learn godly leadership skills to apply in every aspect of life.