By Damien Walker – Contributor

When the bus left for the Leadership Retreat on Oct. 13, 2023, I anticipated a fun weekend where I could meet new people and talk about leadership. I had no expectations. Fortunately, the weekend was packed, and I mean packed. It included activities and speakers who taught us how to unleash our superpowers, which was the theme of this year’s retreat.

Katie Bibbs, the academic coach and leadership development facilitator at Bishop’s, hosted the retreat. On the first night we had wonderful speakers, Prof. Jessica Riddell and Heather Lawford. Both discussed the differences between Marvel superheroes and how they’re all unique, pointing out the fact that not all leaders are the same. However, their big idea for the night was generativity; an idea that would follow us for the rest of the weekend.

That night, we had a campfire where we got the opportunity to hear fellow student Gia Clarke’s beautiful voice and guitar playing, as well as others and all the people who joined in on the sing-alongs.

Saturday morning started with a very emotional and empowering story from Ahmed Hamdan, a Bishop’s alumnus. Ahmed inspired me, and I’m sure everyone else in that room, to make the world a better place or at the very least try to.

Following the keynote speaker, we divided into breakout sessions where we had the opportunity to learn effective communication with Emily Whalley, learn to cultivate confidence with Shakina Blackstock-Pearce or learn community building with Shawna Chatterton-Jerome. 

After these, we took a lunch break where we could relax and prepare to come back for a narrative métissage activity hosted by Amy Abe. Narrative métissage is an arts-based method of learning that uses stories to uncover knowledge. This exercise was a wonderful experience, and I am incredibly grateful to have done it with two other students whom I had never met before this retreat. Our prompt was: “Stand Up or Stand Behind.” We were able to see just how similar, complementary or opposite our experiences were, which made for an enlightening experience in connecting with people.

As eventful as the Saturday was, it was not over yet. We had one more activity with Enzo Evangelisti and Kassandra Gilmour to address the difference between leaders and leadership. Something that Enzo said and which stuck with me, is that “Leadership is relational, not positional.” It was a simple sentence, yet, I believe it can have a big impact on how people perceive leadership. Hopefully, this encourages you, the reader, to seek leadership or possibly apply to next year’s leadership retreat.

Naturally, Saturday night ended with another campfire. This time, Gigi and Hugh, two other students, hosted the game Werewolf, during which we got to see the competitive and funny sides of everyone. It is a game I highly recommend playing with your friends.

Sunday, our final day, began with a UNESCO Story Circles Intercultural Communications tool hosted by Annick Corbeil. This was a tool to develop active listening skills. Here, we went around in circles of four to five and talked about who we admired as a leader. 

We finished that Sunday morning with Katie Bibbs, who asked us to reflect on the weekend and ourselves, a task that came more easily to some than others. Overall, this experience is something that I would recommend to everyone, as I already have with my friends. Katie Bibbs and everyone who helped organize this retreat did a fantastic job. I can say with confidence that everyone who attended, came back feeling more confident in their leadership skills and potential.