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(File photo/northeastNOW Staff)
MUCC SLC

‘Write Your Own Story’: MUCC to host 2021 Student Leadership Conference

Jan 12, 2020 | 12:00 PM

The provincial Student Leadership Conference (SLC) will soon return to Melfort for the first time in 25 years.

Melfort and Unit Comprehensive Collegiate (MUCC) will host the event from Sept. 15 to 17, 2021.

Vice-Principal Michelle Strube-Hauser told northeastNOW staff learned they would host the conference about a month ago.

“Before we did a big announcement to the community we kind of wanted a few of the details ironed out, but we are very, very excited,” Strube-Hauser said.

MUCC student representatives and advisors have attended the conferences over the years, but it’s the first time Melfort has hosted since 1996.

“We decided it was time to pay it forward a little bit and do our part in hosting one of these,” she said.

The next conference is being held in Gull Lake, Sask. and the representatives from MUCC will be there to make a formal presentation inviting everyone to the 2021 event in Melfort.

The theme for the 2021 SLC will be ‘Write Your Own Story’.

Strube-Hauser said the conferences usually start Wednesday afternoon after school, and about 650 to 700 students and advisors are invited.

Students are grouped together and billeted in the host community. A major component of the Student Leadership Conferences is the keynote speakers. Some of the well-known examples of past conferences include We Day co-founder Craig Kielburger, motivational speakers Mark Scharenbroich and Alvin Law, and former hockey player and abuse survivor Theo Fleury.

There are also smaller sessions for students during the event.

Strube-Hauser said they hope to invite back several former Melfort students and community members to present to the students about how they found their own story.

“We’re wanting people in the areas of art, science, medicine, broadcasting, so we’re trying to make it fairly diverse,” she said.

The conference also consists of a banquet and a dance, before students leave on the Friday.

Strube-Hauser said the excitement is building for the event.

“The staff have been awesome. We’ve slowly been starting and making our committees,” she said. “It will be this year’s Grade 10’s that will be in Grade 12 that year. They are just an awesome, awesome group of kids, they’re such good organizers in that class and they are already jumping on board and starting to figure out what they want to help with.”

Strube-Hauser said they will soon be looking for volunteers and billets, as well as sponsorship to help pay for the keynote speakers and other items. The facilities for the two days are booked, including the Kerry Vickar Centre and the Northern Lights Palace.

Schools in the northeast have significant experience in hosting such an event.

In addition to MUCC hosting in 1996, Tisdale Middle and Secondary School hosted the provincial Student Leadership Conference in 2017 and 2009, while LP Miller in Nipawin played host three times in 2014, 2006, and 1998.

cam.lee@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @camlee1974

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