Legendary football coach Vince Lombardi once said, "Leaders aren't born, they are made. And they are made just like anything else, through hard work." Vince had it almost right. It doesn't hurt to also have guidance from good role models, opportunities from a wide range of activities and even a little fun along the way—all available to you on a Christian college campus. Need some examples of what we mean? Read on.

Two years ago, Katie Stanfield lived at home in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and commuted to Cornerstone University an hour away in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Commuting saved money, but made it difficult for her to take on any on-campus leadership activities.

Then, during her junior year, Katie was offered the position of managing editor for the campus weekly newspaper, The Herald. Since the position required a large time commitment outside of class, Katie moved on campus to become a hands-on leader at Cornerstone.

Katie says holding the leadership position plugged her into the heartbeat of Cornerstone. "I've gotten to know the college a lot better and I've gotten to know a lot of people in the administration," she says. "It's kind of given me an inside perspective on the core of the university."

The position also gave Katie a taste for what a career in journalism would be like. She decided which stories the paper would cover, assigned stories to writers, oversaw a staff of five editors, kept up on the college's current events and news, and edited the paper for content and design problems. Having lived that life for a year, Katie doesn't know if newspaper journalism is for her because of the intense deadline pressure, but she knows she grew a lot by taking the position. "Having to take charge of things on a consistent basis and being able to fulfill all my responsibilities has really helped my organizational and time-management skills," she said.

She also values her leadership experience because she got to interact daily with people, make new friends and talk to interesting faculty and students on campus. "The friends I have from being the newspaper editor aren't necessarily people I would have gotten to know otherwise," she said. "But they have each added a lot to my life."

Perhaps the biggest lesson Katie learned: Leaders cannot be effective unless they maximize the talents of those they lead.

"I had a hard time connecting with one of my staff writers," she said. "She'd turn in stories late and not do real well all the time. Eventually, I got to know her and figured out what she liked to write about. When I started assigning her to cover things she liked, she was just amazing. It's all about finding what people are good at and playing to their strengths. Likewise, as a leader I need to recognize my limits and strengths so I can function at my highest level."

Mike sought a leadership role in Alaska Bible College's student government last year "because there was this stigma that campus leaders really did nothing." He wanted to end the myth that the governing body did little more than plan campus events. And he saw an opportunity to make a real difference.

At the beginning of his sophomore year, Mike was elected student body president at a time of transition—the student government had recently thrown out its old constitution and decided to develop new bylaws. He was intrigued that the student government board was reinventing itself and he wanted to have a hand in the process. "I had a lot of ideas of how I wanted to see the student government really be involved in the academic, social and spiritual lives of the student body," Mike said.

Mike entered office last year committed to working hard and encouraging his fellow leaders to do likewise. One of the first things he did in his year of presidency was create a subcommittee to handle planning activities. That freed the student government members to focus on more serious issues.

One of Mike's biggest concerns when starting his term of duty was the lack of current resources in the library, so he led the student government to allocate an extra $500 to the library. This made it possible for the librarians to order books they wanted but couldn't afford with their current budget. Mike also organized open forums for professors and students to discuss problematic campus issues in a positive and constructive manner. "We identified some things going on and tried to talk them out in order to find good ways to make improvements," Mike said. He also worked with the rest of the student government board to organize a system in which student tutors could qualify for the school's work-study program.

Mike, a biblical studies and Christian ministry double major, learned valuable leadership lessons as president. First of all, he quickly realized that leadership means being a servant. He's demonstrated this commitment to service by volunteering with a local church's youth group and even in his job at the college library. "The higher you get in responsibility, the lower you should actually become to the people around you—making an effort to serve rather than be served," he said. To him, this means viewing himself as a helper. At one class barbecue, Mike volunteered to do all the grilling in order to take stress off of his party committee.

At the time of his interview with Campus Life, Mike was unsure about whether or not he'd run for a second year as president during his junior year. He said that it was a decision he had to make carefully. "I don't want to run for president again just to fulfill a prideful ambition, but because I want to do good things for the student body," he said.

Mike said he tries to stay humble as a leader by focusing not on himself but on the bigger picture: God's will and what's best for others. "Just being there for people and praying for them—those are the things that are most rewarding about this job," he says.

Want to be a leader? Don't break the egg! As weird as it sounds, that was a "test of leadership" Scott Angelo endured last year so he could become a Resident Assistant (R.A.) at Nebraska's Grace University.

With a small group of other R.A. hopefuls, Scott, now a senior intercultural studies major, worked to build a protective container from toothpicks and straws. The container had to prevent an unboiled egg from cracking when dropped. But the test really wasn't about building a crack-proof egg container. As each group constructed their egg holder, the dean of men and the dean of women observed how applicants related to other people, how they took initiative, and how leaders stepped up.

Scott's leadership abilities in the exercise impressed the deans. But they didn't really surprise Scott because he'd already had much experience as a campus leader. When he was a freshman, Scott became a captain on Grace's basketball team—a role that was intimidating but prepared him for future success as a leader. "The first year of being captain was a challenge," Scott says. "I had to step up and take leadership among juniors and seniors. That was hard. But I soon realized that this opportunity and responsibility had been given to me, and so I should just run with it and not worry."

When Scott became an R.A. last year, he learned that not all leadership positions are the same or require the same skills. In fact, he says he discovered his leadership style as R.A. was less about leading than it was about learning—and growing—through relationships. "It's your job to get to know the guys in your hall," Scott says. "It's a great position that almost forces you—or at least makes it easier—to just walk into a guy's room and talk about life."

These conversations gave Scott a means to gently lead and challenge the guys in his hall. For instance, one casual talk about what Christians can do about world hunger led to six guys all sponsoring a child through a relief organization. By learning to lead through relationships, Scott also learned how to be a spiritual leader, articulate his faith, and explain scripture. He said his leadership would often take the shape of simply recommending books or by being there for the guys on his floor when they needed him.

Scott's growing leadership abilities helped him also become the official spiritual leader of the basketball team last year. Scott would lead the team in a devotional before each game—an experience he views as vital to his own spiritual growth: "The first couple of times I was a little unsure of myself and worried about how the devotions were going to go," Scott remembers, "but by the end I felt totally comfortable speaking my mind and heart."

As Scott looked toward his senior year, he carefully considered another lesson he learned as a leader: not taking on too much responsibility. "In the future I want to narrow my activities down to a couple of things I feel strongly about," Scott says. "Instead of taking on everything and only succeeding at some of it, I want to carefully select the activities I do so that I'll be the best leader I can be."

Stefanie DeBellis had been a part of her high school's student council, so when she began her freshman year at Roberts Wesleyan University in Rochester, New York, she quickly began thinking about running for class president. She worried, though, that leadership in college wouldn't come as easily as it did in high school. But she soon dis- covered that her fears were unwarranted. "When I saw how easy it was for me to be outgoing in college," Stefanie explains, "I was convinced I should run."

Stefanie won the election last year and has since been re-elected as the class president for this year as well.

Stefanie's goal for participating in her class's student leadership has always been to foster a sense of class unity and fellowship. She tried to create community by planning monthly class activities. Building that sense of community was her greatest accomplishment, she says. "As each monthly class activity went on from October to April last year," Stefanie explains, "more people started to participate and our class unity grew with each activity—a good thing to see happen since bringing everyone together in a community is really our purpose."

Stefanie also hopes to use her leadership opportunity to make improvements in the student government. For instance, she hopes to improve the class council's money management. Last year the student government failed to raise enough funds to continue the long-held tradition of funding the senior class trip. "We didn't have enough to pay for their transportation to Key West," Stefanie says. "Next year I want to get to the point where we can at least provide that. I just want to spend the money wisely."

Being a campus leader has meant more than just strengthening Roberts Wesleyan College, though. "I think I've become closer to the Lord through the position because of the people I've gotten to know and interact with," Stefanie says.

Copyright © 2005 by the author or Christianity Today International/Campus Life magazine.
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