The 2023-2024 cohort of District Leadership Fellows met at SMU for their fall retreat.
District Leadership Fellows were welcomed to SMU for two days of learning, connecting, collaborating and reflecting. After beginning the program online, Fellows welcomed the chance to meet and learn in person.
Day one began with leadership challenge, moved to understanding collective strengths, and included time for each leader to reflect on their mission. Day one ended with dinner and a cake to celebrate three birthdays.
Day two focused on Fellows developing Impact Models for their individual projects. Program Director Dr. Eric G. Bing modeled an active listening approach to interviewing a Fellow to better understand their goal, resources, and activities for their project. Fellows then broke into pairs to interview each other about their goals, resources and activities.
Dr. Bing then modeled a discussion on lead and lag measures before the cohort broke into pairs again to interview each other. The next step was to take all the information gathered in the interviews, and transfer it over to an Impact Model. This was again demonstrated by Dr. Bing before being completed by the cohort. The session ended with a demonstration using ChatGPT as a thought partner to help refine an impact model.
The cohort will continue to meet bi-weekly through the fall, with smaller Peer Groups also meeting bi-weekly for guided discussions. The cohort will return to SMU for a winter retreat in January 2024.
To learn more about Institute for Leadership Impact programs, visit our website, email us at leadershipimpact@smu.edu, and engage with us on Twitter.