On Wednesday, December 3rd, our school’s Principal Leadership Group went to Commack High School for the Compassion without Borders Conference.

There they got to hear from a motivational speaker who not only is a retired NBA player, but is now a high school history teacher and a motivational speaker for the NFL team, the Giants.

His name is Gian Paul Gonzalez and he is best known for helping the Giants win the Superbowl in 2012 with two powerful words, “All In”.

Gian Paul Gonzalez is always trying to help people, and he started with kids in the juvenile detention center, giving them
something to put the anger and aggression to, basketball.

Gian Paul named the team Hope + Future and since then he is the Founder and Executive Director of Hope + Future Foundation, a community center for kids to go to clear their minds and just have fun.

The Principal Leadership Group also was split into breakout rooms with different schools all over Long Island and engaged in activities regarding leadership and compassion. They drew what they thought a leader resembled and worked together to get to know people
from different schools.

Most people in our school don’t know we have a principal leadership group or how to get involved with it, Dr. Rusielewicz, our principal, and the leader/administrator running the group talks about what it means to be involved in the group and what the principal leadership group is.

“I started this group about 15 years ago and I wanted a diverse group of students from all grades that were personable and who would benefit from other students and their ideas to improve our school by the student voice”.

Now the question, how do you get picked to be in the principal leadership group? Dr. Rusielewicz says, “It happens in many different ways. Throughout various functions and conversations, I interact with many students. When I see their potential for leadership, I will ask if they want to become more involved or I’ve had kids who were in the group tell me that their friend wanted to be in it and would assist us in the group, either way I just want students that were well-rounded and want to help other students improve our school.”

The principal leadership group is “also a way that gives students an opportunity to show colleges leadership through college essays and applications,” Dr. Rusielewicz adds.

Piper Ludyny, a student in the Principal Leadership group, expresses what the group means to her and her experience at the conference. “The Principal Leadership group gives me a greater outlook on different schools and how they are run by the conferences we go to, and I like hearing from different guest speakers and their stories”.