Leading Through Middle School

Through a peer leadership class and student council at Hilsman Middle School, students learn leadership skills from teacher and advisor Barbara Gaertig. These opportunities teach students how to lead in their school, community and beyond through volunteering, doing community service and attending conventions. 

Gaertig founded the student council in 2019, starting off with only 18 people. In their first year, they attended the Georgia Association of Student Councils Convention Summit before the Covid-19 pandemic struck. During the pandemic, the council continued meeting online. When in-person instruction resumed, the size of the council grew dramatically. 

During the 2021-22 school year, Hilsman added the peer leadership class to their connections classes, encouraging students to use their voices and become more involved in the school community. The class’ pilot year only had 16 students enrolled, and as the program continues to grow in its fourth year, the class has over 120 students with two connections periods for each grade with most of the students also participating in student council. 

“Our mission in the student council is to lead our school community and support our community outside. We wanted our students to be leaders in the school, so through the leadership program, we started mentoring at Gaines Elementary School,” Gaertig said.

Both the leadership classes and student council have impacted Hilsman’s atmosphere. Students learn how to have positive attitudes and mindsets to help their school thrive. Since the school started facilitating these leadership opportunities, teachers and students observe that there has been an increase in kindness toward peers. 

Eighth grade math teacher Conor Naughton sees the student council as a great opportunity for students. 

“Our eighth graders are meant to be our leaders and our role models in the building, and so giving them more opportunities to develop those leadership skills has been really helpful and powerful,” Naughton said. 

Naughton also says he has noticed more maturity and academic growth in the students as the council has developed. 

“Students who might be underachieving academically start taking leadership and then kind of transform and start improving their academics drastically, I think, because they’re learning how to lead others but also learning how to lead themselves,” Naughton said.

Hilsman has emphasized more leadership and social-emotional learning (SEL) in the years since the program began. Every Monday, students in Extended Learning Time have advisement focusing on social-emotional learning and a new curriculum called Leader in Me. Similar to peer leadership, this subject matter has become a norm at Hilsman. Leader in Me focuses on nurturing student leadership, and helps to build trust in school and boost academic performance. The program has also been introduced during advisement at Cedar Shoals.

Luca McDonald, seventh grade representative for the Hilsman student council, believes that the popularity of the student council is due to the ideals that it spreads. 

“When we started the student council, there were not a lot of people. Now there are over 60. People want to join the student council, not just because it’s fun, but because it spreads positivity,” McDonald said.

Student council and peer leadership offer students volunteer opportunities such as Panther Pals, a mentoring experience to visit neighboring Gaines Elementary School to read and conduct activities with younger students. Similarly, Panther Pals allows students to tutor other students at Hilsman, making them part of the overall team. 

These activities tie back to the peer leadership curriculum. The 6th grade “Career awareness through the art of self leadership” class gives students opportunities to identify their interests, abilities and personality traits and how they relate to career planning. The course aims to help students understand the value and importance of work through activities that promote self awareness, self-management skills, leadership, teamwork, career exploration and educational planning related to students’ future educational and career plans.

The seventh grade course “Junior leadership core 1” focuses on leadership skills through nine important areas to build student confidence and grow their leadership skills. The nine areas include self awareness, self regulation, goal setting, listening, communication (verbal, written and nonverbal), team building, critical thinking and problem solving.

In eighth grade, students enroll in “High school peer facilitation,” covering the prior class with more depth as well as peer mentoring. 

Past Hilsman peer leadership students and student council members who now attend Cedar Shoals say that these opportunities in middle school have helped them in their high school life. These students are happy with the leadership, responsibility and self discipline that the middle school leadership programs taught them. 

“It taught me that you’re going to have to deal with people for the rest of your life and learn how to work with them, even if you don’t particularly like them. You just have to learn how to cooperate and grow together with other people,” Cedar Shoals freshman Elaina Whitehead said about her experience in the Hilsman program.

Freshman Sarah Hodges has seen ways that student council has helped her in her high school career as well. 

“Student council helped me see what would be different in high school and how I could prepare myself as well as how I could try my best to advocate for my needs as a student,” Hodges said.

Whitehead also explained how her communication skills have advanced from student council to high school. 

“It helped me, because if you don’t ask for something, or you can’t just think about something and not get it done like you have to ask (for help). And it doesn’t really matter if they don’t like it, it has to be done,” Whitehead said.

Hilsman eighth grader Aiden Brown feels prepared for high school because he learned that asking questions is a valuable aspect of learning in student council. 

“I like being very outgoing, answering questions when I first ask. I learned not to be nervous or scared, because no question is a bad question,” Brown said.

Teachers feel that they can lean toward these student leaders, and students feel like they are involved in their school community.

“We feel a lot better about the decisions that we make as a school if we know that our student leaders are behind it as well and have had some input on that. So I think just at the school level, adult wise, it helps a lot having those student leaders give that input into our decisions. On an even bigger level, though, just the increased confidence and kind of pride that a lot of our students who are in those clubs and groups do and demonstrate is just so impressive,” Naughton said.