Gavilan Joint Community College District
Preparing Students for a Successful Future
Gavilan College Hosts Two-Day Youth Leadership Conference
During the summer, students from area high schools and gavilan college attended the fi rst gavilan college
youth leadership conference to learn leadership and organizational skills.
D
r. Kathleen Rose, Superintendent/President of
Gavilan College, addressed students by saying,
“When i started my leadership journey 40
years ago, I didn’t wake up and decide to be a college
president. My leadership journey began with simply
living my life every day. Just like you are doing.”
She asked students to turn to the person next to
them and name a leader. The room filled with student
responses. What do leaders do? She asked. Do we need
better leaders? Do you see yourself as a future leader,
and how? With each question, students throughout the
room offered their responses.
“Now together,” she said, inviting a collective response
from her audience, “try this out –I am a leader!”
The conference was the brainchild of Attorney Elvira
Zaragoza Robinson, the first Latina attorney hired by
Santa Clara County. She is known statewide for her work
in public law with la Raza. She served on the Gavilan
College Board of Trustees for more than 20 years.
“It was my spanish teacher who encouraged me to
become a lawyer,” Robinson said in her remarks to
the students. “We are here to learn and to be touched
by others.”
Students then heard from the day’s conference
speakers: Pastor G.E. Harris and José Yengue.
Pastor Gerald Harris, a coach, trainer and speaker,
previously worked as a prison warden with 1,500
employees supervising 7,000 inmates. He started life as
an abandoned baby who was raised by his grandmother
in the Central Valley. Growing up, he never expected to
graduate high school, let alone college.
“I have faith in you,” Pastor Harris told the students.
“You are like a picture I have seen a thousand times.”
He emphasized the importance of influence and using it
in a positive way.
José Yengue, an actor and founder of arts for
tomorrow, told students he would teach them some of
the tools famous actors use to bring their characters to
life in front of the camera, “so you can bring your own
characters, as leaders, to life.” Arts for tomorrow was
ABOVE:
Leadership
conference
students surround
the organizers and
speakers on the
first day.
Rolanda Pierre Dixon, Elvira Robinson and Dr. G.E. Harris,
three of the speakers, shared smiles before the program started.
established to harness the transformational and healing
power of the arts.
Keynote speaker Rolanda Pierre Dixon, former
Assistant District Attorney for Santa Clara County for 30
years, shared her path to success. One of four children
raised by a single mother, Dixon saw how hard her
mother worked to earn a nursing degree and support the
family as an LVN. “I had a mother who cared and sisters
coming up behind me,” she said. “Everything I did, my
little sisters were watching me. Setting an example—
that’s a leader.”
On the second day of the leadership conference,
participants heard testimonials from successful college
graduates, gained information about careers from
practicing professionals, and learned about legal
issues affecting young adults and teens. The program
concluded with a question and answer session with the
first day’s workshop leaders.
Gavilan College is 100 years old. Check gavilan.edu for Centennial information
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GILROY • MORGAN HILL • SAN MARTIN
FALL/HOLIDAY 2019
gmhtoday.com