What’s the view like from the top?
Why, ask Emmy Award-winning journalist, historian, publisher and producer, Dr. Janus Adams. Ask New Jersey Senator Linda Greenstein. Ask Dr. Margarita Camacho, a surgical director at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center. Ask any of the impressive array of speakers scheduled to present at Ridge’s first Women’s Leadership Summit (WLS) this December.
You must have noticed the WLS’s clever, meme-infused advertisement posters peppered across school walls. Has one ever caught your eye and made you curious about the event?
The Women’s Leadership Summit will be a one-day conference in which a host of guest speakers will present short, inspiring speeches. The summit’s aim is to empower the young women of Basking Ridge, to encourage big thinking, leadership qualities, high self-esteem, and confidence. Too often do young girls feel hedged in by stereotypes, shackled by the prophecies of others that say they cannot be this or cannot do that.
The Women’s Leadership Summit is organized and masterminded entirely by a dedicated, passionate group of Ridge High students. Their mission is to spread the word that girls can be this and can do that—girls already have. Their mission is to spread the word that women know the view from the top, from the summit of the mountain, and that young girls can climb up there, too.
One of WLS’ vice presidents, Lianna Shimoun ‘16, elaborates on the club’s goal: “Our mission is to promote the leadership of young women in the community. The summit is focused on allowing girls to become aware of their own abilities to succeed in whatever they want to do, ignoring social stereotypes and the preconceived notions of other people.”
When summer first started, Luca Jobbágy ‘16, the WLS’s president and founder, began uniting a group of girls that would work on making the WLS a reality. “Organizing the summit,” Jobbágy explains, “has been a rollercoaster of opportunities and learning, allowing me to push the limits of what I thought I was capable of and presenting me with countless unique learning abilities.”
It’s been a long road, from finding speakers to finding sponsors, from designing a logo to designing a website, but they’ve done it; the summit is on December 14th.
The Ridge population has received the WLS very positively thus far. Many Ridge students have expressed excitement for it.
“I think leadership summit is great,” states Elizabeth Williams ’17. “I think it will inspire many of the young women of ridge to really strive for greatness.”
Register online or in the main office! Register because, as Shimoun puts it, “girls should understand that they have the power to be who they want to be and that nothing should hold them back.”
If you wish to learn more about the WLS, please visit their website at: