Shaugn and Lauren share their experience of the NZAS Leadership camp they attended during the school holidays.

The first week of the April holidays Lauren and myself were offered an amazing opportunity to attend a leadership camp with 40 other Area school student leaders from across New Zealand. 

On this camp at Wainui, students were put into groups of about eight people and challenged with ice breaker challenges and adventure based activities like high ropes, raft making, low ropes and coasteering. Doing these activities we were pushed out of our comfort zones and had to work as a team, this required good teamwork and communication. 

Over the week we were pushed to use our leadership skills that we already had and we learnt new leadership skills such as perseverance and confidence in difficult situations. I am thankful that Oxford Area school gave me this opportunity to be part of this awesome experience. I can use these skills during this year in my Deputy Head Student role, and I can take these skills into the future. I really enjoyed doing all these fun activities and making awesome new friends.
Shaugn Kilgour

Kia ora
On the 19th of April Shaugn and I had the best time away on the Year 12-13 Leadership Camp at Wainui. In this camp I was given so many privileges that I have never done before and may never do again, such as coasteering, raft building and high/low ropes. 

Walking into this camp I set myself many goals. I wanted to gain more confidence in myself and also within group activities, for example being able to share ideas without feeling anxious that my idea wasn't good enough. When I was in my group for low ropes we had to figure out ways as a group to get each other to the other side of the ropes. During this activity I put my ideas out on the table and they were the ones that got us to the other side. When I saw that the idea I came up with actually worked I got a huge sense of achievement and I also felt so proud that I had actually been listened to and people thought that my idea was good. 

When taking part in coasteering I had so many doubts in myself as it was something I thought I would never do because it is out of my comfort zone. However each time I jumped off the rocks I remembered what I wanted to achieve during the camp and why I wanted to go in the first place. My favorite part about leadership camp was the amazing connections I made with people. I have truly made friends for life. I would have happily stayed in the camp for another week!

Lauren Morris