Empowering High School Students to Become Agents of Change

Student Leaders from Clintondale High School Attend think.respect. Youth Summit Focused on Sustainable School Change

Empowered students are vehicles for positive change in their school and in their community.

That was the message delivered to more than 50 high school student leaders, including students from Clintondale High School, at a recent youth summit focused on building and sustaining student advisory councils.  The summit, hosted by The Neutral Zone, was presented to students as a part of the Safe and Supportive Schools think.respect. grant.  think.respect. is an innovative grant from the U.S. Department of Education aimed at improving student learning by coordinating academics along with healthy lifestyles, anti-bullying programs, parent and youth engagement, and other interventions.

“The summit gave our kids the opportunity to spend some time thinking about what was most important to them, in terms of student leadership at Clintondale,” said Gerrie Brown, think.respect. building liaison at Clintondale.  “Creating an advisory council will give our students a chance to get involved in lasting, positive change at the school.”

“We are honored to be participating in the think.respect. grant, and are seeing significant positive changes in our school,” continued Clintondale Superintendent George Sassin.

The Michigan Department of Education (MDE) is implementing funding for the grant, and is monitoring and evaluating the progress made by each school. The success of the 22 Michigan schools, as well as schools from 10 other states participating in the pilot program, will determine if this grant is made available nationwide in the next decade.