The Lightning Leaders is a group of students nominated by staff, self, or other students who serve Long Reach High School as school ambassadors. Their role is to serve the school community by making everyone feel welcome. One of their duties is to assist new students. They show them around the school and eat lunch with them, acting as buddies to support them through their first couple weeks of school. Another one of their duties is to serve as event support for various events at Long Reach, like Back to School Night, eighth grade orientation, awards assemblies, and graduation.

One of the biggest reasons lightning leaders exist is for community building, but why does that matter? Well, according to Panorama Education, community building is important to create a sense of belonging for students, especially new students. Students feeling like they are a part of a community can help alleviate feelings of isolation and can help them feel supported. This support bleeds into another benefit of community building, which is improved academic performance. It is linked to reduced absences, higher graduation rates, and higher grades. Community building can also help students prepare for the real world. Being a part of a community gives students room to practice empathy, cooperation, and conflict resolution. School spirit is also shown to improve when community building increases. This means there is more involvement in school activities, such as clubs or sport games. Also linked to this is reduced bullying. When a community becomes close knit it is more likely for people to look out for each other and report bullying. The last benefit I will list here is that a strong school community will create a strong support system during a student’s individual challenges. Whether it’s social challenges, academic, or personal, a tight knit community makes it easier for someone to go through these events. It can make students more resilient when they realize that they have their peers to turn to when facing these challenges.

All of this talk of community building begs the question, do lightning leaders actually foster a community that is close enough to result in these effects? I asked some students about this and here’s how they responded. They chose to stay anonymous. For the first question I asked if they knew about lightning leaders and what they do. The majority of them did not know what they did or who they were. Then, after telling them what they did I asked them if they had witnessed any of these actions happening around them. And in response to this question and the fact that Lightning Leaders sometimes help run concerts and plays, one interviewee said, “I’ve only seen people in tech club working concerts.” They also said that as a freshman they were not approached or helped by any Lightning Leader. And in response to my last question, would you ever consider being a Lightning Leader? She responded with yes, she would consider it because she wants to help other students. 

From these interviews and examination of the benefits of community it is clear that the idea of Lightning Leaders is beneficial for students. There is student interest and potential in the program. However, it is clear also through the interviews that the program needs improvement. Whether with more participants or more activities. But overall there is a lot of potential to use this program to make Long Reach a more inclusive and fun community.