McCallie School, YCAP, and Boyz, Inc.wrappped up a successful first annual Leadership Camp this week. YCAP students developed leadership skills and ethics through activities and materials from McCallie School leadership courses and Boyz Inc., an after-school outreach program.
McCallie School Headmaster Dr. Kirk Walker said, "This program marks the beginning of what we feel will be an annual outreach program for boys from economically disadvantaged areas of our community. McCallie School has always been involved in leadership training, and this arrangement takes the history and components of our work and adds complementary partners YCAP and Boyz, Inc. We are very pleased to work with these groups, and I would especially like to thank Jennifer Potter, Ed Snow, and Missy Crutchfield for their efforts and talents in preparing this first year's leadership camp."
Joe Smith, YCAP regional director added, "Both the staff and students of McCallie School have been involved with the YMCA and its YCAP program doing academic tutoring and mentoring for several years now. This week long Leadership Camp held on the campus of the school takes that work to another level. McCallie School is making a real difference in the lives of our community's inner-city, at-risk young people."
The culminating ceremony for the first annual leadership camp featured the debut of the YCAP students in "Circle of Men," a Boyz, Inc. spoken word performance arranged by Ms. Crutchfield. The boys also presented the "Pledge Poles" they designed during the workshop, with the messages "I will never give up" and "I am making a difference."
In a fun moment of celebration at the close of the week, McCallie student leaders James Ward Corn and Julian Nunally had a "dance-off" to the cheers of the students they had been working with during the workshop. James Ward Corn is an incoming McCallie upperclassman who has studied Hip Hop dance with Ballet Tennessee and Julian Nunally is a 2013 McCallie graduate and top track star in Chattanooga who has been awarded a scholarship to Harvard University where he begins this fall.