HDF 190: FIRST YEAR LEADERS INSPIRED TO EXCELLENCE LEADERSHIP PORTFOLIO SPRING 2011 MAGGIE MARTINO

TABLE OF CONTENTS #3- Strengths #4- Opening Statement #5- Self Leadership #6- Leadership Theories #7- Inclusive Leadership #8- Interpersonal/ Organizational Leadership #9- Interpersonal/organizational Leadership

STRENGTHS Top Strengths:  Restorative  Includer  Developer  Empathy  Positivity Values In Action Strengths:  Appreciation Of beauty and Excellence  Creativity, Ingenuity and originality  Fairness, Equity and Justice  Forgiveness and Mercy  Kindness and generosity

OPENING STATEMENT I am from Greenwich, Connecticut and currently a freshman at the university of Rhode Island. I am a business major studying Supply chain management and a Leadership minor. I love to try new things, I’m always up for a challenge and I love meeting new people. Seeing others happy makes me happy, which explains why my top strength from gallup was Restorative, along with includer, developer, empathy, and positivity. My top strength for the VIA was appreciation of beauty and excellence which is very important to me. Appreciation for beauty and excellence can mean two different things. One of them is beauty and I express that threw photography. I have always been involved in photography, it is a great way for me to express my appreciation for beauty because I love to explore the world and find more hidden beauty when I look closer to take a photo. The other side is seeking excellence in people, and I think this is true because I like to looker deeper into things and value what’s beneath the surface. Meeting someone new is thrilling to me because I love learning more about people and learning what is special about them. As a student at URI I would really like to get myself very involved for next semester. My goals are to become an orientation, a member of the WOWW program, and I’d like to study abroad. I am happy to be taking the FLIGHT class because I know it will help me push myself to get more involved, and help me learn more about who I am everyday.

SELF LEADERSHIP Outcome : Student will demonstrate practice of the personal values statement Evidence: My Photography After taking the VIA characters survey I got results that I could not agree with more. My top value was appreciation of beauty and excellence and my other values concluded that I believe in fairness, forgiveness, kindness and creativity. This says a lot about me as a person because I truly believe in these values, I feel personally hurt when others are down and I’m always trying to make things better for everyone. To me appreciation for beauty and excellence can mean two different things. One of them is photography, since I was a child I was taking film photographs because my dad did photography and taught me. Photography for me is a way to see the world in its beauty, because every time you take a photo you are forced to look at the things around a little bit closer each time. I get the biggest feeling of happiness when I find a place that most people don’t even know of, whether that means me traveling on a road trip to visit a place or going for a walk and taking a new path. Photography is a great way for me to express my appreciation for beauty because I find new appreciations and it gives me a extraordinary feeling. Another way I look at Appreciation of beauty of excellence is when I focus more on the excellence side. In my life I have had this thing that I have yet to explain, but most of my friends now were before strangers that I picked up when they were at unhappy time in their lives. I never noticed it at the time, but when I look back I remember this feeling I had when first meeting my current friends. I believe it was a little bit of all my values that brought me to do that. Though at the time it was just me wanting to talk to them, I now believe it was because I saw they were left out from the rest of the students because they weren’t as nicely dressed or were quite in classrooms. I had some type of attraction to that and found every moment I spent with them was interesting, the conversations did not include the boring gossip around school and the places we went were better then the popular hangouts. I think a lot of people, especially in my old high school do not appreciate that kind of excellence, but me having that value really made me who I am because of all the things I learned, seen and experienced.

LEADERSHIP THEORIES Outcome : Student will describe personal application to “Servant Leadership” Target Class: HDF 190 Evidence : Habitat for Humanity club picture. In high school I was apart of the Habitat for Humanity club. I think Habitat for Humanity is a great example of being a servant leader. Our school went to areas where there were families in need of help and my club met once a week to think of ways to raise money for them. I remember my first habitat build was a big eye opener for me; the family was there at the site, one mom and two young girls. When I saw the family I realized it was more then all the talk and it was more then the club. We were making a house for a family in need, and they couldn’t show their appreciation any greater. When I look back I believe we demonstrated Servant Leadership because we wanted to know what they needed, and the only way to do that was to listen. I think we showed all 10 characteristics of what a servant leadership is. We were an active listener to the families, had empathy for what they have been threw and used healing to bring them a new life. We were aware that there were families in need and we persuaded others to join and together we did all of this to build a better community and heal families.

INCLUSIVE LEADERSHIP Outcome: Student will describe personal examples of being a change agent Target Class: HDF 190 Evidence: Picture of Binny Park. I demonstrated social change in my hometown when I took a leadership role in cleaning up the local park called Binny Park. Binny Park is where all the prom pictures are taken, where kids play and hang out, where all different sports teams played and where many have to walk or drive past. The most beautiful part of the park was the lake, but it was so trashed no one wanted to play near it. One day when my friends and I were at the park we thought someone should clean it up, and then decided that we should clean it up. We were committed to this idea and congruent, we immediately thought of ideas to go about this and tried to make it fun. We decided to borrow rowboats, big trash barrels and pool cleaning nets. As the day got closer more people heard about it and we all had a common purpose because we all liked to use this field and kids from the sports teams got involved. As we were cleaning the locals stopped by, some with their kids and watched, and we all did it for the community to create change. I was very proud to start this project on my own idea and commit to it to make that change.

INTERPERSONAL/ ORGANIZATIONAL LEADERSHIP Outcome: Student Will describe personal examples of preparing for and being interviewed Target Class : HDF 190 Evidence: Leadership Institute application Just today I was involved in an interview to be apart of the leadership institute mentors! I have been in interviews before for things like my past job, my current internship and other interviews that I have experienced in college. Some have been casual, some exciting and some can be very difficult. The most difficult one I have had was difficult because it was 4 hours long and I have never experienced one on one questioning for that long before. With that being the most difficult interview I have had yet, it that makes me feel pretty good about myself at interviews. The Simple trick is confidence and I have never gone into an interview with out it. Anyone could gain confidence, I gain it from preparation, and being in the right mindset. If it is a one on one interview I have written questions to ask the interviewer in the past and thought about the type of questions they might ask me. Bringing questions to the interview shows them that I am interested, and have thought a lot about the job and it helps me be more calm because I know I wont run out of things to say and will not have to be afraid about that. When I think about questions they might ask me I think about what the job is, what they are looking for and most importantly I think of everything I have done in the past because if there is a question it is best to answer with an experience. On top of that I come in dressed nicely, I show my real personality and keep a big friendly smile on my face.

INTERPERSONAL/ ORGANIZATIONAL LEADERSHIP Outcome : Student will describe personal examples of using techniques to work effectively with difficult people. Target Class : HDF 190 Evidence: Internship Certificate At the very last part of my high school career us seniors were able to choose to go on to an internship. I made that choice and decided to become an art department intern for the middle school I had attended. This was a very interesting experience for me because it was my first time being in control of a large amount of kids. The time spent was fun and difficult at the same time and I learned a great deal. Working with kids ages in a school as summer was approaching was not an easy task. I had plenty of kids who always made it clear that the class they were taking was mandatory and had no care or respect by the end of the hot day. When it came to a situation that there was a kid out of hand, or distracting the other students I would first go up to them myself, and nicely inform them that what they are doing is wrong and why, and ask them to please stop as a warning. If that still didn’t work I would inform my mentor exactly what has been happening and she would either give another warning or have a punishment for the kid depending on what the situation was. Most importantly we praised the kids that were behaving, and always kept positive. A lot of the things I said were like “You can do it” and go over the assignment personally, and clearly, or things like “If you concentrate on this and get it done correctly you will be able to play outside as soon as it is completely finished. Therefore, kids that usually behaved were able to have their play time, kids that have a hard time concentrating had a great motivation and the kids who continued on misbehaving punished themselves and they will learn from that easier.