(11/2003) - Seventy-one percent of American high school students go to schools of one thousand or more, according to the U.S. Department of Education. Yet, everything we know about the needs of families and adolescents says smaller is better—for the uniqueness of young people, for their achievement, for feelings of connection, for their sense of self.

Over a recent school break, standing in line for 45 minutes for entry to the Museum of Natural History in New York, I had ample time to read and re-read a statement on the wall by Theodore Roosevelt. The final line was, “Character, in the end, is the deciding factor in the life of an individual and nations alike.” Leadership is the practice of character.

At the opening of every school year, I meet with the seniors to talk with them about their leadership in the coming year. By virtue of their seniority, they are leaders; that’s their public image at school.

Leadership means doing the right thing. It is a function, not of popularity, but of clarity, conviction and, ultimately, courage. No leader gets it right every time, nor is there a foolproof formula for leadership success.

At that first meeting with seniors, we talk about what choices one has with the power that accompanies leadership, the choices to use the power (do good), to abuse the power (do harm), or to lose the power (abdicate altogether). But the power is there and it is theirs, like it or not, want it or not.

I tell them about a Wolof proverb I learned in Senegal, West Africa: ku juko yayo, war’nge yayo se morum. The first person to wake up should wake up his friend. In the life of the school, the seniors are the first class to wake up metaphorically, to set the tone for younger students, to be at the top, where the perspective and the responsibility are the broadest.

The seniors, like most of us, tend to think that leadership is only for some, but Shakespeare tells us, in the character of Toby Belch, who says in “Twelfth Night,” that some men are born to greatness, some men achieve it, and some men have it thrust upon them. The same is true of leadership, which, like greatness, takes many forms. The practice of leadership can be public or private; it can be political or professional or personal. With a variety of vehicles and venues, we teach our girls here in Farmington to be intentional, not accidental, leaders.

Where leadership is required is where there is conflict or crisis or confusion, where there are choices to be made, where ambiguity prevails, where courage is essential. Students manifest their leadership, regardless of what they may feel or fear, when they give a heartfelt talk, when they say the painful but true things in a discipline case, when they organize a peace march, when they urge their peers to be thoughtful and appreciative of the kitchen staff, when they intervene when one student is being disrespectful of another, when they go out of their way to say something nice to someone still too shy to make friends easily, when they set an example for others to follow.

Teaching leadership to every girl, not just those who aspire to it or those who are elected to it, but every girl, is inherent in our school mission. Leadership is part of the curriculum, explicitly and implicitly. It’s central to each girl’s education and her experience at Miss Porter's School. What better beginning for her to make her mark in the world beyond?