Light the fire again
By Kim Wilson

Seniors Selah Davis and Sara Grace Turner first got the vision for a student-led leadership conference while they were interning with Drs. John Maxwell and Tim Elmore last summer. They envisioned a conference where students from ORU could learn about igniting a passion for leadership that "burns from within," as the slogan for Ignite says. Their main goal was to spark the leadership passion in everyone to help them discover and nurture those qualities God has given them.

Davis explained that, too many times, leadership is seen as "positional," meaning that leaders are those people who have the occupation or position of being a leader. Examples of this include an RA, a president or CEO. But leadership, according to Davis, is "the core of who a person is" no matter if that person is a housewife, a college student or a bank president.

Launching something as big and novel as the Ignite leadership conference took a lot of planning and praying by the co-visionaries, and also a lot of support from ORU's administration to help things run smoothly. "The administration has been incredible," Davis said. "Dr. Fagin has been our cheerleader."

Funding a conference such as Ignite was no small task either. Davis and Turner spent many hours with business people and top executives explaining their vision. "So many of the executives saw the potential in the students and began pouring themselves into the event," Davis said. Because of contributions from these businesses and corporations, Davis and Turner were able to raise around $12,000.

Many other student volunteers also stepped up to contribute to the planning and execution of Ignite. Davis and Turner organized a meeting with a group of people they knew or had worked with previously to explain what they envisioned for the conference. "We cast the vision and let people come forward who caught on to it," Davis said. The main criteria for choosing people to help direct the conference was passion and talent to complete the task.

Senior Julie Vicena, the director of advertising for the Ignite leadership conference, said that once she heard about what Davis and Turner were planning, she had to be a part of it. Vicena teamed up with senior Angela Smucker to create all the posters, door hangers and fireball-themed flyers that have been distributed around campus. "Our main goal was to take that image of igniting passion and get it into the students' hands," Vicena said.

The speakers for the conference were found through contacts and connections, basically "by the favor of God," Davis said. After hearing about the event, many of the people Davis and Turner spoke with volunteered to come speak at the conference. Considering that many of the speakers attending are used to receiving up to $10,000 for each engagement, this was a great blessing for Ignite.

The Ignite leadership event was designed for college students by college students because, as Davis puts it, college is the prime time to develop skills for the future. "Literally every single tiny piece of the conference has been done by students," Vicena said. Having a completely student-led activity is a new and exciting thing at ORU, and hopefully the Ignite leadership conference will open up the possibility for more student-led activities in the future. Davis and Turner have many great ideas for making the Ignite leadership conference an annual event at ORU. They hope to see other students rise up to take over the conference and catch on to the vision that they have cultivated.

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