The Lake Norman Chamber of Commerce has accepted twenty area High School Juniors in its 2021-2022 Junior Leadership Lake Norman program. The program, administered by the Chamber of Commerce, is coordinated by the 2020-2021 graduates of the Chamber’s Adult Leadership Lake Norman as a service project. Students will learn more about their community during this intensive and rewarding seven-month long program. The leadership development program was specifically created to inform, motivate and increase the overall awareness of selected high school students through educational seminars and interaction with various decision makers of local businesses, government agencies and civic organizations.

The program is limited to twenty (20) participants. The students were selected on the basis of their previous and potential leadership ability and community involvement. This year’s class (Class XI) includes students from Cannon School, Hough High School, The Community School of Davidson, Lake Norman Charter, and Lake Norman High School.

The students include: Mya Zile, Anna Dula, Andrew Burk, Sydney Peete, Matthew Alge, Molly Bradford, Laurel Coughlin, Carrie Griffin, Sophia Kritzer, Kaitlyn Martinez, Jack McMillan, Lulu Scruggs, Patrick Simon, Harshiv Singh, Jessica Teckenbrock, Leah Whiteside, Sofia Blasucci, Sarah Neely, Max Schwanz, and Luke Thompson.

The program kicked off with a retreat at Rural Hill where students participated in an “Mindful Exercise’, Leadership Socratic Seminar and other teambuilding exercises facilitated by Leela Zile, Laura Lorenz, and Lindsey Small. Welcoming the students was Huntersville Mayor Pro Tem Melinda Bales and Jessica Bustamante, the Executive Director of Rural Hill and host of the retreat.

Junior Leadership is presented by Novant Health. Supporting business sponsors include Tenders Fresh Foods (PDQ), Carolina Office Systems, Duke Energy, EnergyUnited, Jason Colvin – State Farm Insurance, Lepage Johnson eXp Realty, Raymer Kepner Funeral Home and Crematorium, Red 5 Printing, Rural Hill, The McIntosh Law Firm, and The Range at Lake Norman.

Caption: The Lake Norman Chamber has accepted 20 High School Juniors in the 11^th Class of Junior Leadership Lake Norman. The students participated in a team building retreat at Rural Hill in Huntersville. Photo by Bill Russell, Lake Norman Chamber.