Holistic Development
Servant Leadership
You will be immersed in a discussion-based course examining the key principles of Servant Leadership by Dave Kuhnert. Led by the intern coordinators, these discussions will teach you how to integrate the concepts of servant leadership into your everyday life. Servant Leadership is the bedrock of Convention of States, and it will serve as the cornerstone of everything else you learn in the Emerging Leaders Program.
Professional Development
Through monthly workshops and hands-on assignments, you will learn how to improve your professional portfolio like your resume, cover letter, and interview skills. You’ll learn skills like networking, public speaking, fundraising, and so much more. Part of your training will include a series of mock interviews with national staff members with years of experience to equip you for a budding career.
Western Civilization
A key portion of the development aspect of the Emerging Leaders Program is a study of the history of Western Civilization. This knowledge is key to understanding and defending the founding principles of the United States of America. As Americans, we won’t understand who we are and why we’re here until we understand where we came from. You will read texts by Aristotle, Cicero, Marcus Aurelius, Martin Luther, Thomas Hobbes, and John Locke, among others. These discussions will delve into monumental ideas such as justice, law, liberty, duty, and their role in American political society. Through these discussions, you’ll come to learn and understand what really built the West.
Constitutional Development
Next, you will learn about the founding origins of the American Constitution through the Patriot Academy Constitution Alive! course. Through video lectures and group discussion, this training will equip you with the knowledge you need to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution from modern attacks.
Statesmanship
The last segment of the ELP curriculum consists of a series of case studies of prodigious American statesmen. You will read about James Madison, Henry Clay, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, and others and assess how they used the virtue of prudence in their political decisions, and how you can apply those lessons to the modern American political landscape.
Why does this matter? One of our former interns said it best:
“Statesmanship should not be reserved for the politician only. Politicians are temporary, and rarely trade today’s pleasures for tomorrow’s triumphs. America is made up of and built upon the everyday patriot. It is the everyday patriot who has lived and breathed and sacrificed and suffered and died for his country… Ultimately, each one of us is an everyday patriot, and a statesman unto our country.”
Weekly Structure
Throughout the program, you will engage with the ELP leadership team on a biweekly basis for a one-hour personal mentorship and discussion call. These conversations will dive into some personal development by talking about your life, your goals, your purpose, and how to navigate the rough waters of life to best fulfill your calling.
You will also engage in a two-hour weekly call with the whole intern class for a Socratic-style discussion of the curriculum for that week. The goal of this call is to come together and share ideas about how to better ourselves through the practice of self-governance for the purpose of growing our leadership and sharpening our worldview. Our goal is not the accumulation of knowledge, but rather the attainment of wisdom. We do not want you to come to our calls with all the right answers, but rather with a holy curiosity and a passionate pursuit of the True, Good, and Beautiful.