(COVINGTON, La.)– Members of Lasallian Youth Leaders (LYL) from St. Paul’s School participated in a Lasallian Student Leaders conference this past summer at St. Mary’s College in Moraga, Calif., with the purpose of developing new leadership skills while having a week’s worth of fun and socializing with other student leaders from across the province.

“What I liked the most was the sense that everyone there was just family,” LYL president, Patrick Napier said, “because everyone is coming from a Lasallian school, and it really just made it easier to connect with people since you have that one common analogy between everyone.”

All schools that attended understand the Lasallian Five Core Principles, and each principle is lived out. The five core principles consist of: faith in the presence of God, quality education, respect for all persons, concern for the poor and social justice, and inclusive community.

“We had seminars just about every day,” SPS Student Body President William Murphy said. “For instance, I had ‘Facilitation,’ ‘Negotiation,’ and ‘Time Management.’ Even though I already knew a thing or two about seminars, I was blown away by the pure information and advice I learned.”

St. Paul’s students and faculty alike recognize the benefits of this conference. The students from SPS who attended this conference now have the ideas and abilities to help make SPS a better place for its students.

“Lasallian Student Leaders continues to impress annually,” Campus Minister Jeff Ramon said. “It is always beautiful to see Young Lasallians from such a large geographical area connect to share ideas that they can bring back to their school communities.”

Students will bring these new ideas to their schools and will help make change in their school community. The attendees from SPS were Patrick Napier, Reagan Hill, Yehya Elkersh, Connor McCarthy, A.J LaCroix, William Murphy, Ethan Hopel, and Jordan Wyble. Moderators during the conference included Jeff Ramon and 2012 graduate of St. Paul’s, Andrew Mullet.