2025 Secondary Conferences – Program
THEME: Lead on Behalf of Others
All plenary sessions and electives include presentations, activities, discussions, and leadership games.
Sessions are updated every year so that students can attend numerous years if desired.
**ALL BRAND NEW SESSIONS for 2025**
| 8.45am | Doors Open |
| 9.15am | SESSION 1 |
| Making Our School a Great Place for Others It’s important that student leaders don’t get distracted in seeking out privileges for themselves as leaders. In this topic we will look step-by-step at a new ‘student focused’ version of a famous model known as ‘Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs’. This will reveal ways that students can help meet the practical needs of their peers. Lots of ideas from different schools will be shared through video examples, conversations with other schools, and time for students to propose new ideas for their own school. |
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| 10.45am | Break 1 |
| Morning Tea Optional Session: Top Tips for Time Management Student leaders usually have many responsibilities that demand their time. This short session will give practical strategies to help manage these pressures before it becomes an issue. (This will only go for the first 10-15 minutes of the break so that you can still get some fresh air afterwards.) |
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| 11.10am | SESSION 2 |
| The Responsibilities of a Student Leader New leaders often hear people say “you’ve now got a big responsibility”. But what does this responsibility look like in a practical sense? Whilst this will differ for all schools, this topic will explore three key responsibilities that link to this year’s conference theme. The responsibility of creating school culture, being a voice for all students, and using strengths to help others. |
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| Electives #1 (choose 1) Option 1: Creating School Events that Everybody Can Connect To Every student leadership team wants more students to be involved in the events that they organise. The solution isn’t to just keep putting up more posters. This workshop unpacks practical strategies so that all students feel that an event connects with them personally, leading to greater participation and enthusiasm from everybody. Option 2: Creative Ideas for Your School that Aren't Events Being a student leader should always be more than just organising events, but sometimes it can feel like the events are the fun part. This workshop shares lots of great ideas from other schools to help student leaders add variety to the way in which they positively influence students, the school, and the community. |
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| 12.30pm | Break 2 |
| 1.00pm | SESSION 3 |
| Electives #2 (choose 1) Option 3: Being a Leader Who Supports Others Student leaders should not only think about ‘organising things’. An important part of leadership is having an impact on the people around you. It’s unrealistic to think that a student leader can solve every problem that others are facing, but this workshop has lots of tips for being supportive in a practical way. Option 4: Tackling Something at Our School that Feels Impossible There are things about every school that students want to improve, but it can feel like it would be impossible. This workshop will look at how to approach challenges in a positive way, as well as three practical strategies that give the best possible chance of making a lasting improvement to the school. |
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| 1.45pm | Q&A with GRIP Leadership Team and Final Review |
| 2.15pm | Finish (You can be assured of a prompt 2.15pm finish. We appreciate that departing efficiently for your return journey is important) |
GRIP Leadership reserves the right to make changes to the program in order to make improvements to this conference.