Undergraduate / "the National Young Leaders Conference" Stanford--Intellectually Engaging Experience [3]

Stanford students are widely known to possess a sense of intellectual vitality. Tell us about an idea or an experience you have had that you find intellectually engaging. 250 words or less

Every day we woke up by six in the morning and did not finish that day's planned simulations until 11 at night. As a group, the scholars of the National Young Leaders Conference followed this hectic schedule of non-stop activities for ten days, while also learning what it takes to be a leader. These activities were academically taxing, pushing our intellectual endurance to the limit. In the summer of 2009, I attended this conference in Washington D.C. It consisted of 320 scholars being separated into 20 different groups, or LGM's, Leadership Group Meetings. While we were in our LGM, we would undergo simulations of political situations involving foreign policy, Supreme Court law, or presidential power. In addition to these simulations, we would discuss our opinions on different political views and our preconceived notions about political parties. We were pushed to expand our intellectual horizons and truly do the research before assuming, what we thought, were facts, though they were based on what we heard from others. The conference was centered on the idea of us forming our own thoughts and opinions through meticulous study. This experience was enlightening, because though I was aware that my opinions were influenced by others, I did not realize the full extent of how much of my knowledge was based on purely what people told me. The NYLC was an intellectually engaging experience because of how it impelled me to research for myself to form the ideas that have made me who I am.