The Student Leadership Institute, or SLi, is facing a very different year because of the pandemic. In past years, students would join the program early in the first semester and meet throughout the school year. However, because of COVID-19, SLi took a little longer to start back up again.
Thankfully, the leaders of the SLi program managed to get it started up again for the Spring semester.
Mrs. Mary Carl Finkelstein, Director of SLi, discussed the topic that SLi will be covering this year and said, “We are having a critical discussion about the COVID-19 pandemic. We are looking at questions like: What is the role of the government in a health crisis? What impact has COVID-19 had on the businesses? What are the lessons learned from COVID-19? What are some of the medical implications of COVID-19?”
Students are excited this organization is back up and running again. Junior Joanna Anil said, “I like the topic we are learning about this year in SLi because it is something that definitely has impacted everyone in the room. The pandemic has been such a huge part of all of our lives this past year and now we get to see more about the behind the scenes in how the government and industries dealt with it that we otherwise would have been unaware of.”
When discussing the meetings SLi has hosted thus far this semester, Mrs. Finkelstein said, “The second week, we heard from two PCA parents, an ER doctor, and a nurse practitioner who works on a COVID-19 floor about the medical view of COVID-19. Then we heard from two business owners, a Mexican restaurant owner and an architect in a local firm, affected by government shutdowns and regulations during COVID-19. Next week our guest speaker will be County Judge Chris Hill to speak to us from the government’s viewpoint. Then we will break into groups with a scenario and prepare presentations to be presented and judged on in March.”
SLi is finally back and the topic revolving around the logistics of the pandemic is sure to be something that all the students attending can learn from.
