Conferences offer multiple opportunities to socialize attendees in the broad professional and academic discourses. They also offer exciting opportunities for participants to exchange new and emerging ideas, spaces to know one another, and even to make commitments for future projects. In this course students will attend the International Leadership Association (ILA) conference in Denver along with pre and post class sessions to become familiar with one academic culture related to Leadership Studies. Students will have multiple opportunities to ask questions related to professional development and conference participation in general, and in some cases, for those who had proposals accepted to ILA, students will have opportunities to practice and receive feedback on presentations prior to the conference.

Students will engage with this year’s conference theme: Leadership Across the Great Divides: Bridging Cultures, Contexts, and Complexities through conference participation, class dialogues, and assignments. Students will reflect on various leadership issues related to practicing leadership beyond the great divides.