As I watched the musical acts throughout the evening I was struck by the high quality of performances, but I also couldn’t stop thinking about the spotlights on the musicians and singers as they performed. As different acts came on to the stage, each group or single performer needed a different light. There were big groups on stage, one-person acts on the piano just off stage, a single singer in the center, a guitarist to stage left.
 
 
At IMS, there is a small group of students that we affectionately refer to as the “Boys in the Booth.” This group of students is generally up, literally in the “booth,” attending to sound and lighting any time we are in the assembly hall, which happens at least once a day. During morning meetings, they help set up audio-visual equipment, turn on the microphones, and select and play music to send us off to our day with a bounce in our step. At special events, they do this while making sure that performers are well lit and heard.
 
The boys in the booth.

The boys in the booth.
 
At the benefit, I began to think about how these students up in the booth exhibit an often-unnoticed but highly-important leadership role through their service to our community. Daily, they quietly go about their work, many times without being asked.

Often, we think of leaders as being those people in the spotlight, but true leaders also make the people around them better. Leaders give others the confidence to step forward. They are adaptable and do their best work to make others shine. I do not know if these students at IMS think of themselves as leaders or recognize their service to the community. Their quiet confidence, competence, humility, and selflessness seems to me the best type of leadership that comes from living a life through service.
 
SojaJoannR Sig