1990
​First Regional Student Leadership Conference Takes Place in Kansas City MO

Click Here to Read 30 Years of Testimony Highlights

Celebrating God's Goodness 
30 Years of Impact
1990-2020
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Our history as told by Dr. Matt Williams - Founder and Executive Director

The theme of "Being Different on Purpose" has evolved as the driving thrust of the American Association of Christian Schools (AACS) Student Leadership Conferences (SLC) over the years. In the fall of 1988, The Wilds Christian Camp offered a new leadership conference for Christian high school students. As an administrator of a Christian school, I felt led to consider this conference as an opportunity for our students. I had a great burden at the time for our students to take some spiritual steps, and this sounded exactly like what we needed. Twenty students from our school attended that first Student Leadership Conference. The changes in their lives was beyond what I had ever imagined possible. The conference incorporated a very effective combination of training techniques. Not only were the students instructed in principles of biblical leadership, but they were also guided through strategy sessions with their sponsors to discuss the blessings and problems they faced in their homes, churches, and schools. 

Additionally, they were stretched in their ability to properly apply the principles they learned by working through true-to-life case studies. All of this took place in the isolated environment of a Christian camp, where our students were allowed to concentrate and evaluate their lives. Our students were challenged and changed. They came home with a strategy for how to praise the good and confront the evil in their lives and school. Read more.

Conference Overview and Pictures

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Who We Are Now

Over the past 30 years, we have sought to expand and develop the conference ministry to provide more schools with an opportunity for leadership training. Several new dimensions have evolved. There is now a specific theme for each year that focuses on key leadership principles. Conference themes have included topics such as “The Biblical Leader and His Focus” (developing a biblical worldview); “The Biblical Leader and His Fight” (standing for right); and “The Biblical Leader and His Footing” (laying a biblical foundation of loving God and loving others). Another new dimension to the SLC ministry has been the addition of one-day Looking for the Leaders conferences. These conferences bring leadership training to individual schools and allow even junior high students to begin training in biblical leadership principles. The one-day conferences introduce the basic leadership principles to the students and serve as a preview for the three-day conference material. Looking for the Leaders conferences may be tailored to accommodate a single school or multiple schools gathered at a central location. Schools have also found these conferences to be very affordable and work well with their schedules.

Your Opportunity

As the director of the Student Leadership Conferences, I have been tremendously blessed to see lives, schools, churches, and even homes changed over the years by the biblical principles taught. I regularly hear testimonies from former attendees, who are now adults, of how a student leadership conference changed their thinking, focus, and direction. These experiences taught them how to stand for right and showed them how to serve others in their ministries.
 
Student Leadership Conferences provide an opportunity to engage and empower students with the message of having a biblical worldview and developing a ministry mindset.  Pastors, school administrators, principals, and other state leaders are invited to partner with us as conference coordinators. Conferences can be organized as a school, state association, church, homeschool group or regional events, providing an excellent resource for any ministry leader that desires to produce student leaders who will be different on purpose.


 

Conference Overview and Pictures