Retriever Essentials Student Leadership Board

As the Program Manager for Retriever Essentials, University of Maryland, Baltimore County’s food access program, I redesigned our undergraduate internship program, the Student Leadership Board. The goals of the redesign were to promote experiential learning, campus engagement, and improve the program capacity of Retriever Essentials.

In this redesign, the core elements of the Student Leadership Board are:

• Self-determination: student leaders co-create their own projects and expectations for their service

• Reciprocity: the educational component of the program is flexible and responds to the needs and learning goals of the student leaders; student leaders receive credit on their college transcript

• Leadership: virtual service volunteers are recruited and assigned to student leaders’ projects; student leaders act as team leads

• Mentorship: one-on-one mentorship by the program manager supports the student leaders throughout the process

• Reflection: the educational component challenges student leaders to engage in self-discovery and reflection about social justice and systemic structures that contribute to food insecurity