KLA Marks 30th AnniversaryEditor's Note: Kosciusko Leadership Academy is celebrating its 30th anniversary. This is the first part in a three-part series on KLA.
Jean Northenor, one of the founders of Kosciusko Leadership Academy, said the focus of KLA is about the young people of the community and what good they can do here.
KLA is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year. It had its first graduation class in 1982.
According to Northenor, who was the county auditor and Kosciusko County Republican Party chair at the time, she and Matt Dalton had found themselves attending numerous community processes. She asked him at one point if there was anyone else in the community who could attend, and that got Dalton to thinking. He called Ball State University.
Later, Dalton called a group together for lunch. That group included Northenor, Doug Grant, Ben Knott, Bob Boley and BSU professor Joe Rawlings.
The purpose of the lunch meeting was to hear from Rawlings about leadership academies. The group talked extensively about them. The leadership academies they heard about were mostly associated with Chambers of Commerce and city or town based.
Northenor wasn't interested in just a Warsaw leadership academy. She was a county person, and is a county person today. And, while she has nothing against Chambers, she didn't want the leadership academy to be associated with the Chamber. The others expressed that they felt the same way Northenor did.
Rawlings told them he'd send a moderator for the Kosciusko Leadership Academy to get it going. Professor Peter Murk was with KLA for its first three years, all on Ball State's dime.
"Ball State was pushing leadership academies to get younger people involved. This was a way to get them involved, and it worked," Northenor said.
After Murk, Grace College Dean of the School of Adult and Community Education Steve Grill served as moderator for about 25 years. Allyn Decker is the current moderator.
"One of the truly unique aspects of KLA is that Jean, Matt Dalton, Doug Grant and the others involved in the beginning had so much authority in the county, they could have said 'we don't want the community to change,'" said Grill. "I'm really proud, and I think the community owes the founders of KLA a debt of gratitude because they did the opposite. They asked, 'How can we grow? How can it spread?' It's a really unique aspect of KLA."
Grant served as KLA's first president. Northenor was curriculum president.
While the title of curriculum president may not sound like a big deal, it is once you realize the person has to create curriculum for 25 young people for twice a month for several months, Northenor said. Today, KLA uses the same curriculum Northenor developed, with some changes.
"Basically, what I did was call in a lot of favors," she said.
The original curriculum included law enforcement, county, church, agriculture, area planning and education.
Grant and Northenor spent a lot of time on KLA, especially the first few years, she said. Among the decisions they made was for the participants to meet at places all over the county, from Silver Lake to Warsaw to Syracuse.
"The whole goal of the whole thing was to get innovative, creative people involved in their community somehow," Northenor said.
For the first class, Northenor called all the companies in the county to see if they would participate by either being a board member or sending their "best and brightest" to take part. Not a single company said no.
Meetings start at 7:30 a.m. so participants give one hour of their time and companies give one hour of their time, Northenor said.
The class size is kept to about 25 students. Some years, they may have had 27 or 23 students, Northenor said, but the aim is 25. The idea is that the group is small enough so the participants can network.
"Networking is as every bit important as what they are learning," Northenor said.
Grill said another unique aspect of KLA is the longevity of the program. Over the last 30 years, Grill has been involved in KLA for about 27 to 28 of those years, he said. KLA founders and Grill have been invited to so many other communities, Grill said, to explain their leadership program and why it works. Many other communities started similar programs, only to see them die out in a few years.
"The reality is, Jean set up KLA so wisely and securely, it has lasted 30 years. It is the gold standard, the beacon, for others to have one. Jean set it up so it is self-perpetuating through the generosity of local businesses. I think that makes us unique. We believe it is the only countywide leadership academy in the nation, though we're not sure," Grill said.
Kosciusko County Community Foundation Executive Director Suzie Light said Northenor is lovingly called the godmother of KLA.
"But it wouldn't be here without her," Light said. "She wanted to make sure women were involved, it included all of Kosciusko County and that people got plugged in to the community. She was looking at grooming future leaders of the community and KLA was the vehicle for that."
In her job, Light gets to be involved with other foundations across the state. She said you wouldn't believe how many communities don't have a leadership academy or can't sustain them.
"Ours is the longest running and, I believe that is because of the way they framed it," she said.
The next KLA graduation ceremony is scheduled for April 28 at the 2517 Restaurant, Warsaw. Social hour begins at 5:30 p.m., with the main program starting at 6:30 p.m.
Northenor said the purpose of the ceremony is to cause all the participants to realize how important it really is. Participants' bosses are usually in attendance, and they can hang their graduation certificates at their work place. They're always invited to keep on participating, and many do, serving as president, vice president or other office holder for KLA.
"The whole thing is about growth. The growth of young people," Northenor said.
Grill said, "KLA is one of the unique aspects of our community. Not only that it's survived, but prospered."
