The 2025 Seminar will be held from June 13th - June 15th. 

Our Annual Seminar

The mission of ILS is to unleash the leadership potential of Illinois youth. We achieve this mission, in part, through our flagship seminar, held annually in June. This year we will be inviting one sophomore student from Illinois high schools to attend. Our Seminar is completely free to the students, their families, and their schools. ​

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We encourage leadership development through emphasis on:

• Personal responsibility

• Volunteerism

• Increased awareness of social and community issues

• Open-minded analysis that considers all sides of an issue when making decisions

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During Seminar, leaders are pre-assigned to groups of 8-10. These groups are random to ensure each leader is exposed to other leaders with different backgrounds. Each group has group leaders called coaches that are student alumni of our program. 

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The main objective of all programming elements is to build each leader's skills to maximize their own strengths, to consider and appreciate the strengths of others and leave the Seminar well-equipped to take on the challenges of making a difference in their classes, schools and broader communities. 

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Additionally, they now have a network of other high achieving student peers, as well as adult mentors, from various backgrounds and across the state.

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We also encourage our leaders to stay active in our organization to support the future development of ILS and, more importantly, the future generations of leaders in Illinois. We are very proud of the leaders that our Seminar serves: they represent the bright future of Illinois and continue to make our world a better place.

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Sending a Student to Our 2025 Seminar.
We ask counselors/school representatives to fill out the nomination form to nominate one sophomore student leader from their school to attend our Seminar. The student MUST currently be completing their SOPHOMORE year of high school (attending Seminar the summer between their sophomore and junior year). The counselor or school representative in our records will receive a nomination email with the instructions for how to nominate a student from their school. Please remember, only one student per school may attend. Once a student has been nominated, that student and their parent(s)/guardian(s) will receive a registration email with a link to the registration form.

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Seminar Details

When attending Seminar 2025, students must attend the entire seminar. Programming is structured to build upon itself throughout the weekend and full participation is required.

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Date: June 13-15

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Location: 

Illinois Wesleyan University

1312 Park St.

Bloomington, IL 61701

If you have questions regarding Seminar, our programming, or ILS in general, please view our FAQs below or contact our Recruitment Director, Sabrina Edwards, by clicking the button below.