If you can think all the way back to 8th grade, I’m sure many of you can remember when we went to the Courage Retreat. This year, a few NHS volunteers from the high school had the opportunity to go experience this retreat again. The main job the high schoolers had was to lead small group discussions. On top of this however, the high schoolers were there to get the 8th graders pumped up about being at the retreat. The 8th graders were skeptical at first about this courage retreat. However, as the day wore on, they began to loosen up with the help of the many fun activities that were played.

Around 9 o’clock Tuesday morning, the 8th graders began to file into the Armory. To begin the day, the Youth Frontier leaders started everyone out by doing some fun “high five” activities to loosen everyone up. Students had to run around high fiving and high tening each other while yelling things such as “I love your face!”. After this, everyone sat down in the middle of the gym and the leaders began to speak a bit about fear and courage. Once they had explained the retreat a bit, the students did another activity where they had to run across the gym in a funky way if whatever the leaders said applied to them. Some students did the crab walk, some leap frog, and some even dragged their friends across the gym by their ankles (all in good fun of course!). The Youth Frontier leaders then did a mini skit on fear and how it is hard to stand up for things you believe in.

There were a few small group discussions throughout the day as well where the 8th graders split off into groups of about 8 or so students who then worked with a high schooler to have some deeper discussions on courage and fear at school. Many fun activities were played throughout the day, some of which include giant jump rope, a huge balloon volleyball battle, dancing, and even a mini “talent show”. To end the retreat, students were asked to write down on a piece of paper something that they were going to do to be courageous. When everyone had finished writing down their thoughts, students were allowed to step forward and share with everyone what they wrote. When they did this they were asked to drop a stone in a bowl of water. When this stone was dropped in the bowl, the water rippled. The ripples in the water were meant to symbolize how one small decision you make can affect everyone else around you.

The Courage Retreat never fails to make one think about their decisions and life choices. This year went well and the students enjoyed it. It will be interesting to see what’s in store for the retreat next year!