Fourteen students graduated Wednesday from Leadership Pike, a leadership development program provided by the Pike County Chamber of Commerce.

The chamber of commerce describes Leadership Pike as “an innovative program designed to prepare emerging leaders from diverse backgrounds for an active role in community affairs.”

The students and their sponsors gathered at the Troy Country Club for the graduation ceremony and luncheon. Graduates include Wayne Buchanan, Emily Reiss, Laterah Baxter, Weston Brown, Jonathan Gordon, Mary Lou Harrison, Tanner Hicks, John Hudson, Theresa Justice, Ryann May, Jonathan Shoffner, Bart Wallace, Rebecca Whetstone and Trey Wofford.

Class president Wayne Buchanan, director of the Boys and Girls Club, used the words of Winston Churchill to inspire the class.

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts,” Buchanan quoted. “Those words remind us that we can never bask in success because failure is right around the corner. All great leaders will fail, but it’s how we respond to failure that defines us.”

The guest speaker at the ceremony was Stephanie Carter Campbell, the creator of the Judith March clothing line. Campbell was born in Brundidge and started her first clothing retail store Deja Vu as a class project at Troy university. She decided to continue the business, selling her mustang for $4,000 to gain capital. She then travelled around the state selling clothes at country clubs and sorority houses.

Echoing Buchanan’s earlier address, Campbell spoke about her successes and a failure that she had to move past. “In 2009 after selling clothes for several years I decided to launch my own clothing line Judith March,” she said. “I produced over 22,000 garments not knowing whether they would sell. I just had to trust what I had heard from my customers for years. We sold out.”

However, her shipper informed her that due to the Haiti earthquake the shipment of clothes would be a month late. “If you’re a fashion line, you’re shipment can’t be a day late,” Campbell said. “Especially your first shipment. I think that’s the only time I’ve cried in business.” But Campbell didn’t give up, and found an alternate way to get the clothes in on time.

The students are professionals employed in the Troy community by businesses such as KW Plastics, Sikorsky Aircraft, Troy Bank and Trust, Walmart Distribution Center, Boys and Girls Club and Troy University.

Many students in the course said they got involved with the program in order to learn more about the community so that they could be more involved. The one thing that most of them cited as learning from the program was the history of Troy and Pike County.

 

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