Aaron Dobbs
TR 11:00
Academy lecture: Dr. Jedidah Isler
She started off the lecture by stating that she was an astrophysicist, but said that she wouldn’t be talking about any of her research. She gave a brief overview of her journey to get to where she is today. Isler said she loved the stars as a child and would spend hours looking at them and it made her mom happy because she was completely quite while doing so. When she found out that there was a job for people that study space she was immediately consumed in perusing astrophysics. As she learned more and more about the stars so did her mom, she made her mom an astrophysicist by association. Which is an interesting dynamic, usually the child follows in the footsteps of their parents, but she chose to be her own person which she put more emphasis on later in the lecture. Growing up her mom was her first leadership model and told her “If someone can do it, then so can you.” This has great impact on her later on in life, as I listened to her story I quickly began to see that many of her experiences and role model had a huge effect on her life. We have talked a lot about mentors and people in influential leadership positions, but she is a true testament to their value and guidance that can help you get to where you want to go, and she didn’t even meet some of her mentors.
As her studies to become an astrophysicist continued she began to realize quickly that she was something of an outlier in her field of study. She had to make an identity choice between a society for female astrophysicists and one for minority astrophysicists. She didn’t like that she had to be one or the other, and this is where her role and journey as an activist began. It was something of a circuitous route to figure out what the point of her lecture was about and what her leadership position was, but I think I would say that activism for minority women was her point. Her journey led her to find a problem that should could make a difference in. I find that this is something of a commonality between leaders, your journey will take you to a place that you may find in desperate need of leadership. In my practice of leadership, I will keep this in mind; follow your dreams and do everything you can to get to where you want to be and do right by the people around you and a leadership position will find you or you will find a need for a leadership position. I believe that real leaders don’t go around looking to lead whoever and wherever they can, but that they are natural leaders and that their passion for an area or idea springs them into a leadership position.
She touched on a few personal values, but the one that stuck out to me the most was advocating for the least. She said that some of us have more privilege than other and that we should use this privilege for the benefit of others and not just for personal comfort. For the most part I am generally turned off when people start talking about privilege because eventually it will be turned into ‘check your white privilege’, which I am pretty tired of hearing about. But she did a very good job of not singling out a race in particular and just said to use your advantages to benefit the disadvantaged. I found this to tie into ethical leadership, she dealt everyone in her speech a fair hand, and didn’t make the whole thing about race. I think that ethics can be seen as looking beyond race, and not singling out any particular group for their faults whether they chose them or not. I think the relationship between integrity, personal values and ethical leadership led her to care for the voice of the out group and the un-included, but it also needs to be noted that this person doesn’t have to be a racial minority in every instance.
I can use what I learned from Dr. Jedidah Isler in everyday leadership as well as long term career leadership. I learned to be brave and to stand up for the people who are afraid to stand up or don’t feel like it’s their place to stand up. She emphasized to importance of authenticity, and that it is our differences that make each and everyone us valuable assets to each other. She ended her lecture with the idea that it is okay to change your mind on something that you believed to be true. Your perceptions of the world around you will change as you change and grow older, don’t be afraid to change with them.