20 November 2009

Stephen Farrell from Dromore Co.Tyrone, who is now in the final year of his BSc (Hons) in Equine Management at CAFRE, Enniskillen Campus had a busy summer in 2009. He was selected to represent CAFRE’s equine students on the Common Purpose Frontrunner programme which took place in August before his return to College.

Common Purpose is a not-for-profit organisation that offers a wide range of educational development programmes designed to suit every kind of leader. It aims to give the leaders of today and tomorrow the inspiration, the knowledge and the connections they need to produce real change - in their workplaces and in their communities.

Stephen joined other young people over the age of 18 who have already demonstrated leadership through their activities and experiences. The programme is designed to bring together young leaders from a broad range of backgrounds, experiences, education levels and geographies.

On the programme, Stephen along with the other participants visited businesses, institutions and organisations such as Queen’s University, and Blick Studios in Belfast to get a behind-the-scenes perspective on these organisations and their sector. They also learned how to deal with real-life leadership dilemmas and learned from the experiences of other senior leaders from different sectors of society. Stephen found the whole experience challenging and rewarding and in his own words preparing for being a leader reminded him of John Wayne’s famous line, “Courage is being scared to death but saddling up anyway”.

Stephen Farrell (second from right) pictured at Victoria Square, Belfast along with a number of the participants on the Frontrunner Programme including Heather Hall (one of the representatives from Greenmount Campus), Orla McEvoy (representing Loughry Campus) Charles Young (University of Ulster), Karen McMenamy (University of Glasgow) and Nicola Clarke (Northern Bank).