This photography project is being undertaken by myself and my partner to demonstrate the development and practice of various leadership skills that would be entailed in such a project.  

​

Leadership skills that have been tested and demonstrated broadly include communication; organisation; teamwork; problem-solving; time-management; research and writing; editing and image-capturing; planning; integrity; and innovation.  

​

The aim of the project is to create a final montage on a school board near the entrance where visitors and parents can view the 2021 legacy of pupils at Langley Grammar School students. This will be done using a Polaroid styled theme, collated as a montage to be used as a display piece. Each group of students we photographed had to demonstrate in a different and innovative way, the word ‘caring.’ This was a key challenge that provoked thought within my team as well as within the student’s photographed.  

This project was selected as, not only was it a creative display of talent, but it challenged our leadership skills as individuals. Below I will outline how various leadership qualities were challenged through this project.  

​

Communication and Organisation: 

​

Whilst undertaking this project, communication and

organisation was a key element. Communication came in

when we would need to email and hence clearly and

effectively communicate what exactly we expected from the

teacher and the pupils when we came into the class. We

would explain the project scope, why we were doing this

photography session, how we required the students to pose;

and that they should engage in a collaborative class

discussion to decide how they wanted to represent one of the

Langley Grammar Motto Words – in our case, our pupils all

had to represent the word ‘caring.’  

 

We found some teachers would email back asking us to come to take the pictures on a certain day the following week, to allow them to prepare for the photo shoot with props and setting. Some teachers and pupils alike told us that they would like to conduct the photoshoot outside, whilst some wanted to do it inside. 

​

Me and my partner found that organising ourselves was particularly important. We would take the pictures in                                                                                               the morning during tutor time, which meant we had to                                                                                                 arrive particularly early so we can collect our                                                                                                               specialised camera from the arts department at school.                                                                                             One challenge was faced when we would expect each                                                                                                 other to arrive at the same time – sometimes, me/my                                                                                                 partner would arrive late and then it was the opposite's                                                                                               job to collect the camera and prepare the class for the                                                                                                 picture. This was a challenge as it meant that we had to                                                                                             improvise whilst also presenting ourselves organised                                                                                                 and confidently in front of the younger pupils. 

​

​

Upon completion of the project, we will send out a questionnaire for form tutors to complete with the class they were with. This will be through email or a Microsoft forms questionnaire. We will need to confirm which form tutors are responsible for each class we photographed as we cannot collectively email the students and individually emailing them would prove very time consuming.

​

Research and Writing: 

​

Me and my team had to undertake extensive research in all aspects of this project.

From picking a polaroid style to selecting a consistent filter for the whole

photography team to use, all required extensive research and planning. On our

group chat we would discuss and share several ideas we can use and then our

teacher would review the and tell us about her expert opinion on what to choose. We                                              would then compile this in a small memo that was then pinned so we would

remember and for a more efficient use of our time.  

​

One key thing we had to research into was how we would take the pictures in a

frame that would be suitable to fit in a polaroid styled frame. Initially we took pictures using landscape mode and found when editing the pictures, some people would accidentally be cropped out due to sizing, so we had to find a way to work around it. One way we worked around it was by using a square camera so naturally we would not need to crop our pictures; an alternative method we used more though was, using landscape mode but taking the picture from further away so we had excess area to crop with no one’s body/face being cut out. This proved highly effective, and we continued to use this method. 

​

Innovation: 

​

We used innovation when photographing our subjects. As the project entailed sing the core school

values in our images of the form groups, we had to get our pupils to pose in a ‘caring’ manner. This was

quite hard to mimic, as kindness is an act that is not usually shown through feasible actions, but words

and behaviour. For this reason, we had to brainstorm some ideas that involved mild intimacy, for

example, holding hands or putting their hands behind each other's backs. However, as we had so many

form groups to photograph, we eventually ran out of ideas. This meant we had to improvise and instead

we asked for input from the form tutors and the students – any ideas they had to visually represent the

word caring in their shoot.  

​

This was met with a surprising amount of feedback, with younger students very enthusiastic about it.

One striking idea we implemented was the use of pieces of paper that spelt ‘caring’ when joined

together, with a different person holding each paper. This shoot was extremely successful, with the

form tutor actively helping us by organising time for the students to create these bespoke designs.  

 

This sense of innovation furthered the sense of ‘caring’ and the individuality of each tutor group, which was what the whole scope of the project was about. Everyone was the same yet represented themselves in a different manner, showing the homely element the school wanted to represent through their pupils.  

​

Health and safety: 

​