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Bonner Leadership Teams

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Below are examples of student leadership teams drawn from across the Bonner campus network.

The average size of a Bonner Leadership Team (BLT) is 8 (and the average size of a Bonner Program is 35-40). Hence, it is good rule of thumb for programs under 40 to have roughly 20 percent (8) of their students involved in their Bonner Leadership Team. 

For medium or large sized-programs (60-100 students), BLTs may be even larger. The largest size reported is 18 students (for programs of roughly 100 students). As noted in the guides, the roles and structure for these teams often involve:

• Class Representatives (i.e., Freshman Class Representative)
• Committee Leaders with specialized roles (i.e., Bonner Love or Community Building committee; or Community Fund committee)
• Senior Interns
• Site Team Leaders or Community Impact Interns (or students working on capacity building and partnerships)
• High Impact or Service Learning Interns (or students working with faculty or on courses) 

Below are some of the distinctive titles of student leader roles reported by Bonner Programs and centers.

Campus Examples

Below are some campus examples, drawn from Campus Profiles shared with the Foundation. As programs revisit their student leadership structure frequently, these are often shifting, but they may help your program imagine new possibilities.

Capital University (35 Bonners)

Bonner Leadership Team (2022) involved:

• 2 Senior Interns
• 2 Junior Interns 
• 6-7 Bonner Recruitment Team Members
• Site Coordinators (2 per site)
• 4 Liaisons (1 per cohort) 
• Committees (by interest) 

High Point University (50 Bonners)

Bonner Leadership Team (2022) involved:

• 2 Bonner Leader Senior Presidents
• 1 SGA Representative
• 1 Treasurer
• 1 Bonner Congress Representative  
• 1 Social Justice & Civic Engagement Chair
• 1 Technology & Social Media Chair
• 4 Cohort Representatives (1 for each class)
• 9 Site Leaders (1 per site)

More information about the roles of each BLT position can be found here: High Point University - BLT Structure and Roles.pdf

The College of New Jersey (80 Bonners)

Bonner Leadership Team (2022) involved: 

• 1 BLT President 
• 4 Committees (each committee has 1 leader and 4 members)
• 1st Year Support 
• Social Media 
• Bonner Foundation & Alumni Outreach 
• High School & Campus Outreach 

University of Houston (100 Bonners)

Bonner Leadership Team (2022) involved: 

• 4 Senior Interns
• 1 Member Engagement Coordinator
• 7 Project Leads & Executive Teams 

More information about the roles of each BLT position can be found here: University of Houston - BLT Structure and Roles.pdf

Berry College (80 Bonners) 

Bonner Center Leadership Team (2022) involved:

• 3 Senior Interns
• 4 Class Representatives (1 per class)
• 2 Bonner Congress Representatives 
• Peer Counselors 

University of Richmond (100 Bonners)

Bonner Center Leadership Team (2015) involved:

• 6 Class Representatives (2 per class excluding seniors)
• 5 Senior Interns
• 2 Bonner Congress Representatives 

Maryville College: They switched from an individual-based role to a committee structure for their leadership team. The committee chair and Senior Interns make up the Leadership Team. The council is open to all students in their Community Engaged Scholars program (11 other scholarship recipients outside of Bonner), so they call their students leadership team "Community-Engaged Scholars Council" (CES) or "Committee Leadership Team" (CELT). Though the committee is open to all students, the Senior Intern positions are only open to Bonner Scholars. This model is in its pilot phase, but upon their first application structure, they filled 19 out of 22 positions. When introduced, they received feedback that this would be 'too many people,' when in fact students actually responded quite well to allowing more voices and assigning work. The students on committees meet at maximum once per week, and leadership will meet bi-weekly. Students are able to use the meetings as hours: leadership members consider their role in the committee as their "secondary" service site, and senior interns have CES as their "primary" service site. 

Sewanee: University of the South (50 Bonners) 

Bonner Center Leadership Team (2017) involved:

• 6 BLT members, from all class years, who submit applications and are selected by Bonner staff
• 3 Bonner Interns

The BLT structure is built around committees. There are six BLT committees including: Curriculum and Assessment, Bonner Honor, Mentorship and Socials, Admissions, Programming and Events, and Big Idea. Each Bonner Intern oversees two committees each, and each BLT member is a member of two committees. Altogether, each committee has three contributors, including interns and members. To read more about the structure and descriptions for each committee, reference this Sewanee BLT document. The Sewanee BLT also comes together for an orientation with Bonner staff. Reference that Orientation Agenda here.

Carson-Newman College (60 Bonners)

Bonner Center Leadership Team (2015) involved:

• 8 Bonner Class Representatives (2 for each class)
• 3 Bonner Center (Senior Interns)
• 1 Federal Work Study Representative
• 2 Faith and Justice Representatives
• 1 Community Connections Representative (a campus-wide student club)
• 3 Bonner Congress Representatives

Centre College (60 Bonners)

Bonner Center Leadership Team (2015) involved:

• 2 Senior Interns
• 2 Junior Interns
• 1 Summer Intern
• 8 Bonner Council Members
• 2 Bonner Congress Members

Allegheny College (60 Bonners) 

Bonner Center Leadership Team (2016) involved:

• 8 Members of the Allegheny Bonner Advisory Board (BAB) (2 elected representatives from each class)
• 3-6 Congress Representatives
• 2-3 Bonner Interns

They meet once or twice a semester, led by Bonner staff.

Rhodes College (80 Bonners)

Bonner Center Leadership Team (2015) involved: 

• 3 Senior Interns (Logistics, Programming, Partnerships)
• 2 Congress Representatives (1 Junior and 1 Sophomore)
• 3 student employees (Kinney, Office, Interfaith)
• Plus the Kinney Leadership Team (3 directors, 24 coordinators), a campus-wide program