MPA Program at CCNY
Crafting your personal narrative deepens your understanding of yourself and elucidates your deepest values, motives, and formative experiences. A personal story is a powerful tool for clarifying your professional identity and goals, communicating these to the world, and advancing your work for social change.
This was the central theme of the MPA Program’s workshop this week, titled “Finding Power in Your Story”, facilitated by MPA Executive Director Bobby Derival.
Derival opened the workshop by sharing parts of his own personal story. He described his process of discovering and developing his narrative and how this process helped him to advance on his career path.
Students then developed their own stories and shared them in small groups. They were prompted to practice intentional, active listening – a key leadership skill taught in the MPA program.
Several themes emerged as students reported back to the group. Students emphasized that they learned important lessons from their own history, and as they dug deeper into their past, they discovered multiple stories about themselves. They found ways to transform trauma and shame into power and progress.
Finally, students reflected as a group about the interconnectedness of all of their stories: how their personal stories connect to a “story of us” – and what that means about the stories they as a cohort will create over the next two academic years.
This workshop marked the beginning of the MPA Fall Workshop Series, which is one component of the MPA Program’s career development programming that includes one-on-one sessions and Changemaker Fellowships. Find out more.