I met Alita Dansey and Mandeep Jaswall last March when they were two of eight Grade 11 students I accompanied to the Rotary Youth Leadership Assembly in Tacoma, Washington. In time I may well end up writing columns about each of the other students as well because they are all Hidden Heroes, ordinary students who are definitely making a difference in their school and in their community.

When we got back home, both Alita and Mandeep became even stronger leaders with our Nanaimo Rotary Interact Club (These are the kids that raised $10,000 for Zimbabwe AIDS orphans last fall). Last week they were elected as incoming president and vice president, but knowing them, they will be more like co-presidents.

“We feed off each others ideas,” Mandeep enthused. “We work really well together.”

Alita described them as being, “each other’s second heart beat.”

In short I have got to know them as two people who set high standards and lofty goals, and always succeed no matter what it takes.

Speaking about lofty goals, as I was ending my conversation with Alita, we started discussing plans for next year’s Interact Club. That’s when I learned that she and Mandeep have set a mighty goal for our 2008 Your Move Campaign to raise money for Zimbabwe AIDS orphans – They plan on doubling the money raised last year giving us a new goal of $20,000.

I don’t know what they have planned and Alita didn’t want to discuss it further until we meet as a club. Don’t ask me how they will lead us to achieve such a lofty goal, especially since last year’s $10,000 was double our most optimistic target, but I’ll be surprised if they don’t make it. These two and their friend Rene Brown along with a couple of dozen of their friends are virtually unstoppable when they set a goal.

Both Mandeep and Alita began to get involved in their school activities as soon as they arrived in Grade 8. Their first step was to join the student council. Mainly they just listened their first year, they told me, but then, in Grade 9, they began to volunteer for various small projects and soon after that, they began to create their own projects and to find other volunteers to work with them.

This year, in Grade 11, they co-chaired STAAR (Students Taking Action Against Racism) and next year they plan on running to become Student Council President, which they will become a three way position to be shared with their friend, Rene, should they win. They also plan on continuing as co-chairs of STAR and of course to lead our Nanaimo Interact Club.

It’s enough to make the average person tired to just think about all the things these kids do while also maintaining top marks in school.

When I asked Mandeep what she thought about today’s “average” students, she said she felt 85 to 90 percent were quite positive. In short she feels they just need the opportunity to help others and a little inspiration from student leaders like her and Alita.

“My definition of a leader,” she said, “is to be able to lead others but even more important, you have to be able to help them find the leader in themselves.”

As we were ending our conversation Mandeep said, “It’s upsetting to see all the negative publicity lately making Nanaimo teenagers seem really bad but there are many more great kids in the community than there are bad, and the ‘bad ones’ aren’t really bad, they’re just being teenagers and everybody makes mistakes. There are so many positive things kids are doing but they never seem to make the headlines.”

Amen to that.