YCOP's President of Excellence

If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, you are a leader.

A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way. A leader is best when people barely know he exists, when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say, we did it ourselves. A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus.

Leadership is a vital management function that helps to direct an organization's resources for improved efficiency and the achievement of goals. Effective leaders provide clarity of purpose, motivate and guide the organization to realize its mission.

Jasper Esguerra Calicdan, 20 years old and from Poblacion San Fabian, Pangasinan. He is currently a 3rd-year college student taking up a Bachelor of Secondary Education major in English at the Don Mariano Marcos Memorial State University-South La Union Campus.

He started his leadership journey when he was in junior high school, but ever since elementary, he have been amazed at his dad, who is a barangay official. As a youth leader, he was affiliated with two organizations that have given him the biggest break as a youth leader. The first is the Neighborhood Youth Association in San Fabian and the Youth Congress of Pangasinan, where he was appointed as the President of both organizations. Leadership has allowed him to explore new things and witness the lives of other youth leaders here in our province, which he can proudly say taught him a lot.

In his journey as a youth leader, he was able to enhance and develop himself and realized that his power to listen has made him an effective and efficient leader. He have also learned that being a leader is not just about deciding for the whole, but also understanding the different thoughts and ideas of all the people within the organization. Being a leader is not just about having that highest position but also making space for those people who are part of the group that you belong to, because, at the end of the day, it is not just about you but for the whole. He will leave this quote that inspired him so much as a youth leader: "I was born to be a leader, but I grew and started as a follower."