Welcome to Belonging in Action, a series about how Girls Leadership creates sustainable support for students and teachers. Today’s post asks, How did you learn SEL? Our facilitators ask this question of all the participating adults before most of our trainings, and in most cases, the answers are the same: they didn’t. Social and emotional …
This year marked our 15th anniversary as an organization, including a major change. While we started as a direct-service girl-serving organization, we’ve arrived at a new approach. When you listen to girls for 15 years you learn a ton, and what we learned is that the girls are powerful; it is the adults in their …
You may have heard of the Alphabet Relay, a fun group relay to brainstorm as many ideas as possible using the structure of the alphabet. The Girls Leadership version, an Emotional Alphabet Relay, is a game to help players express how they are feeling and reflect on their relationship with their emotions. This version was …
Based on our many years of running programs, and countless conversations with girls, parents, caregivers, and educators, we know that our work is impactful. Yet we’re always so deeply moved to hear how our programs and tools help people make positive change in their lives. We had an opportunity to chat with Alejandra Cardenas, a …
Why We Lead Education Roundtable: Fostering the Leadership of AANHPI Girls and Gender-Expansive Youth On Monday, October 28, 2024 we held an education-focused roundtable discussion of Why We Lead: Understanding and Supporting the Leadership of AANHPI Girls and Gender-Expansive Youth Two years ago we set out to research the complex, nuanced, and intergenerational story of …
Naming our feelings is powerful. That’s true even—or especially—when we’re hurting. School has just begun, and already we’re faced with the horrifying tragedy of another school shooting. We have been bombarded with an overwhelm of news, memorials, and arguments. In order to re-establish equilibrium, we want to invite our community to join us in naming …
Why We Lead Roundtable: AANHPI Girls Speak Up Thursday, June 20, 2024 12:00 pm PT/3:00 pm ET Watch the Recording Two years ago we set out to research the complex, nuanced, and intergenerational story of the leadership development of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) girls and gender-expansive youth. That result …
Like all educators, Girls Leadership Program Manager Catherine Castillo Cruz gets up early. There’s always a lot to do, and she has a long commute before she can even start. It’s January in New York and the cold is biting. Catherine checks her phone, hoping for a distraction from the seeping chill, but instead there’s …
Many people think of friendship as a purely social endeavor, but we hold a different perspective: we believe that friendships are an incubator for leadership development — that the social and emotional skills girls develop through friendships form the habits of their personal and professional relationships for decades to come. It’s why building healthy friendships …
January is a natural time for change and reflection. Our efforts will begin with our core work — centering the needs of girls and helping families learn together why centering the needs of marginalized girls benefits all of us. We realize that framing conflict in a positive light may seem backwards; most people dread …
