Tag Archives: Young Women’s Leadership Network

Leaders Unite! The STF*{Campus} Summit is Here

You have no idea how excited we are that this week is finally here!

This Thursday, October 11 is the United Nations’ first-ever Day of the Girl, and you know we love firsts. The movement is designed to create enthusiasm for the advancement of girls’ lives around the world; so, of course all of us here at She’s the First are joining in on the celebration. And I mean all of us—even 35 of our campus leaders from all over the country.

We're celebrating the Day of the Girl with these amazing women!

That’s right: tomorrow evening, the She’s the First*{Campus} superstars will be flying in to New York City and finally meeting each other offline at the 2012 She’s the First*{Campus} Summit. In addition to some exciting Day of the Girl festivities, we have two jam-packed days of activities and workshops planned for the students to bond with and learn from one another.

In honor of the Day of the Girl, we will be hosting an assembly at The Young Women’s Leadership School of Brooklyn for 300 high schoolers, the majority of whom will later become first-generation college students. We are excited to feature some incredibly inspiring women at the assembly, including Christine Quinn, New York City Council Speaker; Ann Shoket, editor-in-chief of Seventeen; Lindsay Brown, Seventeen’s “Pretty Amazing” contest winner and She’s the First*{Notre Dame} President; and actresses Monique Coleman and Josie Loren. Be sure to catch a live broadcast of the assembly on Thursday morning at 8:15 am—you don’t want to miss this! Watch below or on our Facebook page.


Stream videos at Ustream
Thursday afternoon, our She’s the First*{Campus} leaders will convene to propose ideas for bettering girls’ lives. Their solutions will be presented that evening at a reception with VIP guests and later presented to the United Nations. Although it is a challenging assignment, we have no doubt that our students will come up with some remarkable ideas.

This week will surely go down in She’s the First history and we are thrilled to be involved with the Day of the Girl. Stay tuned for a full recap on our blog next week and remember to follow along with our #STFSummit hashtag all week long!

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@ExplorersTYWLS Take On Bryant Park, Part II!


Photo by Richard Scott

It was another great day in the city for the @ExplorersTYWLS girls! Shortly after lunch on July 17th, we rounded up the explorers in Bryant Park to let them in on their latest challenge.

But of course, we couldn’t start the day without checking in to see how our little social media pros have been doing! Seeing almost every girl raise her hand acknowledging her recent use and love of social media was very encouraging to say the least. This was huge progress for all of the girls, especially the ones that in the beginning only had a basic understanding of social media. To drum up a little more motivation, we explained the wonders of Storify.com, and how we’ve been using it here at She’s the First to spotlight the incredible amount of work the campers have been doing!

But we couldn’t forget about our courageous Tumblr Editors! We made sure to check in with them as well, to see how they felt the blog was doing. They’re always busy blogging away, so make sure you check out their Tumblr to stay up to date on the latest @ExplorersTYWLS action!

If you read Kate’s post from July 14th, you are probably familiar with the breakdown of the workshop. On Friday, July 13th, Kate let half the @ExplorersTYWLS loose in Bryant Park to interview people about their own “firsts.” But on July 17th, it was finally my turn!

Before sending them off on their own, we gave them three questions to ask their interviewees:
1. What are you the first to do?
2. What would you like to be the first to do?
3. What inspires you?

…and then they were off!

Photo by Richard Scott

Photo by Richard Scott

A Notebook Designed by a TYWLS Explorer: Photo by Richard Scott

The campers certainly hit the ground running! When I checked up on the girls to see how they were doing, each girl had at least a page full of answers. This would soon prove to be useful for the writing portion of the challenge.

After 30 minutes of interviewing, the girls were instructed to meet back at the steps for a group photo, and start to draft their Tumblr blog posts about their interview challenge. Our budding journalists were certainly hard at work today, and have already started to post to Tumblr their inspiring answers.

Make sure you check out the rest of the @ExplorersTYWLS inspirational posts by visiting their Tumblr blog!

Photo by Richard Scott

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Look What @ExplorersTYWLS Did in Bryant Park!

Since camp began five days ago, the @ExplorersTYWLS have been tweeting away (check out our Storify to see how great they’re doing!) So for today’s workshop, we decided to give them a  little break from pure social media and let them brush up on their offline reporting skills, which they’ll then post to their Tumblr. We armed them with these basic questions…

  • What are you the first to do?
  • What would you like to be the first to do?
  • What inspires you?

…and then we set them loose in Bryant Park!

We all gathered on the steps of The New York Public Library to regroup and talk about their experiences (and, of course, for a photo opp!)

I was particularly proud of the Explorers today because they stepped outside of their comfort zones to connect with people from all walks of life. In-person interviews can be very intimidating, especially when approaching people on the street. The girls were nervous, but not one of them backed down; no one said “I can’t” or “I’m too scared.” They worked through their fears and had incredible success, interviewing tons of people. That, my friends, is courage.

Look out for the articles that the Explorers will be posting about their interviewing experiences on the Tumblr blog: ExplorersTYWLS.tumblr.com.

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What Happened on Our First Day at @ExplorersTYWLS Camp!

Photo by Kate Lord

Flash back! It seemed as if I were back at school for the first day all over again. As nervous and excited girls crowded the elevator, we had already started off on the right note as one of our youngest campers pointed out that being packed so closely together was instantly creating a “bonding experience” among the rest of us. When the elevator finally reached the 7th floor, I could feel the excitement just pouring out of the gym.

As I poked my head inside the gym to simply get a taste of the energy that had clearly taken over the atmosphere, my adrenaline had already started soaring at the thought of working with these 140 excited and energetic girls.

Within about 20 minutes, our first group of girls started to file in and sit down in anticipation for the start of our workshop. Attentive, engaged faces were all we needed to see in order to recognize that class was now in session.

Photo by Kate Lord

A warm welcome seemed to be the only thing that was needed for the girls to feel comfortable and ready to learn. We then introduced ourselves and began to break down what exactly it means to be “a first.” When we opened up discussion with the girls, I can say on behalf of all of us, we were thoroughly impressed with their answers. Girls saying that they wanted to be the first in their families to be journalists, judges, doctors, and even attend graduate school. The depth and complexity of their answers were not only impressive, but also empowering to us and the rest of the girls sitting in the room.

@KateSchwarzNYC - Photo by Kate Lord

After getting down on their level and really diving into their goals for their own futures, we then went ahead and passed out a survey. The survey would include questions about social media, and their usage or feelings on it. For handing in the survey the girls were rewarded with a lovely She’s the First sticker, and a handout that mapped out the instructional information of the challenges we would present to them in weeks to come. After Kate went through the handout, together with the girls we creatively brainstormed a Social Media Code of Conduct, and discussed the do’s and dont’s of their tremendous new superpowers.

 

Photo by Kate Lord

@BrookeSassman - Photo by Kate Lord

In the coming weeks, the girls will be hard at work creating Tweets, submitting content for the Tumblr blog (ExplorersTYWLS.tumblr.com), and taking pictures to post to Instagram. They’ll learn not only how to harness their creative energy, but to use it for good as their strongest superhero power. With that being said, it couldn’t have been more perfect than to leave the girls with a special quote from the Spiderman movie. Kate closed the workshop by leaving the girls with this powerful statement: “…with great power comes great responsibility.”

Stay tuned for our upcoming blog posts as we continue our journey with the @ExplorerTYWLS girls!

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She’s the First-Spirited Teen Poems

Cover of the Young Women's Leadership Schools students' summer poetry anthology

As we blogged on Friday, the impact of She’s the First Poetry Month at the Young Women’s Leadership School spun off into summer camp! The anthology these teens created in three weeks with spoken word poet Azure Antoinette will go into a second edition printing that you’ll be able to purchase on Amazon. There will even be a page inside dedicated to She’s the First, and proceeds will be donated back to education.

After reading the “You Should Know This About Me” anthology, there were two poems in particular that spoke to She’s the First, so we wanted to share them with you:

Writing Prompt: “In a Dream…”

If I were a dream I would first be a diamond, the richest, prettiest wanted of all. I would shine like the stars, big as a hand and weight of a feather.

In my second dream I would be the first girl president of the world and the first of them all. I would help my people and be their servant. I would want to be known as the miracle worker.

To my best dream I would fly away to heaven in peace. I would be happy to know I did something to help the world.

I would have a prince for a princess. My husband would be Damion from The Glee Project. I would visit my acestors. Time travel to places where things would be made. I would have 2 girls and an older boy.

- Amy Ramirez

Young Women's Leadership Schools students writing at camp. Photo by Azure Antoinette

Writing Prompt: “If the world were my classroom…” (the prompt of She’s the First Poetry Month!)

I would show a girl how hard it is for many of us around the world. That many of these girls have already started families at the ages of 13-15. That many of them don’t have the luxury of an education.

I would teach a girl that self esteem doesn’t come from a magazine or the way a boy looks at you. That it comes from the strength in believing in yourself, knowing that as a girl, you can be anything you want.

I would teach a girl that boys are not that serious. Some are temporary if they aren’t best friends. Their main purpose is to cause trouble.

-Melanie Caldwell

 

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The Sequel to She’s the First Poetry Month

The campers show off their anthology (created with Azure in 3 weeks!) at their big finale at Cherry Lane Theatre!

There are many reasons I love Twitter. For the playful moments, like waging war for free ice cream from @BenJerrysTruck, which happened in my day job. There are the soulful moments, when a new follower in NYC becomes an offline friend, perhaps even a team member (@Marissa_Calhoun, @CarlaBlumenthal, @sjvandi on our team all found us that way), or a co-founder (the story of how GIRLS WHO ROCK leader @CynthiaHellen and I met).

But one Twitter success that will forever go down in history is when @shesthefirst tweeted our need for a poet last March, someone to help us teach a workshop connecting girls’ worldwide for this Poetry Month campaign idea we had. Non-profit @girlswritenow helped us out with a RT, and that’s how we found @azureantoinette. Azure’s She’s the First poetry workshop at the Young Women’s Leadership School in Brooklyn was so powerful (read about it!) that the school invited  her back for summer camp!

Cover of the Young Women's Leadership Schools students' summer poetry anthology

Today on the final day of camp, girls recited their poems, danced their hearts out, and listened to a poem Azure had written them, straight from the heart. Watch below!

As She’s the First continues to grow, we hope and dream that our Twitter-holism will foster a global classroom, a cause-minded creative community. While sponsoring girls in the amazing directory of She’s the First partner programs, we can never underestimate the impact we have on the classrooms in our own communities too. Thank you to the Young Women’s Leadership Schools, especially Polly Lagana and Tara Goulet, and most of all Azure for believing in She’s the First and making something so big out of one small idea!

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She’s the First Poetry Month Workshop in Brooklyn

It’s difficult to choose one word to sum up the She’s the First Poetry Workshop hosted by Azure Antoinette at the Young Women’s Leadership School in Brooklyn today. Awe-inspiring? AMAZING? Authentic? Well, take a look at the stream of tweets below, the Flickr photos by Kaitlin Davis, or a video of Azure’s performance for the girls on YouTube, and you can tell us!

THIS is what enthusiasm in the classroom looks like!

Truth is, there aren’t words to describe what we felt connecting with 13-and 14-year-old girls in Brooklyn today, meeting them in a round of soft-spoken introductions, only to watch Azure work her magic and have them all jumping out of their seats with hands raised to recite their poetry before the room — which takes a lot of guts when you’re a teen!

Our goal was to connect the girls to the concept of “If the world was your classroom…” — to tell them about our mission, and the girls we sponsor in the developing world, so they feel part of a global community. We started a cherished relationship with the Young Women’s Leadership Network, where girls will contribute to a She’s the First poetry anthology that will support the cause and build cross-cultural communication…but more to come on that later!

In the meantime, stay tuned to Aspire for the last leg of the campaign later this week — the ecards that will fundraise for a girl’s sponsorship in Sudan! And don’t forget to contribute your own verse to the She’s the First Twitter poem, by answering the prompt here and tagging #stfpoem.

 

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