Girls Driving for a Difference

I usually stick to the STEM topics, programs or websites when it comes to my blog, but I have to tell you about this FANTASTIC program.

The program I want to tell you about is called Girls Driving for a Difference, and it's a leadership workshop for social change aimed at girls. By some lucky accident on eventbrite.com, I came across this program last November. My daughter was fortunate enough (because spaces fill up very quickly) to attend the program in December on Stanford campus, and she loved it. She's always been confident, but she came home talking about doing things she's never talked about before. It was great.

Girls Driving for a Difference website

I attended a Technology Showcase at a local high school 2 days ago, and I was telling one of the parents about this program for her daughter. When I came home, I thought I should tell you about this fantastic program. The only thing is..., it's only available TO ATTEND (that I know of) in the San Francisco bay area. BUT you can HOST this program at your location. You just need to order a starter kit from their website.

Their mission statement talks about girls "losing their voice" as they grow older, and this program is designed to help the girls, especially middle school girls, find their voice. And I can second this from my classroom experience. I've taught Science project classes from K to 6, and between 4th and 5th grades, girls become less vocal about pushing for their team to build their ideas and tend to take a back seat to boys who are more vocal.

When I asked the girls, these are the responses they give (informal survey of about 50+ girls over the years).

• I don't want to look nerdy/geeky, etc.
• I don't want to be bossy about my idea.
• I'm not sure my ideas are good.
• I think their ideas are better.
• I don't want to be wrong.
• I don't want my idea to fail.
• I don't really care what we work on. I'm OK with anything.

And the perplexing thing for me is that, I have them repeat the motto of my Science project classes - Fail Spectacularly! And I share how important it is to fail because no discoveries are made without failure. Most troubling is that the girls I talked to were the girls who went toe-to-toe with the boys about their ideas, building methods, etc. in 3rd grade. What a disheartening difference a year makes!

This is why I think this program is very important. It helps the girls find or hold on to their voices. There's a workshop in San Francisco on 3/11, and there may be more workshops around the bay area and across the state. Please check the website for more information.

Girls Driving for a Difference on Stanford Campus video