Girls for a Change

Sarah

Girls For A Change has helped me grow as a young woman and gave me the confidence and pride I carry on today.  After being urged by my guidance counselor and my best friends in high school, I joined GFC in 2003. Even though I wasn’t sure at first about joining, I went on to be a co-leader of my Girl Action Team, as well as a member of the 2004-2005 Silicon Valley Girl Steering Committee. I’ll be a senior in college this coming fall at Syracuse University, and I have to say my activities in college have been shaped by the things GFC taught me.

I’ve been actively involved in the Syracuse, NY community by engaging in service and being a girls’ basketball coach at an after-school program on the north side. During my community work, the challenges I see young girls struggling with make me even more interested in being involved in my community both in Syracuse and the Bay Area. I try to stay involved with GFC any way that I can. I was fortunate to be one of the Juniper interns during summer 2007 and am program intern this summer.  Any chance I get to work with the organization gives me greater insight that I can take back to the Syracuse community. I learn more about empowering the young girls I coach to believe in themselves and in their future. If I learned one thing from GFC; it is that believing can only come true through action. I am so excited that GFC is going national and hope that one day there will be Girl Action Teams in Syracuse. I think GFC in Syracuse can provide an empowering outlet that will touch the lives of many of the girls I coach and work with through my community service-.

Becky

I was on the inaugural GFC Girl Steering Committee for the launch of the first GFC Girl Summit in the Bay Area.  GFC helped introduce me to top Bay Area executives and gave me the opportunity to learn about building a new organization from the ground up.  Under strong mentorship, I was able to polish my public speaking skills and learn how to effectively advocate for a social cause.  After a year on the Steering Committee, I graduated with honors from Notre Dame High School and landed a four-year scholarship to UCLA as the NBC11 Emma Bowen Foundation fellow.  Every summer, I rotated through different departments of NBC11, learning how to run a news station.

At UCLA, I worked as an Account Manager at Daily Bruin Marketing, Account Manager of the UCLA Advertising and Marketing Team, Victoria's Secret Brand Ambassador, and a reporter for Bruin News 29. I graduated in 2007 from UCLA magna cum laude with a double major in Political Science and Asian American Studies.  I am currently working for Disney in brand category for Disney Food Health and Beauty.

Nhu Anh

I was a sophomore in high school when I joined Girls For A Change in 2002. With my Milpitas High School team and the support and guidance of our amazing coaches, Joan and Lorraine, my team hosted a day long self esteem summit for middle school girls. Today as a GFC alum I continue to attend GFC events, including the Silicon Valley Girl Summits. I believe every young girl deserves a chance to be part of the GFC experience because I know they will LOVE it as much as I did. I hope that one day I can give back to GFC by becoming a coach and help inspire other young girls to chase their dreams.
I am a senior at San Jose State University majoring in Hospitality Management and I’ll be graduating in May 2009. My goal is to pursue a career in event planning. With the help of my GFC coaches, I earned an internship at National Semiconductor as their Events Intern.

Since my internship at National Semiconductor, I have been able to experience other internship opportunities relating to my field of study. Not only did my GFC Coaches provide me with the resources and support I needed to be a strong individual, but they have come to be my mentors and friends.

I am incredibly grateful for the tremendous impact that GFC has had on my life. I support GFC because the program has made positive changes in my life. It is a well run program and organization that encourages girls to create change. As young girls are making a difference, they are also learning about themselves. They learn life lessons and skills that will benefit them as they progress in their lives.

Krissa

At a young age, I often felt like a powerless spectator. The possibility of fulfilling my desires to change my surroundings appeared impossible living in a country ravaged by poverty. So, when I first came to the United States, I was overwhelmingly surprised of the endless opportunities there were for young people to be civically engaged and to be involved in public service. At the age of 13, I quickly learned about the idea of social change and civic engagement by joining with Girls For A Change (GFC) in Silicon Valley.

As a member of GFC Girl Action Teams for five years, I have helped to organize various social change projects. I organized a speakers’ series for young women aspiring to be professionals, and created after-school activities for middle school girls in response to the California school budget cuts. In addition, I helped to create a video to raise awareness about the influence of media on relationships. Through GFC, I have gained a sense of efficacy by empowering those around me and advocating for the community.
In the process of implementing several social change projects, I was challenged to identify the root cause of problems and to think analytically. In GFC, I had many opportunities to voice my concerns to community members and tackle issues with a social change perspective. My involvement in the Silicon Valley Girl Steering Committee and National Board of Directors also developed my ability to lead in various environments. Serving as an agent of social change in my community, inspired me to closely examine issues of injustice, to challenge various institutions, to express my opinions, and to act.

My interest in social justice has grown tremendously over the past several years, and it is for this reason that I intend to be an agent of change in both the non-profit sector and business sector. I plan to be a leader in these sectors because I have a passion for creating projects that help promote and assist the public. Ideally, I would like to combine all of my fields of interest in the hope that I can make a significant and lasting change in community. By being involved in these various sectors, I will have the opportunity to be an advocate for issues concerning social justice and to influence public policy. The non-profit and business sectors have tremendous power to affect all aspects of our society, and thus contribute meaning to my life. For the past five years, I have maturely developed as a social entrepreneur in the San Francisco Bay Area Community. Given the new profound knowledge I have gained in Girls For A Change, I am committed to be an influential leader who is ready to address issues of inequity, and to create positive change that reaches out to the world community.

Krissa Quero is a sophomore at the University of San Francisco.

Aline

Before GFC, I was missing school a lot. I’m from a family of nine and I’m like the good one. I thought I could get away with it and nobody really checked. I think I was being plain young and not thinking. I wasn’t finding anything there for me. And then my GPA was real low. I’m from Burundi in Africa and my parents are from the two tribes that were fighting. So coming from there to here and acting all Americanized was hard. My family has been through hell, I’ve seen war and I’ve been through it. I was so closed off and I wouldn’t talk to nobody about nothing. Growing up in Africa and living in the refugee camp and not having food—it was a struggle. Still coming here, I realized, "I’m still messing up." I felt like I had no reason to go to school, I wasn’t motivated.

And when I joined GFC, they told me to come to school and started encouraging me. When I first heard about GFC I was like: “Who would invest in me?” And then I saw they are really doing it, changing the world, and I wanted to hop on this train. When I joined GFC I would start showing up to school. It was good for me. I got to talk to girls who would listen to me. I was looking up to the people GFC and they were there for me. I managed to get a B in math, and I started believing in myself and going to class and taking in seriously and wanting to get scholarships.

Our Girl Action Team talked about serious stuff but we also joked around and had fun. I also joined the Girl Steering Committee and helped plan GFC events and got to meet the governor of Arizona. I was like, “I’m a rock star!” Before GFC, I was being a bad leader—getting my friends to skip school. When I joined GFC, I became a good leader. Now I tell my friends go to class and they listen to me. It feels good and like I’m helping people instead of destroying their lives.

Now, I’m working on a scholarship to go to college to become a criminal defense attorney or lawyer. Without me going to school, there’s nothing. There is so much pressure. The GFC staff and coaches, they have been there for me through everything. I don’t where I would be if I haven’t met such awesome people. GFC has done so much for me. I know they are always there. GFC helped me and that makes me want to help other people. I want to tell people to invest in GFC because it helps girls in my situation who don’t know what to do in their lives at this moment, it helps us know that there are options out there. And we learn that other women in power want to meet us and want to be there for us. It’s helping us believe in ourselves and be more successful.

Jennifer

Before GFC I was shy and I didn’t have much self-confidence, I always hid in the corner. I thought everyone was smarter than me. After the first three weeks of GFC I started coming out of my little shell and participating in class more and everyone noticed. Now I’m the first person to raise my hand to go in front of the class to give a speech. In GFC they made me realize that everyone is equal and no one is better than anyone else.

For our project, we wanted to change that California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger didn't want to give driver’s licenses to immigrants. My friends and I all thought it was so unfair. But at first we didn’t know how to reach out and make a difference. And after the first few GFC meetings, our coaches helped us develop our project to go to Sacramento to talk to some state senators and Lieutenant Gov. Cruz Bustamante about this. We wanted to tell the governor that everybody is equal and he himself is an immigrant. What if he didn’t have the chance to run for governor? We met with Bustamante and he told us that he supported our idea!

That first year our project, it was really cool because we got to meet important people and the certificates that they give you at the completion ceremony are up on my wall. I feel proud of the project because not  a lot of people get to meet with politicians one-on-one. Our coaches encouraged us so much. They made us feel like we were actually doing something for the community and they empowered us to do our project. When we get all quiet, they’d have a play a game and they’d always keep us going. I found that there was a lot of people out there who do believe in your cause, if you talk to them they can give you resources to accomplish things.

In GFC, I learned you could really change something that you thought you could never change. I started cooperating more with people and now I’m that person who does things in pairs. I learned that I’m very capable of doing things that I wouldn’t do before—like talking to someone on the phone, talking to adults and meeting with people like politicians. I keep telling everyone that I'm going to be the first woman president of the United States or at least one of the women presidents! Before I would have thought that I was too shy. GFC helps girls find their inner potential. Sometimes girls don’t know they can do stuff that maybe they’re really good at—like me. I used not think I could speak in front of people and now I feel that I can do anything.