Girls Inc. Teams Up With CBS4 To Launch Virtual Girls & Science On 'Introduce A Girl To Engineering Day'
(DENVER) CBS4 - Virtual Girls & Science 2022 launched Thursday to celebrate "Introduce A Girl To Engineering Day." That mission perfectly aligns with how Girls Inc. has operated in Denver for the past 40 years.
Girls Inc. President and CEO Sonya Ullibari said the nonprofit's goal is to inspire all girls to be strong, smart and bold.
"That pro-girl space is such an important part of our work and we try to encourage that each step of the way in any area of interest and exploration that any girl has."
For the month of Girls & Science, that means an extra focus on STEM, or Science, Technology, Engineering and Math.
One way Girls Inc. is enriching the program is through its March "Girls thINC Outside The Box" activity kit. It's yet another creation sparked by changes brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.
"It was birthed out of the height of the pandemic," explained Destinee Perkins, the Director of Programming for the organization. "We thought 'How do we reach our girls? How do we connect to them in their homes?' They were on Zoom for hours on end, so how do we get our Girls Inc. experience into homes and off computers? This idea was just birthed and we just ran with it."
Perkins curates the boxes including a variety activities, experiments, books and a magazine. That magazine also features a female hero -- or "SHEro" -- like Dasia Taylor.
"She invented color changing stitches so depending on the color if it turns a little more purple, it will show that there's infection. In high school, (she was) doing awesome work. So we like to highlight girls just like her in our magazine so our girls get to see faces that are familiar to them, who look like them who are awesome things in the STEM world."
And Girls Inc. believes in providing key support to the girls who use the program.
"Aspirational capital is something that we really value here at Girls Inc. That's the ability to dream, to have a goal for yourself -- maybe for the first time somebody in your family has that goal. Whether you're the first to graduate from college, the first to go into a STEM career, it's really important to have that support, resources, network around that to make it a reality."
And introducing girls to unexpected careers is just the first step we hope they will all take this month by exploring Girls & Science.