Girls Speak Out® Worldwide

Girls Rock and Rule!

Workshops, Trainings, Support & Projects For YOU
4 Detailed Information on Trainings to offer our workshops for girls and women click here.

Our ORIGINAL WORKSHOPS for GIRLS ages 7 and up (with women supporters)

Recommended Length of 2 days, 10 hours total

Overview: Since 1994, in over 40 states in the USA and in countries on five continents, girls have thrived in our unique, positive setting in a circle of girls from 7 to 18 and women of different ages (who learn that Girls Speak Out can also be about their true selves then and now). Venues have ranged from meeting rooms, public housing developments, small huts in India and private and public school classrooms to the CNN Center and the General Assembly of the United Nations.

Girls Speak Out (GSO) spreads seeds. Girls grow from the inside-out, and move ahead to create social change no matter where they live with our ongoing support. Girls learn to move in positive ways, allowing them to blossom and connect with each other, the earth and all people. The program is also a missing link between what girls need to find out for themselves and what they can learn from each other and teach others. Its agenda is to inspire girls to find, value and speak out about their true selves. It's fun. It uses storytelling, literature, history, discussion, art, games and a talk show format to reach girls at a pivotal time in their development. Girls do not pay to attend, and food and supplies are provided free of charge.

In the workshop, girls receive information they wouldn't ordinarily know exists on topics such as cultural biases and research on the psychology of girls and women. We avoid jargon. Experiences and beliefs are expressed with no judgment. Particpants receive a green stone, which symbolizes their true selves as described in Alice Walker's Finding the Green Stone picture book, and become part of a unique club. Thousands of girls and women carry their green stones as a source of strength.

Girls Speak Out workshops led by Andrea Johnston can be booked, we can find a certified trainer or you can become one.

YOU CAN participate, train and become certified to present workshops and/or volunteer and help organize workshops.

MORE WORKSHOP CHOICES

Boys Speak Out Workshop
Recommended length of 1 day, 6 hours total

Boys are empathetic, although they have few opportunities to show it with respect to females, and they thrive when they have authentic information about females. Men can attend as supporters; and each participant learns research about females, statistical information, discusses questions and statements from girls, and has a unique opportunity to talk openly from the heart and connect from the inside-out.

*Workshops for girls and boys (with women and men)

Learning Together Co-ed Workshop
Recommended Length of 2-3 days, 10-15 hours total

Girls and boys who have experienced single-sex GSO workshops make leaps and bounds in social development when they come together. It's another vision of the future that becomes a reality with Girls Speak Out.

Girls meet first for a workshop, then boys meet and explore Girls Speak Out and female history*, and the final workshop is co-ed. As one observer notes, "I never thought I would see and hear these kids respect each other, make plans to change what's unfair, and have fun."

Women Speak Out Workshop
Led by Andrea Johnston
Recommended length of 1 day, 6 hours total

A workshop for women old and young who want to connect in a positive way with girls in their personal or professional lives and with the girls they were--and still are today.
Participants include mothers, teachers, therapists, fathers, and others who will explore:
How to strengthen bonds between girls and women that cross traditional boundaries of race, class, ethnicity, geography, religion and sexual orientation
Why and how to change negative beliefs and behaviors about gender arising from our childhoods
Ways to expand feelings that reflect the joys and strengths of being female
How to open doors and overcome fear-based behavior about our strengths and gender
Strategies that help you move in a positive direction with girls of all ages
Historical information that challenges unfair beliefs and practices
How to value a true self at any age

I didn't connect how what I experienced during my girlhood stood between me, my daughter and who I wanted to be as a mother and woman. I can feel and make that mother and woman real now. Gretchen, 46, Canada

Action Network Projects and Newsletters

You decide what you want to change and we offer support on the ground and/or long-distance.

start a hard-copy or online local newsletter with our support
start local Girls Speak Out clubs
Support ongoing Caged Bird Sings Projects

Consulting services, speaking engagements and seminars

Retreats for families and groups

Girls Speak Out changed the way I relate to girls. The workshops opened doors that made huge differences in our lives. Paula, 37, USA, Girls' Program Director

You can't change the world if you leave out half of it. Plan of Action, First National Girls' Conference

Still More Info...
Contact us to join and for more information...

Girls Speak Out Action Network

Inspire Girls Globally
Girls and their friends who contact us have and can become part of our worldwide network that actively supports girls of all backgrounds and circumstances. We locate help through our own network to contact groups such as Girls Incorporated, the Women's Sports Foundation, Equality Now and UNICEF. For instance, a girl who wanted to start a Girls Speak Out Club in her school in the United States, a girl who was discriminated against in Canada because she wanted to play baseball, another who was at risk at home because of sexual abuse, and a girl who was being sexually harassed in Africa were each helped through our Action Network.

TRAINING WORKSHOPS

If you want to organize a workshop, then our Train-the-Trainers Certification process can enable you to make it happen near you no matter where you live:
In-Person and Distance Training is Individualized.
In response to requests from women and organizations, Andrea developed a train-the-trainers program to certify adult organizers, leaders and trainers of Girls Speak Out program workshops. The YWCA Toronto successfully piloted the training program in 2002, and today girls and women are being inspired and supported by certified GSO leaders on different continents. Andrea currently participates in in-person and long-distance trainings to certify individuals, schools and groups worldwide.

What do you learn? Step-by-step Certification that entitles you to offer workshops and, if you choose, to train others using our name, materials and activities.

In-person Training: Recommended Length of 4 days, 16 hours total

Distance Training: Length determined by your schedule and experience, one-on-one online and phone support, guidebook included

Contact gspeakout@aol.com to be trained and/or to reach certified organizers/trainers in the following locations :

Florence, Cameroon*
Jane, Kenya **
Breena, USA
Kim, Ontario, Canada/Tanzania***
Dyan Visalia, California

*Girls Speak Out Cameroon's Florence Mambotiji has been chosen to participate in a two-week Training of Trainers on Gender and Non-Violence for selected women peace activists by the Africa Desk of the Women Peace Makers Program of the International Fellowship of Reconciliation headquarted in the Netherlands.

** Jane founds Kiberan Women for Peace and Fairness (http://generationkenya.co.ke/main/category/champions)

***Kim is fundraising to support Girls Speak Out Tanzania, a group she trained on a visit in 2007. Currently, we are helping find one of the girls who was stolen on 3/31/08.

Girls Speak Out Program Workshops
Boys Speak Out Workshops
Leading Together Co-ed Workshops

Girls Speak Out Train-the-Trainers
Certification Workshops

Women Speak Out Program Workshops

Girls Speak Out Action Network--
Supporting & Inspiring Girls Globally

Connect with Andrea to Speak and/or Train and Present Workshops

From Gloria Steinem:

At the heart of this program is its success in bringing together girls from diverse backgrounds, and showing through links to pre-history that symbols in every culture and continent speak of a past when females were respected in authority. It was originated by and has depended on Andrea's rare ability to bring people of different ages and backgrounds together, and to challenge such deep and unfair divisions as racism, sexism and economic class.

From Florence in Cameroon:
For Girls Speak Out Limbe
You know the girl child is very vulnerable here in Africa. The whole exercise of making them strong is so challenging that some times I am tempted to listen to the other voice that tells me to 'abandon'. But I am so determined and fortunately I met Andrea giving me this most needed push.
One day while I was teaching, there was some fidgetting at one angle of the class. When I asked what was happening the class prefect told me that two students were quarrelling. When I went further, the female student told me that the male student just insulted her by saying that her breasts are too big. All efforts to make her understand that it does not have to be an 'insult' failed.
I got her later on in the staff room and tried to talk to her and she opened up that her mother was even planning to take her to a place for the breast to 'go back'. I then understood that it was breast ironing.
From that day I became interested in female student issues. I went further to form a club known as For Girls Only. As I researched further I discovered that there are many issues about girls that need attention. I advised them to be able to say 'No!!!' sometimes. Each time we met they will shout No,No,No, so many times. That was how I came about the name 'SHOUT NO!!
Fortunately I met Girls Speak Out and with Andrea's assistance, I could improve on my methodology. I resorted to giving talks to the students in my school and other schools,I met them in social gatherings,during graduations.
I also saw the need to talk to parents. I tried men but they said it was a 'woman thing'. I found favour with the women because at least they took some time out to listen to me. They were interested because it concerned their daughters.
Each time I call for the girls I expect them to speak out but I discovered they are shy. The topics we discuss often sounds like a taboo to them. They will not want to pronounce the word 'sex', boyfriend, vagina, etc." They will need to be 'drunk' to pronounce it and when they do the other girls will laugh at them and look at them as 'harlots'.I had to talk,'preach','sing',shout, to make them undestand that it is not a taboo subject we are discussing. Some say their parents will shout at them if they ask certain questions. They feel very free when talking to me instead. If I am to talk to women as I sometimes do in local village meetings in the city here, the women are so surprise when I ask them to be actively involved in the sexual life of their children, mostly the girls. They ask me how that can be possible.They say the culture forbids them discussing things l;ike that. I discovered that some of them do not even know when or whether their daughters have had their menses. All they know is to provide the most needed 'rags' at such times.I took it as a challenge to make them know that they are even suppose to check on the colour, ask them about their boyfriends, all social issues concerning them. It is not easy with the African woman. Couple with the fact that most of them are uneducated it is so difficult. They even expect that their time be bought.they will need snacks and other little forms of attractive things to get them to listen to me.
I can remember after one session a woman asked me to bring the sanitary towels I want them to be giving their children.These are some of the things. I always feel like abandoning the whole thing. Another thing is that if I intend to continue with this thing then I will be needing the services of other people who are experts in other fields to come in.
If for instance I need to talk about school drop-out to the girls, I will need to get the services of a social worker because if they listen to other people they take the subject more seriously. To get these other people in I need to pay for their services.
With the use of the name Girls Speak Out, I will let the idea go national. I will get a place, a sign board, legalise the papers, get more women in and train them myself and send them in the suburbs to meet girls and women.
There is a serious problem in Cameroon. The uneducated women need a lot of attention. Because they are uneducated their girls are left on their own. They drop out from school, are sexually abused, carry out harmful practices on their bodies such as breast ironing, ignorantly harm themselves and the list continues. These are some of the challenges that | face in getting girls to speak out.
If I were to propose a way forward, I will think we need to go ahead and create a kind of women training centre and send them to go round schools, villages, meeting other women all around the country. Women and girls also expect a video coverage at each meetings with them.This idea to is not bad because it can be put into a disket and sent to Girls Speak Out headquarters. It is really demanding and my women have virtually abandoned because of lack of finance.
Dealing with gender issues interests me a lot. I have always wanted to be a social worker. I think Cameroon can be a good case study in the new dimension in handling gender issues that Girls Speak Out is trying to introduce in Cameroon. I think with the assistance of the headquarters of Girls Speak Out, our efforts are not wasted.