AFG | August 2023 Newsletter
Note from the Executive Director
In June, we were all heartbroken to see the Supreme Court make three devastating decisions on the future of affirmative action, student debt forgiveness, and the rights of LGBTQ+ individuals, including allowing businesses to discriminate against couples based on their sexual orientation. This came at a time when we, unfortunately, had to commemorate a major step backwards for abortion rights with the one-year anniversary of the overturning of Roe vs. Wade. To those of us fighting for progress, day in and day out, it is a punch in the gut.
As I prepare myself for the final months of my time here at Alliance for Girls*, even in the face of such devastating regression, I ground myself in the victories that we have won and continue to win at the local level. The regional and state policies which we have helped to pass remind girls and gender-expansive youth of color and LGBTQ+ young people that their communities do still care about their safety and well-being. Moreover, the hundreds of thousands of young people, who our members serve, are told every day in these programs they matter, and are valued and loved for exactly who they are. I am grateful for the small but real part Alliance for Girls gets to play in making those programs as strong as they can be, and supporting the people who run them with training, community, and care. Even as we all feel the effects of rights being ripped away, we are reminded that the fight is far from over and that the young people on the frontlines of the fight, are not alone.
I continue to be so excited to bring this impact and expand our reach to Los Angeles.
Our kick off event on May 23rd was a success with 60 intergenerational attendees and powerful evaluation results. It was an incredible opportunity to engage with our “boots on the ground” folx who are working directly with girls and gender-expansive youth in LA County as well as youth themselves.
AFG is undergoing a strategic planning process to build our vision for the next three to five years. Deeply rooted in our community, our strategic planning process engages our members, funders, and girls and gender-expansive youth themselves, along with our staff and board. If you are interested in participating in our feedback process, please email me at emma@alliance4girls.org.
Lastly, I am incredibly excited to announce the AFG Girls* Resource Hub is now on our website. Our team has been working on this extensive directory of 114 organizations for several months to help girls and gender-expansive in California find resources they need. Youth can filter by what they are looking for - from counseling services to arts organizations.
While this is my last newsletter as the Founding Executive Director before my final day on September 15th, I am excited to see what’s to come for everyone at AFG as well as the youth we serve. There will be an opportunity in late August where I can gather with this extraordinary community and celebrate all that we have accomplished together. More details will be shared soon. I know that together AFG will continue to make a difference in the fight for gender equity across the state.
In community,
Emma Mayerson
AFG Founding Executive Director
AFG Girls* Resource Hub is LIVE!
This month, Alliance for Girls launches the new and improved AFG Girls Resource Hub! Formerly the Girls Service Directory, the AFG Girls Resource Hub is an interactive, online directory of 114 organizations (and growing) - that provide programming and/or services for girls and gender expansive youth across California, with a focus on the Bay Area and Los Angeles County. It is a space where organizations - particularly our members - can use to help connect girls and gender-expansive youth with the services they need and want in their communities, but is accessible for youth themselves to navigate.
To add your organization to this powerful directory, please fill out the form at bit.ly/GirlsResourceHub and email your logo to kennedy@alliance4girls.org. To recommend an organization for our directory, please also email kennedy@alliance4girls.org.
LA Kick-Off Recap
We couldn’t have been more proud of our LA Kick-Off that took place on May 23rd. The event convened 60 girls’ champions and youth, representing 25 different organizations across LA County, for a day of learning, connecting, and most importantly collective dreaming of the transformative change that is possible for girls and gender-expansive youth when we work together. From inspiring keynote speakers to engaging sessions, attendees had the opportunity to learn and re-ignite their passion for this work. Of the participants that completed the evaluation of this event, 96% agreed that they are more knowledgeable about the resources and programs that are available to girls and gender-expansive youth in LA County due to the LA Kickoff Event, and 95% felt more connected to a broader movement that is supporting and advocating for girls and gender-expansive youth.
During our Collective Visioning exercise, participants were asked to brainstorm what girls and gender-expansive youth in LA County need to thrive on an individual, organizational, community, and public policy level. We took copious notes during the collective vision session, and below is the image that a youth artist created for us based on the key takeaways.
At the individual level, girls and gender-expansive youth in LA County want:
Spaces that honor their autonomy and more opportunities that center their lived experiences and personal stories;
Knowledge and access to more resources and programs in their communities.
At the organizational level, organizations that serve girls and gender-expansive youth need:
More funding to support their programming and to better serve girls and gender-expansive youth needs.
At the community level, girls and gender-expansive youth want:
Public spaces where they feel safe, seen and where they have agency to make decisions for themselves and their communities;
Opportunities to reflect and address the root causes of violence in communities.
At the public policy level, girls and gender-expansive youth want:
Opportunities where they are sitting at the policymaking table as key contributors and decision-makers;
Access to affordable housing, guaranteed basic income, accelerating decarceration, and public budgets that value and invest in girls and gender-expansive youth.
In the coming weeks, AFG will be releasing a heat map and accompanying Community Asset Assessment report that will give the community a snapshot of what resources and programs are already available for girls and gender-expansive youth in Service Planning Areas (SPAs) 6 & 7 and what is still needed to create environments where they can truly thrive.
AFG in Action
Special kudos to our member IGNITE for allowing us to join their IGNITE the Capitol event in April at the Sacramento State Capitol. It was an honor to partner with them to lift up the voices of girls and gender-expansive youth.
Thanks to everyone who attended - girls and gender-expansive youth confidently advocated for the change they want to see in their communities.
Together, participants championed the following legislation:
Menstrual Product Accessibility Act (SB 59)
Menstrual Equity Act of 2023 (SB 260)
Public Transit for All: Improving Safety and Increasing Ridership (SB 434); and,
Postsecondary Education: Sexual Assault and Sexual Violence Prevention Transportation Services (AB 1138).
All these bills can potentially improve the lives of girls and gender-expansive youth across California. Shout out to our member orgs who attended with their youth on behalf of AFG – Oakland Lacrosse, Young Women’s Freedom Center, Oasis for Girls, Shine, Chinese for Affirmative Action, and Youth Advocates for Change!
In addition, our team has been hard at work to pass SB 260 (authored by Senator Menjivar) , The CalWORKs Menstrual Equity Act of 2023, which aims to expand CalWORKs benefits to include $10 of monthly cash assistance for purchasing menstrual products. The bill recognizes that access to reproductive healthcare, including menstrual products, is a basic human right that should not be denied due to an individual’s financial circumstances.
As an extension of our #NotOneMoreGirl campaign, we’re thrilled to report that SB 434 (authored by Senator Min), which requires the top ten public transit systems in California to collect data on rider harassment with the purpose of improving ridership safety, passed out of the Assembly Transportation Committee several weeks ago. The bill gives a voice to the millions of transit riders throughout the State of California who cannot freely use public transit without fearing for their safety. Senator Min hopes to submit a coalition letter to Assembly Appropriations when the Assembly reconvenes in mid-August.
AFG is a proud co-sponsor of both bills and currently, they await a vote in the California Assembly Appropriations Committee. We’ll have an update for members in the fall on the status of these two bills.
In late June, AFG’s Advocacy Manager, De’Anna Miller, gave testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on AB 452: the Justice for Survivors Act (authored by Assemblymember Addis and Senator Skinner), which would remove the statutes of limitations for civil cases involving the sexual abuse of a minor, and therefore allowing survivors to seek justice years later. Her powerful words supported the final passage of this bill on June 27th.
The AFG Learning Corner
Thank you to everyone who attended our spring and summer workshops thus far!
During June and July, we hosted our incredibly popular Unmasked: The Art of Healing Trauma series. We would like to thank Kandee Lewis from the Positive Results Center for facilitating a brave space for us as well as modeling vulnerability and self-reflection. Thank you to each of you who attended for your honesty and vulnerability and for sharing your joy, pain, and experiences with us.
Earlier in the spring, we also hosted Healing for Healers: Pausing with Purpose workshop series led by Destiny Webster from She Magick Rituals. This three-part workshop series was geared towards learning the importance of pausing as an act of resistance to our minds, bodies and souls as machines.
Both events were an important part of acknowledging how all of us need emotional and physical healing in all of our lives and learning how to hold space for it.
In addition, we’re excited to announce two new on-demand courses we are adding to the AFG Learning Hub in early fall! Course topics will be on Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR), hosted by Evaluation Studio, as well as a Financial Literacy course, hosted by Latinas Talk Dinero.
REMINDER! All of our current on-demand courses can be accessed by AFG members for free! Email Miari at miari@alliance4girls.org for the members promo code.
A Girl's Perspective
We at Alliance for Girls (AFG) have always prided ourselves on a number of things - the innovative work we do, the fantastic team we have built and nurtured, and most importantly - being a girl-centered organization. As an alliance of organizations, AFG listens to the girls and gender-expansive youth we and our member organizations serve, and amplifies their voices and leadership in order to advance gender equity. One way we’ve accomplished this is through our Youth Fellowship program, which supports young women and gender-expansive youth to be in the driver’s seat of effecting the change they want to see in the world.
Are you interested? We are hiring an Advocacy Fellow to join our team this August who will be with our team for a full year. Through these fellowships, you can learn more about non-profit ops, and the nuts and bolts of how to make one work or how to affect systems and policy change through strategic advocacy. This position is perfect for folx early in their career.
We have already started the interview process for the Operations Fellow and are looking forward to both of our new fellows joining Senior Membership Fellow, Kennedy Foye.
Kennedy Foye serves as AFG's Senior Membership Fellow and could not be more ecstatic to continue her fellowship with AFG for a second year.
In her capacity in this position, Kennedy adopts a youth-led approach to shaping membership services tailored specifically to the needs of young individuals. Her primary goal is to engage more youth through advocacy, collaborations, workshops, and leadership training.
Kennedy is passionate about yoga, nature, entrepreneurship, and spending time with her family. Alongside her commitment to her work at AFG, she is also a yoga instructor and aspires to stay within the nonprofit sector for her future endeavors.
Kennedy notes, "Working at Alliance for Girls has truly changed my life for the better. I have developed a profound passion for the nonprofit field and honed many essential professional skills. AFG has been instrumental in preparing me for my future, and I feel confident about embracing any role that comes after this one."
AFG Member Spotlight
AFG member - Justice & Joy National Collaborative - was founded as a national advocacy organization in 1883 (140 years ago!). Their collective work has always been vital for girls, young women, and gender-expansive young people of color to heal and thrive.
Their upcoming national conference will be held in San Francisco from November 8 through November 10, 2023. “ In Solidarity We Rise: Joyful Radical Abundance” is a youth-led, intergenerational national gathering for girls, young women, women and gender-expansive people, including leaders, advocates, activists, community-based organizations, policymakers, etc. At its core, In Solidarity We Rise is about strengthening and co-constructing an intergenerational interracial/interethnic movement for social transformation to address issues such as education equity, justice reform, professional and organizational development, mental health, all forms of gender-based violence, and much more.
Interested attendees are encouraged to submit their own ideas to inspire and galvanize our community by presenting at the conference themselves!
Share your experience, expertise, joy, strength, wisdom, and passion during one of the many sessions throughout the gathering. Proposals are due 11:59pm PT on August 7, 2023 .
Check out the agenda at a glance and learn more about the conference.
Our 7th Annual #TheWorldWeImagine Conference convened more than 475 intergenerational leaders including best-selling authors, community leaders, policymakers, champions of girls and gender-expansive youth, and over 200 girls and gender-expansive youth.
Together we engaged in a day of learning and restoration and left feeling energized as girl champions and more connected to the broader movement that is advocating for girls and gender-expansive youth.
As we move into our 11th year, AFG remains committed to uplifting the powerful leadership of girls and gender expansive youth, especially those of color, here in the Bay Area and most recently in Los Angeles County. Together we believe our collective work can create radically safe, sustainable, and equitable communities where every girl and gender-expansive youth can truly thrive.
AFG Events
*"Girls" refers to gender-expansive youth (cis girls, trans girls, non-binary youth, gender non-conforming youth, gender queer youth and any girl-identified youth).
