Rosie's Girls

When I walked into Woodward High School each morning over the past three weeks, I never knew how I was going to be greeted by the girls in the Rosie’s Girls camp.* Would they be wiring electrical outlets? Constructing a lamp? Practicing karate? And how would I (with only journal in hand) compete against hammers, power drills, and karate chops?

In bringing Young Women Writing for (a) Change to the YWCA’s Rosie’s Girls program, Dawn Diebold (my co-teacher), and I knew we had to be innovative with how we implemented Young Women Writing for (a) Change practices. We also knew that we wanted to give participants a holistic learning experience involving self-discovery, peer interaction, and creative activities in order to nourish their own self-confidence.

Some of the favorite activities included collaborating on group poems, designing and performing skits based on character development, pair-sharing and fast-writing. Girls also participated in discussions around societal expectations of women, the myths of gender-roles, and what it takes to become a strong woman.

In our final read-around, girls shared pieces in response to Maya Angelou’s “Phenomenal Woman,” Nikki Giovanni’s “Ego Tripping,” Naomi Shibab Nye’s “My Body is Symphony.” And after one time around the circle to share pieces of writing, girls continued to volunteer to share more and more of their words. It was a true gift to be witness to how the girls’ voices transformed over the three weeks of working and writing together. A line from one camper’s writing reads: “I want to run for the dream. I believe I can make it to happiness if I try and work harder.” Sage advice from an 11 year-old that seems to sum up what a girl can do if she preserves.



*In brief, Rosie’s Girls is a three-week camp for girls ages 8-12 that provides hands-on instruction in traditionally male-dominated skilled trade work such as carpentry, welding, bike repair through the YWCA of Cincinnati.