GirlSpring Vestavia

Through social gatherings, mentoring, workshops and now virtual space, GirlSpring has been empowering young women for more than a decade

Thanks to GirlSpring, Vestavia’s Ariel Zhou has made connections with girls and women she might never have met – and had experiences she expects to help her in the future.

And she’s had fun.

“It’s really fun getting to connect with so many different girls from different schools because all of us are super different and we have different passions,” Ariel said. “And it’s been really interesting getting to meet not only girls my age but also women who work in banking, and the healthcare industry. I’ve gone to like, interview them and speak with them.

“So, it’s really nice forming these new connections and kind of learning from my peers while also getting to read what they write and then seeing what everyone is passionate about on the website.”

Ariel is president of the Springboarders, a GirlSpring committee that serves as “kind of our teen advisory board,” which also creates content for the organization’s website and helps organize specific virtual events. The senior has been a part of GirlSpring for two years now, which has given her the chance to intern at a bank and shadow a young executive. “It was a really good experience,” she said.

Thousands of girls across the metro area have made connections - in person and virtually - through GirlSpring since it was founded in 2010, said Executive Director Kristen Greenwood. The nonprofit organization is totally focused on empowering young women in ways they might not otherwise experience.

“We know that girls don’t necessarily get all the skills they need to succeed in the classroom, not because they don’t have great teachers, but because they are focused on academics, which is very important,” Greenwood said. “But girls and women face challenges in life that they need to know how to navigate. Whether it is career or family, or both, there are things that girls need to know that aren’t taught in school.”

Greenwood talked to Vestavia Voice about how GirlSpring got started, and why it’s so important.

Q: What does GirlSpring do and why?

A: Our mission is to empower girls 9-18 with the tools they need to succeed in life: accurate information, inspiring events and positive female role models.

Q: What does that look like in practice?

A: What this looks like in terms of programming is an online magazine and mobile app created and managed by a group of teen girls called the Springboarders, monthly talks led by female community leaders called Wonder Women that focus on topics ranging from how to succeed in careers (particularly male-dominated fields) to cybersecurity and financial literacy to nutrition and wellness, career and STEM fairs, film screenings, mother-daughter events and an annual summer camp.

Q: Give us an example.

A: Our largest ongoing program is the Springboarders teen program, which consists of 60 girls, 13-18, who are tasked with managing GirlSpring’s website, girlspring.com, which reaches 15,000 visitors per month, in Birmingham and beyond. The girls have varying roles of responsibility. At a minimum, each girl contributes some type of content to the site, such as an article on a topic relevant to their peers, a poem or artwork, or works with other team members to create a podcast or video interview with a female role model from the community.

There are also leadership roles such as chairs for the various committees (podcast, YouTube, etc.), and executive level (president, vice president and secretary). The girls work together to develop a monthly topic for their website submissions, create online events for their peers, such as trivia nights and peer to peer college prep advice panels, and periodically get together to have volunteer days. Girls are drawn from all different schools and backgrounds, so through this program they get exposure to girls from different walks of life, they learn how to work together as a team, develop leadership skills, and get to meet lots of inspiring women from our community that they might not otherwise meet.

Q: That would seem to touch on a lot of real-world skills.

A: In terms of volunteer opportunities, people often don’t realize how great this looks on a college application, but consistently the graduating seniors tell me that when they go for their college interviews or put this on scholarship applications, that it really stands out because it is a unique and different type of service.

During COVID especially, we heard so many girls tell us what a great resource the website had been for them. People often want to hear about our events, which are wonderful, but the website, which is driven by this group of teen girls, is really at the heart of everything. There are resources written by professionals on certain topics, but 90% of the content is created by teen girls.

Q: How did GirlSpring get started?

A: GirlSpring was started by Jane Comer. She saw a lack of women in leadership positions and a need for more. She believed that by empowering girls, we build better communities, better businesses, better relationships, and ultimately a better world. So, she started gathering input from women in Birmingham who felt similarly and founded GirlSpring as a 501(c)3 nonprofit in 2010.

Q: Tell us more about Jane Comer.

A: Jane has two passions: empowering girls and the arts. She is a native of Birmingham, and besides GirlSpring, she also started ArtPlay, which holds art, dance, and music classes for children and adults and is housed in a restored 19th century house in Southside. She’s a lot of fun and also one of the nicest people you’ll ever meet.

Q: How did you come to GirlSpring?

A: I worked at the Birmingham Museum of Art for many years, and knew who Jane was, but didn’t really know her. One of my colleagues knew her well and knew about GirlSpring and introduced us.  I fell in love with the mission immediately!

Q: How many girls does GirlSpring serve?

A: It’s a hard question to answer, especially on grant applications. Through our in-person programs, where we actually see girls directly, about 1,000 per year from Birmingham and surrounding areas. Our biggest platform, however, is our website, which has, on average 15,000 visitors per month. Our website visitors ... could be from Birmingham, or they could be from anywhere across the globe.

Q: How do girls sign up?

A: There are many ways to get involved. We have a number of public programs - monthly events called Wonder Women talks, films, an annual STEM Fair and Career Fair, and a summer camp, but to “join” means to apply to our teen leadership program, the Springboarders. Springboarders must apply via an online application, be interviewed by a small peer group, commit to monthly meetings, and commit to submitting something to our website each month (an article, artwork, poetry, podcast, video).

Q: Did the pandemic change what you do in any way? If so, how?

A: Yes, when schools shut down and girls had more time at home, we saw a dramatic increase in traffic to our website — 30% within weeks. We went from 8,000 average visitors to 13,000 in several weeks. That’s continued to grow since then.

We had the largest Springboarder class since we started, and the pandemic actually was a huge booster for our growth. Girls were looking for resources online, and luckily they found us. The feedback we got from the girls we work with directly was that we also were a great source of structure when the rest of their world fell apart. Plus, reading articles written by peers going through the same thing made them feel they weren’t alone. Also, all of our in-person programs are now completely offered online.

Q: As the pandemic eases, what do you want to see change?

A: Getting people to recognize what a great resource our website and the virtual world can be when circumstances make it impossible for people to be together physically. For so many girls, having virtual programs has been wonderful because for a small town, we are pretty big. Depending on where you live, it can take an hour to get from one part of town to another, plus, with virtual programs, you eliminate barriers like lack of transportation that many households have to deal with.

Q: Tell us about a success story.

A: It’s hard to pick just one. When I first became executive director at GirlSpring, a set of twin sisters joined GirlSpring when they were entering ninth grade. They both stayed in the program all four years of high school and now are in their first year of college. Although they each had their own unique personalities, they were both quite shy when they started with GirlSpring and I watched their confidence grow and saw them develop into leaders over the years. GirlSpring can’t take all the credit, but I know they used it on their college applications and scholarship applications, and both said they felt that it showed as such a unique experience, they felt it really helped and made their applications stand out.

Q: If there was one thing you’d want people to know about GirlSpring, what would it be?

A: I think there is a perception that it is a website where girls publish their writing, artwork and poetry. That is only one component of what it is. Although that is important, and valued, I think what the girls get out of it is so much more. It’s the behind the scenes camaraderie of working together to decide on the theme for the month, it’s the women they get to meet as guest speakers at their meetings and the women they interview for podcasts and video interviews, the in-person events like the Wonder Women talks and the STEM fair and career fair and the summer camp. I hope that people will visit our website, Instagram, Facebook, and check us out.