During December I began participating in an online mentorship program for young girls in South Asia called the Ivy Girls Lead program. This was built to empower young girls, promote leadership qualities, and provide us with vital life lessons and ways to navigate the world as succesful and aspiring girls. It consisted of 2 weeks in which mentors and speakers came in to speak to us and share their expertise, and allow us to enagage in meaningul exercises. We then had a 3 month project which we intiated and underwent in relation to a service goal.

The Ivy Girls Lead Program was truly a unique and enriching experience, which encouraged me to reflect on my own skills, passions and purpose, as well as my role within a larger community, as a young empowered girl. For example, I was able to become more self aware in terms of my leadership style, which is to lead by example, and this ability to identify my skills, will allow me to capitalise on them within teams. Each guest speaker brought forward a different perspective. Whilst some spoke about how our mindsets impact our realities, others spoke on more practical ways to improve ourselves and discover our purpose. Guest speakers also focused on how to navigate the workforce and our adolescent lives as young girls, and the importance of empowering ourselves. The variety in the topics presented to us helped me reflect on all areas that constitute a good leader, from attitude, to practical organisation. The wealth of resources we all were informed on was extremely helpful, with book recommendations, podcasts, contacts, websites and more. For example, Ms Sonia Hirdaramani shared around 10 valuable pieces of advice, along with many resources, on how to improve ourselves and achieve our maximum potential. 

My favourite component of this course was the emphasis on community service, and individual initiatives to serve a larger, meaningful purpose. This required us to bring together all of the skills we were learning about, in a tangible product. By identifying an issue we deeply care about, which for me, was the mistreatment of women in prison, stemming from the intersection between gender inequalities and the dehumanization of prisoners, I was able to narrow my focus on how I can create a bigger change. This task allows us to employ all of the leadership skills we have worked towards, connect our learning to the bigger community we are within, and empower ourselves as young girls.

 

This connects to many learning outcomes as follows:

LO6: Demonstrate engagement with issues of global significance – Students are able to identify and demonstrate their understanding of global issues, make responsible decisions, and take appropriate action in response to the issue either locally, nationally or internationally.

This is connected because we were encouraged to acknowledge the global inequalities towards women and then create a tangible action pathway and undergo a service project.

LO5: Demonstrate the skills and recognise the benefits of working collaboratively – Students are able to identify, demonstrate and critically discuss the benefits and challenges of collaboration gained through CAS experiences.

We were encouraged to work in teams for our service project which improved the effectiveness of the project, and we were also able to engage in groups with people from other countries.

LO3: Demonstrate how to initiate and plan a CAS experience Students can articulate the stages from conceiving an idea to executing a plan for a CAS experience or series of CAS experiences. This may be accomplished in collaboration with other participants. Students may show their knowledge and awareness by building on a previous experience, or by launching a new idea or process.

We had to intiate a service project following the 2 week mentorship program and pursue this as a team to create an imapct.