Girls are always facing an uphill battle in STEM, whether it's feeling left out as the only girl in a science class, discrimination in the workplace, or unequal treatment between their male peers. Unfortunately, these experiences are commonly shared amongst females worldwide. After attending a Kode with Klossy coding camp for girls, our founder Shivali Gulati saw the potential to build a broader community of support and encouragement for girls. In December of 2018, Girl Genius was born, sparking a global community where people of color in STEAM are given a voice to inspire the next generation of female leaders.
To empower girls in STEAM, Girl Genius focuses on four key solutions: magazine issues, virtual events, outreach, and YouTube videos.
Magazine
Designed by aspiring women in STEAM, our past three magazine issues have amassed over 3,000 reads, teaching readers worldwide how to create inclusive spaces through school clubs, educating themselves on rising female founders, and applying to college as a STEM major. Throughout our 240 pages of inspiring content, Girl Genius amplifies the voices of women in STEAM through magazine interviews with nonprofit leaders. By creating free and digitally accessible issues, we empower girls from all over the world to create change and pursue STEM.
Virtual Events
With COVID-19, many STEM events and clubs close, presenting students with a large learning barrier. As a result, we launched our virtual event series in May with nonprofit leaders, Google Research Scholars, and industry experts, amassing over 4200+ attendees from 75 countries. Every week, we host free workshops, allowing attendees to explore different career paths in STEAM. In early July, we held our first Girl Genius STEAM Conference, with 2200+ attendees and 9 inspiring panels/workshops presented by female leaders in STEAM.
Through these events, we aim to give our audience the confidence to increase their involvement in STEAM and explore underrepresented industries in their area.
Outreach
As many students are disengaged from social distancing, our team at Girl Genius was eager to create a community that connected like-minded girls worldwide. We turned our vision into a reality through our Community Slack, uniting over 2900+ girls from 51 different time zones to network, build, and grow into female leaders.
With over 39,000 messages exchanged, our members consistently share STEM opportunities and ask questions on starting organizations, advice for virtual interviews, and much more!
YouTube
Our YouTube videos focus on a variety of topics: female leaders in STEAM, school advice, and diversity! In one of our ongoing series, Letting Off STEAM, we interview women in STEAM about their career path and experience as a minority in the workplace. We highly encourage girls interested in STEAM to watch our series to gain insight on navigating the workplace in STEAM. Our team also produces a Pre-College 101 series for rising seniors writing college applications.
What’s next?
Besides our four main projects, our Passion Projects x You program allows us to work with girls in our community to launch their own nonprofits and events. (Apply here!) We’ve released 30 applications so far, and are looking forward to transforming bright visions into realities.
Starting in September, our team will embark on our fifth iteration, continuing on our mission to shape girls into strong female changemakers. Girl Genius doesn’t stop after a single magazine release or workshop—we connect and inspire girls in STEAM all year long.