Empower Girls Camp

Young people are our future and giving them tools to grow into healthy adults.  Empower Girls camp is a summer program started by teacher Jill Fortin.  Jill brought her students to Mind Body Spirit Yoga this summer to participate in a yoga class.  Kathy Hemer is a yoga teacher at the studio and taught the class.  

 Empower Girls for Medford is a 5-day camp to help promote girls to succeed and lead healthy, educated and independent lives. Fortin worked with pre-teens ages 11-14 to combat bullying, harassment, encourage education, promote mental health, and address the prevalence of gender stereotypes in the media. These ideas are pervasive and cause young women to lack confidence, shy away from opportunity and to find other sources for self-worth. The goal is to reach at-risk youth to promote healthy coping skills. 

Suicide remains the second leading cause of death in children 10-24.  A high number of girls have had some type of adverse childhood experience and in those young girls 92-98% of them will struggle with PTSD, Depression and anxiety. 1 in 5 teens report suffering from some type of mental illness. Almost 8 out of 10 high school girls report being unhappy with their bodies. 1 in 3 U.S. students are bullied in schools and most bullying happens in middle school. Introducing young women to tools to help through some of the most divisive times of their lives is essential to the overall health and well-being.  Focusing on the pre-teen can give them the tools needed to get through those troubling years and become strong, competent adults.  Our community is not different from any other community in this country.  We are fortunate to have women like Jill and Kathy who take time to work with girls in our community.  

Empower Girls camp focused on 3 areas:  

Mind: Students learned about journaling, healthy media use, relationships problems, resilience, and failure. Lessons were taught with discussions and speakers and hands on activities.  Students were offered examples of issues and situations and then through role playing they came up with solutions.  

Body: Students learned about healthy eating, healthy lifestyles, cooking, nutrition, exercise, body image, and self-esteem.  Students participated in activities with exercise or cooking demonstrations.  They learned to read food labels at the grocery store.  They also participated in activities to look at body image and increase self-awareness and esteem.

Spirit:  Students learned about mindfulness, participated in yoga and took a nature walk. They were taught about cognitive behavioral therapy with thought provoking lessons and hands-on activities.  

I am happy that yoga at the studio played a small part in the camp. When girls are offered lessons like these, they will grow into women who help to make our community better for all who live here.  Thank you to Jill Fortin and Kathy Hemer for their dedicated work with the girls.  We hope to participate in this event again.