By The Culture
The Florida Girls Databook – an unprecedented, group-supported research project on behalf of 1.3 million trauma-impacted girls ages 7-17 across the state – has been unveiled with an eye toward implementing real change in the way local and state governments, community stakeholders and
boots-on-the-ground organizations work together to approach and fund crucial interventions.
Led by the Florida Girls Initiative, which was created and is led by Miami-based nonprofit Girl Power Rocks, Inc., the Florida Girls Databook raises awareness of the unmet needs of the state’s “at-promise” girls – an intentional and important reclaiming of the widely used “at-risk” label – to identify the most alarming “red flags” and encourage cross-collaboration in addressing them. The project was fueled by $300,000 in funding facilitated by Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava.
“The Florida Girls Databook was designed to put girls center stage and shed light on the quality of their lives – how they live, how they’re being treated and how they’re feeling as they move through their homes, their schools and their communities,” said Thema Campbell, Girl Power Rocks Founder and CEO. “There are serious traumas and incidences happening with girls statewide, and we need to bring those out of the darkness and advocate for making our communities safer for at-promise girls.”
Campbell assembled a robust coalition of collaborators and supporters from across the state to create the databook, including elected officials and various municipalities, school districts, universities, health care systems and associations, community stakeholders and leaders, and community-building and faith-based organizations. Many of them also participated in listening sessions conducted across the state – which included parents and young girls themselves – to collect direct feedback that enhanced additional data culled from myriad sources to inform the databook.
“We knew we needed to collaborate with people who understood the power and the needs of girls, who understand what girls are going through,” said Campbell. “But we also knew we had to partner with people who had resources and could open up doors – we had the knowledge but we didn’t have the
funding, so the first person we partnered with was Mayor Levine Cava, who provided the funding to make sure that we could go throughout the state to speak with and listen to people about what’s going on in their individual communities.”
Highlighted findings from the Florida Girls Databook include:
▪ 1.3 million are living in circumstances that put their futures at risk
▪ Nearly half – 44% – have considered suicide
▪ 461,000 have suffered abuse and trauma
▪ 600,000 are struggling in school
▪ More than 1 million are economically disadvantaged
“The most startling thing we discovered was how many girls are thinking about killing themselves or had tried to kill themselves,” said Campbell. “Even after 25 years of working with and advocating for at-promise girls, that was shocking to me. And the number of girls aging out of foster care who immediately become homeless, are reading below their age level, and self-medicating with alcohol or drugs, was also shocking.”
“The information we gathered isn’t just meant for the databook; it will create long-term collaborations and the funding support needed to create or expand the programs serving at-promise girls,” added Nikki Gaskin-Capehart of The NGC Team, who executed the listening sessions. “The result we want to see is a huge system change – we’re creating a new lens through which we focus on and deliver what the girls really need.”
With the databook now available to those individuals, organizations and government agencies working toward making better lives for Florida’s at-promise girls, the hope is that it will spur funders and relevant change-makers – and create new ones – to ensure the overall well-being of a state that’s home to one of the largest populations of young girls in the country.
“The goal of the Florida Girls Initiative is to establish dedicated statewide funding to empower organizations serving at-promise girls across the state – to bring in the resources, bring in the dollars, bring in the health care and the mental health piece, bring in the mentorship – all of the things we know from our experience at Girl Power Rocks that at-promise girls need,” said Campbell. “The information it’s uncovered will also support the development of the strategies and programs we’ll use to take away the trauma and give girls and their families the tools they need to navigate their challenges. And once you take that trauma away? The world won’t even be able to hold all the talent inside these girls that’s currently being wasted.”
