Focusing on yourself can be a wonderful way to bolster your strength to help others, especially when it comes to building your self-awareness, self-expression, self-reliance and self-giving.
That was the one of the key messages given to middle school girls at GirlsUp, a week-long summer camp program for girls ages 10-13 held July 11-15 and 18-22 at Chevy Chase Elementary School.
Delia Friel, 13, of Chevy Chase said she knew she would meet new people and have fun at camp, but she was surprised to discover how much she learned from the program’s discussions about self. Now in her second year of the camp, she said her growing self-awareness has even helped her change her actions during the rest of the year.
“One of my friends was getting bullied, and I told [the bully] that wasn’t nice and stood up for my friend,” Delia said.
GirlsUp was started in 2008 by Kelly Murray, a Chevy Chase mother of six daughters who was also a psychologist, professor and author.
According to the GirlsUp website, girlsup.org, “she believed that a girl could be truly successful only if she connected with a deep and genuine sense of herself, only if she developed a confident, unflinching authenticity of spirit.”
GirlsUp was about to hold its second year of summer camp in 2009, when Murray and her 7-year-old daughter, Sloane, were killed by a tree limb that fell on their car during a storm.
Murray’s close friend, Debra Soltis, decided to carry on the program to honor her friend’s vision.
“She died tragically one week before the program was set to begin its second summer, so I took her notes and worked with a committed group of Kelly’s friends to carry it on,” said Soltis, who now serves as executive director of GirlsUp. “In addition to all the things this is for girls, it is a wonderful legacy. To carry it on for the girls has been a privilege.”
The program uses different approaches to help the girls tap into their strengths. For example, the girls spent nearly an hour Thursday with martial arts master Michael Coles, owner of Coles’ Martial Arts Academy in Bethesda. The theme for the day was self-reliance, and the girls lined up in the gym to learn how to hit and kick as well as how to be prepared and protect themselves. Coles walked them through some basic moves and then held a flexible plastic board for them to hit. The shouts and grunts from the girls, combined with the striking sound when they hit the board, made each move seem even more powerful. By the end of the session, each girl had taken a turn breaking a wooden board that Coles held that was about 1/3 inch thick. Some broke more than one board at a time, cracking through more than an inch of wood.
“Martial arts is one of the most used vehicles for developing confidence,” Coles said.
The girls cheered each other on as they succeeded in breaking through the boards. Afterward, Soltis encouraged them to learn from the experience.
“What do you do with all this you learned about yourself? Are you going to keep looking inward?” Soltis asked them.
The summer camp, which costs $295 a week, will also soon be expanding into other arenas. After two years, campers can become Teen Board members, which means they will be able to help the adult board members evaluate the summer sessions and plan year-round activities.
This year, the GirlsUp organization was selected to partner with the United Nations in its program of a similar name: Girl Up.
Soltis still does not know exactly what the Chevy Chase group’s role will be in the new partnership with the UN, but two girls from the Chevy Chase group have already been selected to be on the United Nation’s Teen Board. In a blind essay contest held by the Chevy Chase group, Soltis’ daughter, Annie Kiyonaga, 14, and Murray’s daughter, Jillian Murray, 14, were chosen to serve as the representatives from GirlsUp with the United Nations.
“The UN started an initiative for empowering girls around the world; the similarity of goals drew us together,” Soltis said.
pmcewan@gazette.net
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