By Kellah Lavoie

Conference teaches girls about themselves

Oct 24, 2010 | 11:21 AM

It’s all about girls getting to know themselves.
Yesterday was the second annual Power of Being a Girl Conference. It was put on by the YWCA.
Ashley McLean is one of the members of the power of being a girl planning committee. She said the event was about getting girls together to help them feel better about themselves, empower them and to just have a fun day.
“We got together girls from throughout Prince Albert and area in Grade 6 to 12 to come and to do a conference on exactly what the name says, the power of being a girl,” she said.
She said the event went over so well last year, they had to do it again.
“We had 110 girls register this year and it’s just growing. I can see it growing in the future and just it’s a really positive, successful event.”
The event was open to more girls this year as well. McLean said they allowed girls who were a little younger to take part.
“We just found that we had a lot of girls want to come that weren’t in the age groups that we offered last year. And we just thought the more the better. The more girls that want to come and join us and share in the experience the better,” she said explaining they wanted to be more inclusive.
Saffron Powell, 11, was one of the girls attending the conference.
She simply described the day as “fun.”
Powell said her mom and councillor both encouraged her to take part in the day.
She said one of the groups she was a part of was talking about herself and learning about self-esteem.
It’s exactly what McLean was hoping the girls would get out of the day.
“I hope that when they leave here they feel maybe happier about themselves and who they are, more comfortable about themselves. I hope they’ve learned something, you know anything and I just hope they had fun met some new people and maybe made some new friendships and relationships that they maybe otherwise wouldn’t have,” she said.
It wasn’t just the participants who were having a good day and found the conference to be lots of fun.
“These girls have a ton of energy, probably more than all of us volunteer combined, but so far it’s been really great. We’ve added different thing. We did yoga with them, so this morning we had a whole group of girls doing yoga and that was really neat to see it was the adults and the girls doing it all together. It was just really great, there seems to be a lot of camaraderie here and all the girls enjoying themselves.”
klavoie@rawlco.com