MEDIA, Pa. (KYW Newsradio) — Hundreds of girls attended a free empowerment summit — created five years ago by a then-high school junior — addressing the issues that impact them.
The first year that Julia Kasper created Girls Spark, she had about 100 attendees. This year, 135 middle school girls and 115 high school girls signed up.
“In 2018, when I was struggling with my mental health and I was struggling with anxiety, I was looking for a place to go that wasn't a group therapy that would help me build a supportive community of women, but also learn from them,” recalled Kasper.
This year’s summit, held at Penn State’s Brandywine campus, consisted of speaker sessions and workshops addressing issues including mental health, self-confidence, financial literacy, healthy relationships, body issues and more.
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College strategist Linda Hollenback was among the speakers. She likens the path to success to making a wrong turn on your GPS.
“It doesn’t say you can't get to your destination. It says, ‘Recalculating,’ and that's the way life is,” she said. “You can take a step, assess where you're at and take another step towards your goals.”
Those messages resonated with attendees, such as 15-year-old Sofia Bass. Bass attended her second, and said she gets a lot out of the program.
“It helps me meet new people which is important, but those skills that you take with you later in life,” she said.
“Definitely life skills, and soft skills like communication, how to organize stuff … it really helped me outside of Girls Spark as well.”
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