By Amy Adams | Creative Director
GLOBALGIRL MEDIA 2015 - A Year in Review
Happy New Year to all of our GlobalGirl Media friends and supporters! As we look forward and set our intentions for the year ahead, we are also reflecting back on all of the successes, challenges and amazing stories that occurred in 2015.
See below for a brief recap of our highlights:
Total Girls Trained: 87
Total Videos Produced: 60
Total Blogs Written: 175+
Our major new programming initiative for 2015 was the launch of our #ListenOutLoud Campaign. In partnership with Jamba Juice, the campaign’s goal was to raise awareness about Teen Anxiety and Depression. Our Global Advisor for the initiative was actor, Tammin Sursok, of Pretty Little Liars. With her lead, we ran a one-month video and social media campaign and held an in-person event on October 11th, for International Day of the Girl. Tammin was also named GGM Global Ambassador, and will continue to help us raise awareness on girls' rights and issues. PLAYLIST FOR LISTENOUTLOUD
OAKLAND: PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS
Now in its second year, our Oakland Program has been thriving. Executive Director Amie William’s move to the Bay Area has resulted in many new connections based there including JAMBA JUICE CEO, James White, who joined us as an advisor. Several key videos from 2015 include:
INTERVIEW WITH NOBEL LAUREATE LEYMAH GBOWEE
YOUTH, TECHNOLOGY AND HEALTH CONFERENCE
ERIC GARNER: CONCERT FOR JUSTICE
As part of opening operations in the Bay Area, we held an event at the Oakland Impact HUB, hosted by Danny Glover and CNN Pioneer Black Female Broadcaster, Valerie Coleman Morris. DANNY GLOVER SPEECH. Special thanks to Apollo Education Group for sponsoring the evening!
The GGM Media Training Academy was successful in training another group of great girls. Held in July, the training was hosted at the Youth Impact Hub. GGM Oakland was also hired to produce a SHORT FILM for the Global Women's Funding Conference, held in October. And with a grant from the AKONADI Foundation, GGM Oakland started a new video project, “My BFF Oakland,” which seeks to highlight and celebrate open spaces and special places for young women in and around Oakland.
LOS ANGELES & COACHELLA: PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS
GGM was given an amazing opportunity by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association to cover the 72nd Golden Globe Awards last year. Our very own GGM Reporter, Ariana, did an amazing job speaking with many Golden Globe winners. See our coverage!
GGM Reporter Imani C. joined Bay Area Advisory Board Member, Sandra Clifford, and traveled to NYC to cover the U.N. Report on the Status of Women. They interviewed many key people in the movement and produced two great pieces: LET GIRLS LEAD & INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY MARCH, NYC.
We worked with Santa Monica College to produce the LA INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY MARCH and covered the Annual L.A. Junior League Casino Fundraising event, where we produced this VIDEO. GGM’s series, MOTHER/MADRE was hosted at the California Endowment and we were also awarded a grant from the California Humanities Community Stories to produce the video, PROFOUND HEART: PROFUNDO CORAZON.
We trained nine new GGM Reporters during our L.A. GGM Summer Media Training Academy. Our GlobalGirls then had an active fall, which included attending our second annual L.A. fundraiser, Night Out @Home. Their #ListenOutLoud video, Culture of Silence, was accepted into the Real to Reel Youth Media Showcase where two of our girls spoke on a festival panel. The video also won an Outstanding Film award. Other highlights included attending the screening of the documentary, He Named Me Malala, courtesy of the Eileen Fisher Foundation.
We also received an invitation from the Getty House Foundation to film their Women in New Media event. Held at the Mayor of Los Angeles’ home, GGM Reporters filmed and interviewed event attendees including Mayor Eric Garcetti.
COACHELLA
Our reporters in Coachella garnered headline news for their coverage of a LGBT hate crime (making the front page of the Desert Sun newspaper) and were interviewed by local news stations, including UNIVISION. Our GGM reporters hope the short documentary they produced about the tragic story will further much needed discussions about LGBT rights and issues in the Coachella Valley. JUSTICIA POR JUAN.
CHICAGO: PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS
GGM CHICAGO was quite active this year, focusing on identifying and learning about the issues that concern girls and women within civic action. GGM reporters covered the Chicago Women Take Action CWTA Mayoral Forum, interviewing all five of Chicago’s Mayoral candidates including, Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Jesus “Chuy” Garcia. To engage the youth vote, rapid fire videos were produced, describing the voting registration process, parodying Bruno Mars’ Uptown Funk and developing a social media campaign of short videos on what issues would motivate them to vote, #Vote4U. The teen reporters also independently blogged on topics from science, beauty, and music, to personal reflections on race, Lent, and the act of cutting one’s hair.
Other event coverage included: the Chicago Foundation for Women (CFW) forum on Race, Feminism, and Social Media and participation in CFW’s Salon for Solutions discussion around actions for elevating women and girls; Lynsey Addario Lecture on her career as a Pulitzer Prize winning photojournalist; WTTW screening/panel of the Kartemquin documentary The Homestretch, which dives into the issue of homeless youth in Chicago; an inspiring studio visit at the UChicago and Theaster Gates’ Arts Incubator with Honey Pot Performance, an Afro-diasporic collaborative community centered on feminist and fringe sensibilities. And six GGM Chicago reporters were interviewed and will be featured in a book about girl activists by renowned author and photographer, Paola Gianturco. The book will be released on International Day of the Girl, 2017.
The GGM Chicago Summer Training Academy produced five videos that continued to address the theme “Justice and Liberty for All.” These videos looked at: Chicago Youth Violence, Same-Sex Marriage, Youth Voting, and Politics and Civic Engagement LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL PLAYLIST
During the fall, GGM Chicago Reporters produced a PSA for International Day of the Girl around the issue of violence against women; covered an art exhibit, If You See Something Say Something on the issue of rape culture; organized a protest and reported on the Chicago Public School (CPS) budget cuts: ROOSEVELT HIGH SCHOOL WALKOUT. GGM also entered the Walgreen's Expressions contest by creating an original spoken word video, HELP A SISTER OUT - emphasizing the importance of self-esteem and female empowerment, where they came in second place; developed a new podcast series "Let's Hear It From The Boys" where our reporters will have conversations with teen boys around issues that concern them.
Additional Awards and Recognition Details:
One of our reporters received a Silver Key from the Scholastic Arts & Writing competition; three of our reporters were nominated for the MASH 18 under 18 where one reporter, Emma C., was chosen as the WINNER in the Media category; Chicago GlobalGirl, Aimee R., was selected as a scholarship student to attend GIRLS GEARING UP, an international organization aimed at empowering teenage girls to be the change they want to see in their world; Five of our Chicago reporters received an invitation to participate in Grammy Camp, where they learned about sound/music engineering, production and songwriting; GGM Chicago reporter Ebony M. wrote a story on Celebrity Feminism that was chosen for publication by Women’s ENews.
GGM Chicago is greatly humbled for support from: professional media mentors, McCormick Foundation, After School Matters, MacArthur Foundation, Hive Learning Network, Chicago City of Learning (CCOL) and DePaul University.
KOSOVO: PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS
Our GGM Kosovo bureau partner, KOSOVALIVE, is an award-winning online news site that also focuses on issues affecting women. Helmed by Annea Hapciu, a consultant with KosovaLive, we successfully launched this new bureau in 2015. Amie travelled to Kosovo in April to lead the training for the program, called Girl Be Heard. The 20 girls trained continue to meet once a week for their news bureau, overseen by KosovaLive 360. View all KOSOVO VIDEOS produced in 2015 and the new THEORY OF CHANGE VIDEO, which highlights the project’s approach and goals.
GGM Kosovo continues to produce great work this year, averaging two videos per month, and garnering recognition and coverage from local press. The bureau has already earned several prestigious accolades including the German Comenius EduMedia Award. This winning video profiled the village of Krushe e Madhe, known in Kosovo as the "Village of War Widows".
SOUTH AFRICA & MOROCCO: PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS
On the 25th of May, 2015 GlobalGirl Media South Africa started training 12 incredible girls at Rammolotsi Riet Pan at the Dramatic Arts Art Centre. They completed a three-week training sponsored by the Ponahalo De Beers Trust in the remote village of Rammelotsi. 15 young girls were trained in photography and writing, producing four newsletters in a hard-hit community. The quality of the newsletter surpassed all expectations and the Trust has decided to extend the program into 2016.
The Tshimologong History of the South African Internet Web Program was a six-month production program carried out in conjunction with the Johannesburg Centre for Software Engineering. It entailed the shooting and editing of 25 documentary inserts with a JCSE. The reporters involved earned a small salary and the GGMSA Bureau was able to earn a production fee. GGM South Africa also produced a paid project for the CANADIAN EMBASSY, called ANCHOR OF MY HEART which focuses on strong mentorships and mentors in the Alexandra township.
MOROCCO
Morocco is undergoing a restructuring process and recent Yale Graduate, Djenab Conde, secured a grant from Yale University to travel to Casablanca to help with this process. She has been on the ground since August, 2015 and is working directly with GGM Reporters to register as an Association. Stay tuned for an upcoming series on Women and Entrepreneurship to be produced there.
GGM Morocco Reporter NajlaeBellouri received an award to travel to Switzerland, the Emilie Gourd Foundation, through the Swiss Ambassador to Morocco to present the Documentary, Breaking the Silence, which continues to be screened at film festivals, including a recent screening at USC’s School of Management.
STAFF HIGHLIGHTS
Amie Williams was awarded the SuperBowl50 Playmaker Award, which came with a $10,000 prize. She was also selected to present a TEDx Talk for Women in Barcelona, highlighting the story behind the origins and founding of GlobalGirl Media. She continues to publish her own journalism and work, focused on the female-centered stories from the Middle East and North Africa, where she is also developing a feature film in Tunisia. Her articles include:
HUFFINGTON POST: Wisps of Hair, Wisps of Hope (about the Tunisian Nobel Peace Prize)
TRUTHDIG: Borders of War: About the Syrian Turkish Border and Women and ISIS
International Program Coordinator, Amy Adams, secured a Boehm Media Fellowship to attend Opportunity Collaboration, one of the world’s most prominent social change-maker forums.
2016 LOOKING AHEAD<
Hiyab Tadesse, Tammin Sursock & Amie Williams
Imani Crenshaw with activist Susan Bazilli in NYC
GGM Kosovo on location
Oakland GlobalGirls
L.A. GlobalGirls with Mayor Eric Garcetti
By Amy E. Adams | International Program Coordinator
By Amy E. Adams | Program Coordinator
Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can receive an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.
