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Originally Posted by tab1a
This is great. I've been wanting to launch a Girls in STEM campaign for my own team and I was wondering: how did you get the support needed for this from the team members and mentors? I have a few students on my team that are skeptical of such a campaign. Thank you!
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I am excited to hear the comments, as others here noticed the FIRST Like a Girl videos are meant to be positive, encouraging and personal.
I love the girls on my team and noticed that confidence seems to be a huge aspect of girls not joining and/or stepping up more. I wanted to help girls see others girls like them doing really cool stuff and think, "Hey that's cool! I could do that too!" And, I have already seen the confidence of the subjects of the videos increase in the way they interact with me. It is so encouraging!
Key points to help your team see the value.
- Positive Message. "Encouraging girls to join the FIRST community without bringing up equality or gender treatment." as The Swaggy P mentioned in a previous reply. No negativity, comparisons or blame -- just celebrating what they do and love about their experience.
- Personal Stories. Helping prospective girls see the "real" girls on our team and what they are involved in, so maybe they can relate to some of the girls and the type of things they like and give it a try.
- This is not a big investment of time to create and commit to. You can do 1 video and see what kid of response you get. Ours has been overwhelmingly positive and supportive.
- This program was conceived by, interviews are done by and edited by females. I don't think this is necessary or practical for every team, but hopefully knowing the background of the initial endeavor helps.
- Not everyone will interview well on camera. And, often not the ones you think will. Our subjects have been some of our quietest kids. And, they came across GREAT!
- The interviewees are given final approval on the videos. This is really important. No one wants to “look stupid”. Control gives them the confidence to know no one will make them “look bad”. It has been a huge selling point for their interviewees. No one has yet to object to their video :-)
- We are also working on personal stories of the boys on the team as well. Because we want boys to be able to relate to our team members as well. The students are excited to share their stories and I look forward to seeing how this helps with our recruitment and their confidence in the coming season too.
On a more technical note… it also really helps that we have organized video with an uncomplicated structure, simple and to the point. They have been fairly easy to put together.
-- Filming takes about 10-15 minutes per student. Setting up, placing the microphone, rewording and repeating as necessary.
-- The girls have been really thoughtful about their “robotics story”. But we also have some interview questions to help make sure we have enough content.
-- We include 5-7 pictures of their involvement.
-- And, keep each to only about a minute. (I will be looking into the other recommendations made)
If you like the videos, I hope you will go to our facebook page and share our latest video of Kate from Bacon Builders FLL Team 8265!
https://www.facebook.com/explodingba...3707898873741/