A special night with Avi from the Peace Corps- from Carly

For girls night last week we had a special guest speaker come to the office and speak to the girls twelve and older in the program. Avi is a Peace Corp (El Cuerpo de Paz) worker here in Granada. Nicaragua has about 150 Peace Corp workers currently volunteering throughout the country working in one of five areas: Environment, Agriculture, Small Business Development, Youth at Risk, and Community Health. In addition to being very active in the business community, Avi teaches Small Business and Entreprenuership skills in Granada high schools and is a friend of the Futbol Sin Fronteras program and volunteers.

Avi was very excited to be able to speak particularly to the girls in our program because they are at a great age to be making active choices toward improving their futures and dedicating themselves to their dreams. The focus of his talk was to get the girls talking about gender stereotypes and the ways in which they can push beyond these barriers. He had the girls do an exercise in which they brainstormed words that reflected first men and then women. Without even knowing it, the girls had split all of the jobs and characteristics up into very stereotypical groups. It was very surprising to the girls that even they put labels on males and females that fell into these gender stereotypes. After this, they then worked as a team to come up with ways in which they can work together to break these barriers as well as identify ways in which each of them can make very small changes in their lives that can help them in their future career goals.

The girls absolutely loved the time with Avi and Suyen and we literally had to promise them that we will have Avi come back and continue with a Part Two. It was very cool to see the girls so excited about thinking about themselves, their futures, and eachother.