When girls are about 5 years old, all of the negative, dismissive, and discouraging comments they have heard and seen start to impact their dreams and aspirations. “Mostly boys are prime ministers”. “You know, you have to be quite strong to do that, I don’t know if that’s a good job for girls”. Girls start to believe that they are not as capable, intelligent, or valuable as boys and that they have less options. This is a phenomenon called the Dream Gap.
When girls are between 8 and 15 years old their confidence and self-esteem begins to decline. We live in a culture obsessed with diet and wellness culture and our mainstream media is super saturated with images of idealised beauty standards and messages about the importance of appearance. We encourage our girls to be ‘anything they want’ but we also tell them to avoid being ‘bossy’. Gender stereotypes are rife, perfectionism is celebrated and risk taking is discouraged. Representation of women in media is limited, girls are praised for being sweet, clean, and neat and girls are taught to value perfectionism over experimenting with risk taking and failure.
Research tells us that 7 in 10 girls believe they are not good enough at their performance in school and in their relationships with family and friends, (Dove Self-Esteem Fund, 2016). On this foundation, how can we realistically expect girls to make confident decisions about their education, career interests and futures?
In 2021, Melbourne Wellbeing Group became a proud corporate sponsor of an amazing charity called Inspiring Girls, a charity dedicated to raising the aspirations of young girls around the world by connecting them with female role models. Inspiring Girls understands the need for girls to be exposed to aspirational women working in different sectors, to show that there are many paths they can choose to take. Leading by example is the best way to show girls how they can achieve, and Inspiring Girls puts real women in front of girls to talk about their experiences.
It’s been an amazing two years working alongside Inspiring Girls. Dr Celin Gelgec and I volunteer as the Program Development Directors and program facilitators, which has been deeply humbling and exciting. Since we joined the organisation, Inspiring Girls Australia (IGA) has officially launched, rolled out its core program to an incredible group of students at McKinnon Secondary College and expanded to partner with Mattel for delivery of the Inspiring Girls X Mattel Barbie Dream Gap program for students in prep to grade 2. Our Inspiring Girls team has expanded as has our database of volunteer role models eager to meet and inspire Australian students. An absolute whirlwind.
Last year, time spent with students while delivering the program demonstrated how downtrodden and afraid girls can feel, and how preoccupied with issues of appearance and judgement from others they can be. It was also eye opening to be shown how complicated it is for some girls to participate in a STEM pathway at school, and how self-conscious many girls feel about their career dreams. It also amazed us that in 2022, girls are still being discouraged from ‘male’ careers by the adults in their lives. It was in these moments that the power of discussion spaces like these was reinforced. Over the course of the program, girls found ways to articulate to the group just how awesome they are and we witnessed the students lifting each other up. And when the students connected with the volunteer role models and heard their career stories, they lit up with feelings of optimism and opportunity.
Our hope is that the experiences we help create for students through Inspiring Girls will be long lasting, and that we will have the opportunity to inspire many more girls in years to come. This has been an extraordinarily enriching experience for Celin and I and an aspect of our Melbourne Wellbeing Group’s work that we are extremely proud of. We are looking forward to all that is to come in 2023 and beyond.
For more information on the Dream Gap head to https://shop.mattel.com/pages/barbie-dream-gap.
For more information on Inspiring Girls or to discover how you or your school could get involved, head to https://www.inspiring-girls.com.au/
This blog was written and prepared by Dr Tori Miller – Associate Director and Clinical Psychologist at Melbourne Wellbeing Group.