Kylie Schuyler knew this particular group of girls was different.
There was something in their eyes—a spark of confidence that set them apart as she traveled through rural areas with World Assistance for Cambodia.
Schuyler saw it, and so had the organizers of Girls Be Ambitious, an offshoot program of World Assistance’s Rural School Project, which had built 530 schools for poor children in rural Cambodia.
Young girls weren’t attending the schools, though. The economic realities of sending a girl to school were simply too harsh. They had to either work in the fields or take care of their siblings, or their families couldn’t survive.
Rural School Project organizers devised Girls Be Ambitious to give rural Cambodian families the equivalent of about $10 per month in American dollars in exchange for sending their daughters to school. Virtually every family that was approached readily agreed.
Schuyler, a former bond trader who holds a doctorate in clinical psychology, had moved to Japan in 2002 with her husband, Doug Hodge, now chief executive of Pacific Investment Management Co. who at the time led the firm’s Asia Pacific region. Schuyler aligned herself with World Assistance. She traveled extensively with the group and saw first-hand the circumstances of many young girls throughout Asia.
She was struck by how transformative the Girls Be Ambitious experience was for those who participated.
“It was absolutely incredible,” she said. “These girls wouldn’t be illiterate their whole lives. They wouldn’t be trafficked or put in slave labor situations. Their lives—and the lives of their whole family—would be positively affected by this program.”
Schuyler and Hodge and their seven children moved back to the U.S. in 2009, and that’s when Schuyler decided to form her own organization to help girls around the world. She named it Global Girls Rising and chose to focus it on empowering girls.
“I realized that there was also a dire need to invest in the lives of girls right here in Orange County.”
Girls, she said, especially those between 10 and 14, need support to deal with everything from managing stress to bullying to boys. Schuyler decided to create a mentoring program for girls in grades five through eight in which accomplished college-age women would serve as mentors.
In 2012, she approached El Sol Science and Arts Academy to offer the program, and Executive Director Monique Daviss agreed.
“El Sol Academy was the perfect place to start,” Schuyler said (see related story, page 1).
Global Girls Rising mentors hail from colleges such as Chapman University, University of California-Irvine, and California State University-Fullerton and go through a rigorous hiring process. They sign a one-year contract in order to ensure consistency for the girls. Mentors meet weekly with up to four El Sol middle school students who opt in to the program.
Schuyler has arranged support from Le Nid France, a frozen yogurt brand based in Aix en Provence, France. That’s helped the group lease a house across from El Sol that had been refurbished for office space in June, and the program and its seven members set up shop there, along with Global Girls Rising’s headquarters.
Schuyler said about 100 El Sol girls are involved in the program—but that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
She and her staff also are in the process of expanding it to two other middle schools in Orange County.
Global Girls Rising has teamed up with New York-based Litworld, a nonprofit organization that focuses on illiteracy around the world, to apply Global Girls Rising’s mentoring in Los Angeles, Harlem and Detroit, as well as Haiti and Guyana.
Schuyler said Global Girls Rising is also working to create a safe online platform where girls can connect.
The idea is that every girl will know she has a counterpart in another part of the world who’s experiencing many of the same things she is.
She said she sees the future for girls—and Global Girls Rising—as virtually unlimited.
“When we mentor, support, and educate girls, we create an upward spiral that changes their lives, their families’ lives, and the future for all of us.”
