Girl Up

Estimated reading time: 7 minutes

I recently checked out the Girl Up Club map and realized that I founded the only Girl Up Club in my country less than a year ago! How was that possible? I’ll tell you my story in just a bit, but first, you must hear from me or anyone else at least once in your life: If you can DREAM it, you can DO it.

I was a freshman when I first encountered gender bias. Girls lived in a separate dorm, far from the boys and the school, girls had to pay a higher tuition fee than the boys, and the teachers tended to “prefer” boys during classes. Everyone was so casual about it. It didn’t only happen to me but to every girl studying STEM fields in my school, so I waited for someone older to do something about it. The sad part about waiting for miracles is that they may never happen for you. This is how my story starts: With a pretty big disappointment.

A year and much more research later, I stumbled upon Girl Up’s Instagram page and started reading about their mission. Finding the “HOW TO START A CLUB” button impacted my life in a way I could never describe. I followed a few simple steps and my Club, Girl Up Neuroscience, was official. Lots of people may consider this the important part of my story, but I’m barely warming up.

I’ve always said, “Make a difference, especially if no one was there to make it for you.” That sounds like a cliché but take a moment and read it again. I know there are many people out there—me included—who think changing something in society makes you worthy of commendation. However, a lot of that so-called “change” should be called “tradition”, as it usually means continuing someone’s legacy, following in their footsteps, giving back to the community, and returning a favor—essentially doing the good that was done to you. In other words, I’ve seen and heard many examples of “I’m going to help someone because someone helped me” or “I never had that and turned out fine, so why should I give it to someone else?” Although there is nothing wrong with those ideas, something is missing…actual change and improvement! That’s why I think that if no one was there for you or you didn’t have a certain opportunity, offering it to someone else is the best way to make a real difference and help society grow.

If no one was there for you or you didn’t have a certain opportunity, offering it to someone else is the best way to make a real difference and help society grow.

I founded my Girl Up Club with this idea in mind and nothing else – no friend to start it with, no members, not even a clear idea about how I want to achieve this “change” – but I’ve come quite far since then. With almost 100 members, Girl Up Neuroscience is a growing force in the feminist fight.

Why “neuroscience”? Search neuroscience initiatives in Romania on social media and let me know how many you find, because I’ve found less than 10. While Romania may not be the biggest country in Europe 10 neuroscience initiatives in the entire country is somewhat unfortunate if you ask me.

All four years of middle school, I didn’t perform a single neuroscience experiment; the materials stayed on the top shelf of our classroom. I’ve studied and watched experiments online, but that was the end of my interaction until I started participating in STEM Olympiads during high school. After you go to Nationals, people finally consider you deserve to touch chemical substances, but what about the rest of the students?

So many girls with so much potential don’t have the chance to go to competitions, but they deserve to learn through practical experiments just as much as me. Therefore, I decided to give that to about 90 girls. After so many years of waiting for the teacher to allow us to work on something, after hearing the whole “they are just to be seen, not touched; they are incredibly expensive” speech over and over again, it all began to sound like a rehearsed excuse to keep our curiosity caged. Girls should be able to see the outside of that cage, especially because I couldn’t at that age. This is what our next and biggest project so far is all about: Helping middle school girls from Romania discover the beautiful world of STEM.

However, there were also some bumps along the road without which my story would not be complete. I’m sure everyone knows the moment when everything is going just fine, but a sudden obstacle appears. For Girl Up Neuroscience, that was the moment our social media page was deactivated. It didn’t only happen to my Club but hundreds of Girl Up Clubs worldwide, but for a new small initiative, the impact was huge.

Nonetheless, my team’s efficiency seemed unaffected by this inconvenience, and we came back truly stronger. We tripled our impact during the last four months and even organized monthly webinars with expert speakers, which people from all over the country attended. Another thing I learned along this journey, was that dedicated people, a supportive team, and open-minded partners are hard to come by, but once you have them, the transition between dreams and reality becomes just a matter of time.

Dedicated people, a supportive team, and open-minded partners are hard to come by, but once you have them, the transition between dreams and reality becomes just a matter of time.

Among big NGOs, schools, foundations, and many other huge initiatives with long-standing experience, my Girl Up Club succeeded in receiving £1000 in funding (about USD $1285) from a well-renowned grant program from my country: The Start ONG program. This opportunity is what makes our next project—and the chance to give young girls a strong reason to love STEM—possible.

Although I may have made it look easy, my realization about the small acceptance rate of the grant program came only after the first meeting with the implementors. That is where I met people much older and more experienced than myself, certainly being the youngest person “in the room”. The activities “Girls in STEM: An Innovative Project in My Country” involves are diverse, spanning from a bimonthly national blog for girls to discovering both theoretical and practical learning activities in the world of STEM. I aim to empower future generations of girls through what I didn’t have.

This all started with hope, hope that someone would make the world a better place for me. While that didn’t happen, I’m a better person for it. I’m someone who managed to make her dreams come true instead of waiting for others to do it for her. Although I’m trying to make it easier for other girls, I believe the best thing someone can receive isn’t opportunities on a silver plate, but the chance to be in charge of their own destiny. My story can become yours or you can write your own, but don’t let someone else create it for you!