Congratulations to Our CalSac Fellows

We’re so proud of Chris Ibarra, Tigi Bihon, Stephanie Dietrich, and Araceli Espinoza – four Girls Inc. staff members who just graduated from a year-long statewide fellowship through the California School-Age Consortium’s (CalSac) Leadership Development Institute.

Professional and leadership development training are key to Girls Inc.’s mission and program delivery philosophy. Staff undergo continual training and have opportunities to expand their skills, which directly impacts our girls’ success.

This year, the program focused specifically leadership development with an equity lens. Staff developed competencies in coaching, youth development, and managing organizational change.  They also focused on developing themselves as leaders – building on their core strengths, finding their own voices, learning supervisory skills, and developing program ideas.

For one of her projects, Araceli developed an art curriculum that could be used in after-school programming. Building on her own background, she honed the project with CalSac trainers and her cohort. Now, with a fully developed program, she is ready to roll it out to Girls Inc. girls.

As Courtney Johnson Clendinen, our Chief Program Officer said, “this type of training is critical for our staff. Because our girls so often suffer from a lack of equity, with programs like CalSac we can better integrate with our schools, support our girls’ families, and delivery the type of programming that fosters transformational change.”