Meet Girls For A Change (GFC)

When Whitney Smith founded Girls for a Change almost 10 years ago, she'd been working with young people in high-risk situations for more than 20 years. She noticed a huge commonality among the girls she was working with: they felt like they had no way out. Without role models and the right tools, the girls were simply surviving instead of thriving.

"Even though these girls had all these challenges, they still cared," Smith says. "They still got fired up about social change. And I realized that if we could take that and use it as a fuel to learn and do these things, it would be a phenomenal combination."

And so, Girls For A Change (GFC) was born in San Jose, California in 2001. Empowering girls to create social change, GFC invites young women to design, lead and implement social change projects of their choosing. The program is completely girl driven, while GFC provides the tools, resources, partnerships and support girls need to realize their full potential.

"After she's created this amazingly positive community change, learned to work with other girls and built this caring circle around her, she's forever different." Smith says. "She knows that she's capable of things that she never thought she'd be capable of before."

Read our exclusive interview with Whitney Smith