Stephen and Angela Peters developed The Ladies' Club with the goal of helping girls improve their confidence in a male-dominated society. Like The Gentlemen's Club, The Ladies' Club focuses on values, beliefs, strategies, and techniques that foster hope in students. The facilitator's guide and materials provide all the resources needed to implement a Ladies' Club. Clubs should complete one module a week for a total of 26 weeks.

How We Can Help Girls

Consider the following points as you begin your Ladies' Club:

1. We need to "empower girls to be their own best friends."
Girls often look to others for self-fulfillment and self-validation. It's essential that young woman begin to rely more readily on their own sense of self by essentially being "their own best friends."

2. We need to "inspire [girls] to be proud of who they are."
In addition to urging girls to "be their own best friends," it is crucial that we encourage them to be proud of who they are." In the media today, proud women are typically those who are skinny to the point of looking anorexic, have straight or loosely curled hair, and are pale skinned. Regardless of one's physical attributes, girls should be proud of themselves. Girls' self-confidence and pride should be internally born, not dictated by the unrealistic and ridiculous standards of the media.

3. We need to teach girls that "failure is not an option."
As has been well documented, students growing up and living in at-risk environments are a great deal more likely to fall beneath the radar and between cracks. Today's schools and the school-based communities in which these girls learn need to stress that "failure is not an option," that students themselves, with the assistance of caring mentors and teachers, will take all possible strides to succeed in the world.

4. We need to teach girls that "education is the only way to true freedom for all children."
More than ever, a good education is the means to intellectual, financial, and personal "freedom." Many students who have grown up without role models who attended college and completed their education are at risk of eschewing education for other options – options that will not assist them in the long run. The Ladies' Club seeks to remedy this risk by stressing the importance of education in both word and deed.

5. We need to give girls the "confidence and knowledge" necessary to thrive in a "male-dominated society."
Although women have made incredible strides in our society over the last century, our culture is still male-dominated. Girls need to be aware of this fact and need to know how to navigate the waters of this culture and thrive within it.