Polished Pebbles Girls Mentoring Program

Polished Pebbles Girls Mentoring Program serves girls ages 7-17 in South Side neighborhoods of Chicago. We serve over 150 girls with about 100 volunteer mentors. Our focus is mentoring our girls on the importance of strong communication skills and teaching them how to be effective communicators and leaders in their communities, at school, and in their future workplace.

Through our partnership with Bloomingdale's, our girls are able to participate in Bloomingdale's Brown Bag Apprenticeship Program, where they go to Bloomingdale's Department Stores and job shadow Bloomingdale's employees. Our girls are able to learn from Bloomingdale's employees about the retail, cosmetics, and fashion industries.

Through our partnerships with the Illinois institute of Technology and the Microsoft Store in Oakbrook, we are beginning a South Africa Virtual Exchange Program. This program will allow our girls to strengthen their technology skills and be mentored by IIT and Microsoft employees on how to communicate using technology, as well as introducing them to jobs in the technology field. Our South Africa Virtual Exchange Program will teach the girls how to communicate with girls from a school in South Africa using technology skills to blog, email, Skype, and share pictures/videos.

We partner with Chicago Public Schools and University of Chicago Charter Schools, where we have after school programs that cater to the young, female students. We also have a Second Saturdays Program, which takes place on the second Saturday of each month and is open to girls from any community or school, even if we do not partner with their school specifically.

We focus on preparing our girls to become strong communicators and leaders, while also prepping them for their future jobs and success in their future.