Girls Learn International (GLI) has grown to be one of the biggest clubs at Pleasant Valley. The club’s founder, Ramya Kumar, describes their mission “is to empower and educate high schoolers on pertinent human rights issues around the world and provide them with the knowledge and resource needed to advocate and create real change for marginalized peoples everywhere”. The club has grown in size and impact. Junior and executive member of GLI, Lily Williams, states “It’s cool to see how much the club has grown, and that freshman are taking the initiative to join.” GLI has accomplished many things since its start back in December of 2015. They have raised thousands of dollars for girls around the world to advance their education and have created a kinder, more positive community at Pleasant Valley High School.

Recently the club was recognized and honored nationally for their services.

On November 17, the club attended the largest ever anti-bullying assembly, Fearlessly Girl. Over 7,000 girls from across the country participated in or watched the assembly. It was hosted at Augustana University and was broadcasted live across the country.

Fearlessly Girl is an anti-bullying organization started by Kate Whitfield. Its mission is to creating a kinder girl world in schools and communities across North America. It was hosted by Whitfield and the Quad-Cities very own tennis star, Madison Keys. The conference consisted of Keys and Whitfield addressing topics prevalent in girls’ everyday life, such as self-esteem and pressure to conform to societal standards of beauty. The audience and those online were able to ask Keys and Whitfield questions about their personal experiences, as well as advice on how to combat these issues.

The Pleasant Valley High School GLI chapter was awarded the #kindcomments award for their display of kindness on and off of social media. Instagram sent someone from corporate to present them with the award. Upon receiving this award, Williams, Kumar and Whitney Ankton had the honor to be interviewed by Keys and Whitfield. Williams describes the interview as “intimidating due to the fact that [they] were in front of thousands of students and being interviewed by two girls (Keys and Whitfield) who have made such a difference in the world of spreading girl power and anti-bullying messages.”

GLI will continue to fight for change in and outside of our school. The knowledge they have received at this conference will help them shape their future meetings. To join the change, there are meetings held every Tuesday at 3:45 in Mrs. Levora’s room.