Pearl Club is an organization that believes in the ultimate power of sisterhood and the power of higher education. Its goal is to see young women go to and graduate from college.
At their 2nd annual event at Chatham University, a series of breakout sessions and lectures were held during a six-hour workshop. The seminars were titled, Defining College Readiness, Negotiation Skills, Paying for College and Financial Aid, Career Readiness Skills, Finding A College Fit, Understanding yourself to Achieve Success, and Mental Health Grade-specific pre-college advising.
Lately, an importance has been placed on saving young Black men from the pitfalls of society. President Obama’s My Brothers Keeper initiative is the most widely publicized example of that, but what about Black girls? Black women currently earn about two thirds of all African American bachelor’s degree, 70 percent of all master’s degrees, and more than 60 percent of all doctorates. Black women also hold a majority of all African American enrollments in law, medical and dental schools. According to the Pew Research Center, 69 percent of Black women enroll in college after graduating high school compared to 57 percent of Black men.
Katie Rowe of Works for Progress—empowering women through negotiation, explained why women need to negotiate and why women don’t.
“From 2012 for every dollar a man makes a White woman makes 77 cents and for Black women it is 69 cents and Latino women it’s 56 cents. Women are getting degrees in higher numbers than ever but the number of women in leadership roles in business are not reflecting that,” she said, instructing them also on the rules of the game and the trick to realizing what leverage is and when to use it.
“Who are the parties involved and what is the relationship? Long term, short term? What are your underlying interests? Why do you want what you want? What are your options? If you have another job offer that a lot of money than you have a lot of power and you can use it to your advantage,” she said.
She hammered home to the girls, mostly all 11th graders, the tactics to getting the optimum outcome “Do your research, what are people in this job being paid on average and what do people at other companies make so you know what a deal is you should be thrilled with.” She said while forewarning them not to “Stake out inflexible positions.”
Kyshira Moffett of Her Movement—a company that educates young professionals on leadership and career development, instructed the girls on the importance of finding their expertise.
“What can you bring to the table that others don’t,” she said. While emphasizing the importance of specialization, she also gave a broader lesson on social media. Saying, “You can use these sites to network for jobs” but gave a general warning of social media.
“Facebook updates their privacy policy every two weeks so you better check what might be made public one week that wasn’t last week.” She forewarned them not to fall prey to the risks young women tend to make all too often of putting racy or possibly damaging photos of themselves on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Ciera Smith, 16, said she wants to be a public defender. Smith said this day had profoundly changed how she will push college to her friends. “A lot of my friends don’t want to go to college and don’t think it’s for them. I think that college is for everybody and I think everybody should at least get an opportunity to go because you never know until you try.”
Isis Coffey said she is still undecided about what her goals are but said she left more in favor of trying college because of the funding doors she is now aware of. “I didn’t know you could get scholarships in 9th grade and get grants just for being in activities,” she said.
In addition, Citizens Bank gave a seminar on taking care of money and growing wealth. Other lessons among the many were how to get financial aid for kids who don’t have support from their parents getting independent status, knowing who you can use as a mentor and gaining connections for a job through people you know which emphasized there is a six degrees of separation to getting a job. Mary Kay foundation showed the girls how to do makeup because as cosmetologist Danielle Graham told the girls, “You only have 7 seconds to make a first impression.”
(J.L. Martello also contributed to this article)
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