Brattleboro >> Once inside the Brattleboro Development Credit Corporation's Book Press building, the Girls on The Run Vermont office is easy to find.
It is preceded by a trail of glittery flowers and swirls lining the hallway walls, a familiar girl-power motif which continues into the office space. To dismiss the decoration as frivolous would be a mistake. Within these fuchsia walls, perched on lime green and orange medicine balls, the Girls on the Run staff develops and executes brilliant programming for 3rd to 8th graders in 13 counties.
Nancy Heydinger, executive director of GOTR Vermont, describes the program as "a running program that isn't really about running."
This is an understatement. What Girls on the Run does that differentiates it from a physical education class or sports team is focus on the development of the whole girl, as an individual and as part of a team, on her terms.
"Running is just the tool that we use," Heydinger said, "and this is the genius of the curriculum; it recognizes the strong connection between the mind and the body that is often ignored in more traditional athletic programming."
Noncompetitive by design, GOTR reframes exercise as a personal tool to be used toward self-realization and actualization. The focus is not so much on athletic performance as on nurturing physical, emotional, and spiritual health while helping the girls to define their own goals and values.
"We teach them to recognize their power and be intentional in their decision making," said Heydinger. "And so we find girls of all abilities — from athletic to sedentary, some wheelchair bound, some with special needs — united in the concrete and achievable goal to complete a 5k at the end of the program, but taking it at their own pace, and learning deeper lessons as they go.
Each after-school session begins with a themed lesson, covering such topics as self-esteem, untangling our emotions, and healthy habits. "Star Power," a visualization exercise, provides girls with a beautiful metaphor for staying calm and serene amidst chaos: Look up at the sky and see the stars. There are millions of them and they are all bright, beautiful and unique. Take one of these stars and put them next to your heart. Just as these stars shine you shine within. Sometimes clouds come and dim the stars, just like sometimes negative thoughts and messages come in and they dim your light. Take a moment and blow the clouds away. These exercises, combined with the running games which complement them, provide the girls with strategies and skills to articulate and process the challenges of these critical middle school years.
As the weeks go by, the lessons begin to center on team building, and more broadly on creating a foundation for healthy relationships. The girls are encouraged to give each other "Energy Awards" at the end of each day.
"If you see one girl do something special that day, for example if Julie stopped running to help someone with a skinned knee, then put Julie in the middle and give her an energy award," said Heydinger.
Meanwhile, the team comes together to devise and implement a community impact project.
"They feel like an important member of the community, especially when they are the ones deciding what to do and then they go and carry it out."
The Brattleboro community, where Girls on the Run Vermont began and is still headquartered, has been supportive of the program since the beginning. Now that momentum is picking up, the latest challenge is that there are too many girls who want to be involved and not enough coaches. More community involvement is crucial to making sure that Girls on the Run is able to accommodate everyone.
GOTR Brattleboro is always looking for people interested in volunteering as coaches or helping with the 5K event, which is the culmination of the program.
Heydinger described the event as "The most joyous, life changing thing for so many girls. You see them hands in the air crying, hugging parents. It's a real struggle for a lot of these girls, and they have worked hard to do it."
In the end, joy is the word that describes the program best, and it is the experience of this joy which proves most transformational.
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