Inspiring Girls and Young Women to Recognize Their Own Strength

A program for girls and young women to build confidence, develop a healthy understanding of empowered womanhood, and become leaders in violence prevention.

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What is the WISE Club?

The Women Inspiring Strength & Empowerment (WISE) Club is MCSR’s youth development program for girls and young women. WISE provides a supportive space for participants to build confidence, strengthen emotional and social skills, develop leadership, explore healthy relationships, and understand and challenge gender-based barriers and violence. Through facilitated sessions, peer leadership, and youth-led community projects, WISE members learn to recognize their own strength and potential while developing their own vision of empowered womanhood.

Participants are encouraged to take what they learn beyond the Club — to their peers, schools, and communities — and become leaders in creating cultures grounded in equity, respect, and safety.

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This is the first space where I felt safe enough to be honest about who I am and who I want to become. It changed how I show up for the people around me.

Jordan R., Program Participant

The shift in our students is real. They are more thoughtful, more respectful, and far more willing to step up and lead.

Maya T., School Counselor, Ballou High School

MCSR does not just talk about prevention. They build the relationships and the skills that actually change how people treat each other.

Devon W., Community Partner, Community Partner Org

I watched my child find their voice here. They came home with a confidence and a compassion I had not seen before.

Alicia G., Parent

WISE Club The Knowledge, Skills and Abilities of WISE Club

In the WISE Club, members explore key areas of social-emotional development, then share those lessons with their peers. Through WISE, participants have opportunities to:

  • Build confidence and self-awareness
  • Develop emotional and social intelligence
  • Explore healthy relationships and communication
  • Understand and challenge gender-based barriers and inequities
  • Learn about gender-based violence prevention
  • Develop leadership and peer-education skills
  • Define and express their own understanding of empowered womanhood
  • Turn their learning into community engagement, advocacy, and youth-led projects

Strength in Action

WISE members collaborate with the MOST Club to lead member-created Community Strength Projects and shape signature programming, including the Project Me empowerment conference, Counter Stories Media, and Solutions Through Film Festival.

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Explore Our Other Youth Development Programs

MOST

The country’s premier primary violence-prevention program for mobilizing young men to prevent sexual and dating violence — a structured, supportive space to build their own definition of healthy masculinity.

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MCSR community — men and youth mentorship

Community Strength Projects

Youth-led community projects that position MOST and WISE Club members to lead, advocate, and create change in their schools and communities.

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