Positively Digital!

The Junior League of Greenwich (JLG) is thrilled to announce a brand new program: “Positively Digital”. On Saturday May 13th from 10:30 am to 2:30 pm at the JLG House, this inaugural workshop is for 6th & 7th-grade girls and a guardian for girls and parents to learn about healthy online habits and ways to positively interact on social media with their peers!

Based on the needs of our community, the 2021 DataHaven town equity profile, and the 2021 Greenwich Youth Survey conducted by Greenwich Together, all projects will focus on mental health and programs around adolescent anxiety. There have been many recent studies that show the negative correlation between heavy social media usage and adolescent depression, which came to the attention of the Junior League’s Project Impact committee. The JLG is using this workshop to address areas of concern from the Greenwich Youth Survey specifically where 25% of female respondents expressed “a lot of stress around measuring up to others with respect to what you post on social media”. According to the CDC, in 2021, 16% of high school students were electronically bullied, including through texting, Instagram, Facebook, or other social media, during the past year. Female students were more likely than male students to be electronically bullied.

This workshop was designed to help middle school-aged girls learn how to effectively communicate with their friends and family using the internet. There are so many ways that pre-teens can set themselves up for success online, and their parents are great partners in that educational journey. Topics such as Red Flags/Best Practices, Healthy Communication, and Cyberbullying & Mental Health will be discussed, among others. Speakers include Beth O’Malley (a Psychotherapist and Radio Show Host who has over 30 years of experience in the mental health space) and Micaela Birmingham (an Emmy award-winning producer specializing in digital media).

Register HERE!

Project Impact is a hands-on placement in which members coordinate and participate in events scheduled throughout the year in conjunction with various community partners.  Specific responsibilities of the committee include (1) researching potential projects, (2) selection of projects, (3) coordination of events with the community partner, (4) promoting the project both internally and externally, (5) recruiting and scheduling volunteers, (6) participation in the events and (7) follow up after the events.