HER’d is an all-girls club with a unique focus: the empowerment of the female community in the school. As many students might have seen these past couple weeks from the colorful pink flyers posted on notice boards and classroom doors around the building, the new extracurricular opportunity is being offered to all grade levels of the Independence student body.
The main priority of the club, according to its sponsor, Mrs. Stacey Cole, is to provide a safe space for girls of all ages and grade levels to get together, do fun activities, have student-led discussions, form closer bonds with their peers and make a positive impact on the Independence community through volunteering and planned events. Cole says her hope is for the girls to “feel good about themselves, and make each other feel good.” The club also aims to give its members a voice and provide opportunities for them to talk about female-oriented issues while also becoming agents of change.
Since HER’d is just starting off, weekly meetings will consist of relationship building and participating in fun and casual activities that students can enjoy together. One of the first such activities being planned is a vision board party, where students can get together and create their own collages of images and pictures to represent their personal dreams and goals. Later on, the meetings will also be used to discuss things that members would be interested in doing for the school or general community, allowing students to develop independence and team leadership. “I want to bring them in so that they can understand what the club is about, and then I want to take a step back,” Cole said. “I just want to be the adult in the room for supervision but have the club be student-led.”
Cole explained that, while working with a faith-based community service club for girls in Fairfax County, she gained personal experience with the change that it fostered. “I saw how much of a positive impact it had made at my previous school, so I thought it would be a good idea to bring something like that to Independence,” she explained. HER’d is the first female-focused club being offered to the Indy Tigers.
HER’d meets every Monday morning in 2504. Students who are interested in joining HER’d or learning more can contact Mrs. Cole in person or by email, as well as sign up for the club Remind by texting “@ihs-herd” to 810-10, and enroll in the Google Classroom with the code “tbt6iiu.” Officer positions (vice president, secretary, historian, and treasurer) are still available for students of all grade levels.