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The Girls Circle Association is a leading provider of gender-specific, research-based programs for girls and offers a wide range of curricula and trainings for facilitators dedicated to improving the lives of girls ages 9 through 18.The Girls Circle model, a structured support group for girls, is designed to build protective factors and increase positive connection, personal and collective strengths, and competence in girls. It aims to counteract social and interpersonal forces that impede girls' growth and development by promoting an emotionally safe setting and structure in which girls can develop caring relationships and use authentic voices.Girls Circle has been utilized in a broad spectrum of prevention and intervention settings with diverse populations and programs serving girls since 1994. Recognized as a promising approach by the Office of Juvenile and Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) in 2005 in their Model Programs Guide, the Girls Circle has emerged as a gender-specific program with evidence and potential to positively influence the direction of social-emotional development for girls in the United States, Canada, and a growing number of countries around the world. Girls Circle is a research-based program, currently working to become one of the few evidence-based programs for gender-specific groups for girls in the United States - showing increases in girls' self-efficacy, social support, and body image. The Girls Circle format is applied to programs in areas such as schools, peer leadership, health education, juvenile justice, economic literacy, outdoor adventure, athletics, school advisory groups, pregnancy prevention, boys and girls clubs, scouting groups, gang-prevention, and substance abuse prevention in such settings as schools, agencies, group homes, parish halls, clinics, and homes. In this way, the Girls Circle provides the opportunity for authentic relationships within a context of a girl's own setting and community.
