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GENaustin, formerly The Ophelia Educational Fund, is based on
Dr. Pipher's book, "Reviving Ophelia: Saving the Selves of
Adolescent Girls." We inspire girls to become healthy resisters through
self awareness, body awareness, and learning specific coping skills.
GENaustin is made up of volunteers committed to helping
girls grow into healthy, confident women who feel valued for
what’s inside, and not outside, themselves. Our mission is to
help adolescent girls develop and maintain healthy self-esteem
and leadership skills by educating them, parents, teachers and
others about cultural and media influences that seek to undermine
girls’ sense of self. We facilitate skill-building programs that
empower girls to be true to themselves while advocating for
positive change in the world.
We currently organize Speakers Series events in middle schools by
recruiting experts from the therapy and education communities
to make free public presentations dealing with various
adolescent girl issues. We plan to offer at least one major
girl-oriented community event in Austin per year, plus a
variety of workshops, programs, retreats and conferences
for girls, parents, and educators.
Since our inception, we have organized more than 50 events
per year, including speaker presentations in middle schools
in the Austin, Eanes, and Round Rock school districts in Central Texas.
We have also hosted national speakers at major community
events: former Gov. Ann Richards in 1996; Mary Pipher, Ph.D., author
of "Reviving Ophelia: Saving the Selves of Adolescent
Girls", in 1997 and 2001, Jean Kilbourne, Ed.D., noted author
and producer of "Killing Us Softly" and other videos,
in 1998; NASA astronaut Lt. Col. Catherine "Cady" Coleman,
in 1999, and Pat Love, Ed.D. in 2000.\
GENaustin is organized based on research by educators
and psychologists over the last 10 years that shows girls of
all socio-economic levels experience a dramatic, and sometimes
permanent, loss of self-esteem in the middle school years.
Some of these findings:
A landmark study of adolescents by the AAUW showed the number
of girls who strongly agree with the statement: "I like most
things about myself" drops 31 points between elementary
and high school.
The biggest drop is in perception of competence. Even
girls who excel in math in elementary school are half as likely
as boys by the time they enter high school to feel competent in
them. This decline in perception of competence in middle school
precedes by two years a real drop in performance.
While girls enter elementary school decidedly ahead
academically, they leave high school significantly behind.
On average, girls’ SAT scores are 60 points below boys
(lower in all areas). College continues the decline. Girls’
score 127 points on average below boys on the Graduate Record
Exam (GRE).
One in five girls will experience a serious eating disorder
by their early 20s. The figure is even higher among white,
upper-middle-class girls.
More than one-in-three girls experience a period of serious
depression during adolescence -- and one in 10 will suffer a
severe depressive episode.
By the time they are 18, 78 % of all girls say they are unhappy
with their bodies.
Among the causes of these alarming statistics are rampant
"lookism" promoted by the media and the culture, gender bias
in the classroom and growing awareness among girls of gender
stereotypes that devalue women. This loss of "self value" is
at the core of epidemic rates of eating disorders,
self-mutilations, depression, drug use and sexual acting out
among teen girls, according to Dr. Pipher.
Pipher suggests the best way for families to fight pressures
on their daughters to conform to unreal and unhealthy images
of "female," is to help them become healthy "resisters."
This is accomplished primarily through awareness of unhealthy media
messages, self-awareness, body awareness and the learning of
specific coping skills.
GENaustin is a non-profit organization founded in
1996 by a group of concerned parents in Austin. We welcome
volunteers and donations to help us carry on our work.
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