BEGIRL.WORLD GLOBAL SCHOLARS AWARDED P.E.A.R.L. PLEDGE GRANT FROM PEARL MILLING COMPANY - OCTOBER 2022
beGirl.world Global Scholars is excited to announce we have been awarded a grant from Pearl Milling Company to continue and grow our work of changing the face of study abroad, travel and foreign service! See below for more information on this exciting racial equity initiative.
Pearl Milling Company is honored to support beGirl.world Global Scholars as it continues to uplift Black women and girls in the community.
This year, 17 non-profit organizations will be awarded grants to support meaningful services and education that promote Prosperity, Empowerment, Access, Representation, and Leadership for Black women and girls in the U.S.
A total of $1 million in grants will be awarded as part of Pearl Milling Company’s continued commitment to help uplift the Black community and PepsiCo’s broader Racial Equality Journey initiative.
The 2022 P.E.A.R.L. Pledge grant recipients have missions that address a wide range of subjects affecting Black women and girls including: homelessness, food insecurity, entrepreneur mentorship, mental health, breast cancer awareness and advocacy, and after-school programs. In addition to having a purpose that aligns with the P.E.A.R.L. Pledge mission and pillars, grant recipients were selected based on how they will use the funding to further their initiatives, among other criteria.
With the P.E.A.R.L. Pledge grant, beGirl.world Global Scholars plans to expand international education through the Black Girls’ Guide to Study Abroad initiative to continue to change the face and narrative of global education and travel for young Black women.
Thank you Pearl Milling Company for believing in us! You can learn more about the P.E.A.R.L. Pledge initiative in the link in our bio and on their website and learn more about our work, sign up for updates on our upcoming programs, and donate to support this important work at begirlworld.com.
Learn more about the P.E.A.R.L. Pledge Grant Initiative here.
STATEMENT FROM DEESHA AND MARCELLA - JANUARY 2022
Dear Friends & Supporters of beGirl.world,
This letter is a little long, but very important. beGirl.world is starting 2022 off with some exciting news and BIG changes - new name, face, and focus!
First, going forward, we’ll officially be known as beGirl.world Global Scholars. This isn’t a symbolic change. It’s a recognition of the impact we’ve had fostering a more inclusive international education ecosystem for Black girls and college women. It’s also a recognition of our forward-looking focus on addressing gaps that create barriers to young Black women’s access to study abroad opportunities that can lead to new pathways for career and personal development.
Second, for the past eight years, we’ve poured our time, energy, resources, finances, and passions into making beGirl.world an organization that we can be proud of: one that serves the promise and possibilities of young Black women, opens doors across the world to girls who would otherwise lack the resources to do so, seeds the dreams of Black college women with the financial award to study anywhere in the world, and moves every mountain to fulfill this mission so dear to our hearts. We wouldn’t have traded a single second of this journey and we are so grateful to those of you who have traveled it with us and your overwhelming support for our treasured participants!
The time has come for us to shift from running the day to day operations and into more advisory roles for the organization, which is why we are pleased to announce beGirl.world Global Scholars’ new Interim Director, Cheryl Davis. Cheryl has served beGirl.world as our Grants Manager for the past year. In this new role, Cheryl will be taking over many of the operational and programmatic responsibilities of the organization, which will allow both of us to direct some much-needed attention to developments in our own personal and professional lives while still providing high-level guidance for our path forward. Cheryl can be reached at cdavis@begirlworld.com.
In light of these changes, we’ll use this year to engage in a strategic planning initiative to set the course for our future. This will include recruiting several full time staff, charting a course for a National chapter model for our high school program, partnering with HBCU’s and community colleges to build capacity for study abroad opportunities that cater to the needs of Black college women, and finding more ways to connect young Black women to supportive networks at home and within the global Black community.
We look towards this next phase for beGirl.world Global Scholars with both anticipation and celebration. Even with the uncertainty of the past two years, we’ve stayed the course in fulfilling our important mission. We awarded three study abroad scholarships to college women who will be pursuing their education in Morocco, Denmark, and Paris. We launched our beGirl Broadcast series of interviews with travelers from around the world to continue to inspire our young future explorers. Our work was recognized with generous awards from the Gates and William Penn Foundations, to name a few. All this in addition to our already established track record of providing meaningful travel experiences, leadership opportunities, exposure to college communities, and so much more.
Again, our sincere thanks for your amazing support for beGirl.world Global Scholars’ mission to “raise a girl who travels”. We are fired up for this next stage in our growth and ready to meet the challenges ahead so that we can continue to foster rewarding life experiences for young Black women and girls.
Thank you,
Deesha & Marcella
