Girls For A Change

Girls For A Change (GFAC) is a nonprofit organization that empowers Black girls in Central Virginia to visualize their bright futures and potential through discovery, development, innovation, and social change in their communities. Girls for a Change administers a variety of programs to support our mission to prepare Black girls for the world and the world for Black girls.

GFAC’s Immersion Lab program began in 2019 with the purpose of closing the digital divide disproportionately impacting Black women. It began as a monthly professional development program for highschool and college students to gain certifications, learn skills, and gain insights from experts in multiple industries.  

The Immersion Lab's mission expanded to include an entrepreneurial component. This new program was developed to address the historic economic obstacles Black women entrepreneurs face. The COVID-19 pandemic shed light on long-standing financial issues that disproportionately impact Black women-owned businesses, like the lack of significant adequate capital resources and the ability to test their business ideas without jeopardizing their financial security. Our business incubation program is designed for Richmond-area highschool entrepreneurs. This youth entrepreneurship program approaches learning in an interactive, experiential manner. Participants benefit from mentoring, networking opportunities, workshops, and resources, and gain access to market resources, and business development services like accounting, marketing and technology implementation. This program connects real-life economic decisions to the institutional learning experience. By incorporating technology, mentoring, and startup of simulated and real businesses and opportunities for funding, we will produce trained experienced Black women entrepreneurs. 

Nationally, and in Metropolitan Richmond, Black women business owners are underrepresented. Barriers to Black-owned business include lack of access to mentorship, training, funding and other resources. Black entrepreneurs  rarely inherit business or capital. The depressed COVID economy exacerbated this problem; women suffered the greatest business loss. Bank of America’s 2021 Women Business Owner Spotlight found that since the COVID19 pandemic, women-owned business owners decreased by 25%. A retail incubator is one forward thinking solution to support Black women entrepreneurs.  

The goal of a retail incubator is to support successful startup through resources like space, equipment, technology, mentorship,certifications, training designed for adolescent people of color, financial literacy, and seed money.

 Studies indicate that budding entrepreneurs learn retail skills relatively quickly with training and mentorship (Barr, 2015). Shared spaces and resources eliminate overhead barriers and promote visibility. This preparation and connectivity launches successful businesses, improving diversity, inclusion and growing local economies. Incubating brands  is an efficient way to build community and connect people to great products. The retail incubation strategy is employed by companies and   municipalities such as Target and Kroger and Boston (Baldinger, 2019). Program-based retail incubators are effective because they coordinate financial support and address knowledge and networking gaps. 

These facts indicate that investment in budding women entrepreneurs benefits not just minority business owners, but also their communities. Now, more than ever, investment in our Immersion Lab has the potential to positively impact Black girls and their communities as we recover from the global pandemic. 

Our Immersion Lab program focuses on aligning aspiring high-school entrepreneurs with successful business leaders in order to develop leadership skills, goal-planning, financial literacy, networks, exposure and community engagement. Through this experiential learning experience, skills acquisition occurs through direct relationships with successful members of the greater community and consistent exposure with their community. This enables our innovative focus to be not just improving business development and wealth building for black women; we are also able to address greater social issues within our community like institutional racism and sexism in the digital divide. 

GFAC’s asset based framework is a replicable model of social justice for Black girls in the United States. In 2021, Richmond Public Schools requested that GFAC spearhead their Advisory Group to strategize culturally responsive services and conditions for  grades 3-12 Black girls. Holistically responding to the intersectional biases against Black girls, our team leads, supervises and supports the alignment of school practices with the districts’ strategic plans and equity policy. We believe that this model of grassroots intervention is a powerful and replicable model for advancement of Black girls in school systems nation-wide. We envision the Immersion Lab as a capstone program in this work with Black girls in central Virginia. We aspire to create alliances with other Richmond business incubators, so our Immersion Lab entrepreneurs may continue to receive support as we assist them in making a successful transition into adulthood.

Girls For A Change (GFAC) serves socially, economically, and academically vulnerable, self-identifying Black girls in grades K-12 throughout the Richmond Metro Area. Black girls have been systematically subjected to prejudice and poverty at more disproportionate rates than any other ethnic or gender group in America. As a result, Black girls continue to be vulnerable and survive primarily on the margins of society. GFAC is on a mission to change that with targeted programs that address issues critical to Black girls’ success and vitality, namely leadership skills, goal-planning, financial literacy, network building, exposure, community engagement, skill-building, sisterhood building, and socio-emotional learning. We address institutional racism, sexism, the digital divide, and the concrete ceiling unique to the Black female lived experience. 

GFAC’s approach to addressing these systemic issues across the Greater Richmond Metro Area is unique: we support youth-led programming, thereby co-creating advocacy and policy change with our participants, and providing them safe spaces to explore culture shifts. We started after school programs and summer camps in Greater Richmond Metro Area school buildings to provide direct-service for Black girls as an intervention point for, and means of, empowerment and protection. GFAC programs are designed to provide consistent support to girls, from youth to young adulthood. Through experiential learning and consistent exposure, we focus on ensuring that our participants are ahead of the learning curve, breaking cycles of poverty and closing the opportunity gaps faced by Black girls. We want to give every girl who aspires to get ahead a chance to be seen, heard, and celebrated. We recognize that the work to end gender-based violence and to advance racial and gender equity requires large-scale systemic change. We must change how society views Black girls and honors their autonomy to ensure that they, and their communities, can thrive. 

Virginia 

Girls For A Change’s mission is to prepare Black girls for the world and the world for black girls. Our Immersion Lab incubator program prepares Black girls to engage in the 21st century business landscape through exposure to skills, experience, and professional networks that they often lack. Participants access monthly professional development sessions  to gain certifications, learn and apply business skills, and connect with industry experts. After six months of training, participants develop business plans and pitch their ideas to community business leaders. They are then granted seed money to launch their enterprises and work alongside local businesses to build brand awareness and generate revenue. Through this experiential learning and consistent exposure, GFAC ensures Black girls are ahead of the entrepreneurial learning curve, breaking cycles of poverty, and closing opportunity gaps.

The Immersion Lab’s goal is to strengthen Black women-owned  businesses in Richmond, Virginia by eliminating historic obstacles. The program will help these young women embrace and improve their use of digital technology for domestic and global sales. It will improve financial practices so young start-ups can survive and thrive. The Immersion Lab offers heightened visibility in a profitable industry. Young entrepreneurs will access facilitated opportunities, such as pitch sessions with investors, to secure capital. Mentorship and business networking opportunities will provide resources as their businesses mature. Business planning, skill-building and pitch sessions will ensure every business plan is fully prepared to create and operate an effective organization and increase resilience among existing Black-owned businesses. In June, a week-long residency, “Creative Industry Camp,” offers participants a sneak peek behind-the-scenes of successful retail businesses and hands-on experiences. In the summer months, the Immersion Lab provides opportunities for participants to test their business models, pivot ideas  and explore other areas for growth, both from a product and geographic perspective. This pop-up programming for existing businesses provides similar benefits to a start-up, with a couple key additions; research by pop-up specialists at the Lion’esque Group shows that the average pop-up sees a 35% increase in sales from doors open to six months after doors close. Alliances with other Richmond business incubators, will assist our Immersion Lab entrepreneurs to make a successful transition into adulthood.  Ultimately, the Immersion Lab guides young Black business owners towards successful, sustainable endeavors and entrepreneurship-driven generational wealth creation. 

The Immersion Lab’s business incubator program is serving twenty 9-12 grade Black girls in 2022. We currently project growth of up to 40% over the next five years. Our goal is to serve 50 in 2023 and 300 in five years. The number of people impacted by the business incubator program will be significantly greater than just the number of business owners, however. Merchant Maverick’s data study of the best states for Black women-owned business ranks Virginia fourth in the nation. The data examined the percent of Black women who own an incorporated business and their average income.  Black women comprise 7% of the U.S. population, yet Black women solely run 0.74% of all employer firms in the country. Such a drastic under-representation must improve (Beilby, 2021).We expect program results to track towards improved trends in Black women-owned business in Virginia. In turn, we expect to see this impact the communities in which these women live and work.

Girls For A Change serves Black girls in the greater Richmond metropolitan area and actively recruits and incorporates Black women and girls from Central Virginia into GFAC’s governance and decision-making. At the Board level, Black girls serve as official advisors. Black women make up 60% of our Directors. Black girls are employed as GFAC brand advisors, ensuring the program’s voice  is true to their lived experiences, unique needs, and their development of programs and events. GFAC works closely with area public schools, community members,  government agencies and other nonprofits to serve Black girls holistically. GFAC partners with the Richmond Public School as the lead Girls Mentoring Program in implementing programs and services, developing strategies to improve the culture and conditions for Black girls resulting in culturally responsive service. We partner with many companies like Target and Capital One for internships and career opportunities.  We are currently developing a housing project with Maggie Walker Land Trust.

Richmond, Virginia, was once was the United States’ center for the sale and torture of enslaved Black people. Following the Civil War, despite emancipation, Jim Crow laws continued the historic oppression of Black people. Housing remained segregated and Black people were blocked from equal participation in the business economy. In response, Black people in Richmond, Virginia, created a business economy for themselves, a thriving community for Black people by Black people, located in Jackson Ward (Coghill, 2020). Jackson Ward, established around 1870, was originally home to free Africans, German, Irish and Italian immigrants.  During Reconstruction, free African Americans overwhelmingly moved into the area, and by 1920, Jackson Ward was the center of Black business for Richmond (Chavis, 2017). Maggie Lena Walker was one of these Black American women entrepreneurs who broke both traditional gender roles and discriminatory racial laws. She became the first Black woman to establish and become president of a bank in the United States, located in Jackson Ward, in 1905. Walker and many other Black Virginians transformed Reconstruction-era Richmond into the birthplace for Black entrepreneurship. Jackson Ward became a famed business and entertainment district, earning its nickname of the “Harlem of the South” sometime in the 1920s. Walker, a suffragette, remained a political activist in the Black community, fighting for Black Americans and women to achieve economic and social independence until her death in 1934.

Jackson Ward began to fall into disrepair and poverty in the 1940s, due to multiple discriminatory practices and events. Following the Great Depression, a New Deal program, the Homeowners Loan Corporation (HOLC), offered refinancing to prevent home foreclosure. Eligibility was determined by an HOLC assigned neighborhood grade. In heavily segregated Richmond, as elsewhere in the country, Black neighborhoods received the lowest D ratings. This reduced or altogether eliminated assistance in Jackson Ward. Established in 1934, the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) is a program that guarantees low interest loans with small down payments. This program historically refused to make loans to Black Americans regardless of credit worthiness, citing the HOLC ratings as reason for refusal. This loss of access to federally funded assistance significantly reduced Black homeownership in Jackson Ward as well. Property, specifically home ownership, is the foundation to wealth creation in the United States. Lack of access to financing of property significantly constrains Black communities to poverty. 

In 1940, the Virginia General Assembly created the Richmond Housing Authority (RHA), which was controlled by the city's white business elite. The RHA who could condemn property and issue bonds to construct housing. In 1941, 1956 and 1961, the RHA’s redevelopment plans targeted Jackson Ward. Initially, the RHA demolished 200 homes and built Gilpin Court in a sub-neighborhood of Jackson Ward, adjacent to Maggie Walker’s bank. Similarly, in the 1950s, Richmond destroyed 4700 housing units in Black neighborhoods and replaced them with 1736 public housing units, within three miles of Richmond's center. No public housing development was located in Richmond suburbs. Centralizing public housing, such as Gilpin Court, in traditionally Black neighborhoods, like Jackson War, essentially centralized poverty in Black neighborhoods (Chavis, 2017).  In 1954, the all-white Virginia General Assembly created the Richmond-Petersburg Turnpike  Authority, which four months later announced I-95 would be built through the center of Jackson Ward, effectively splitting the neighborhood in half. Over 1000 homes were destroyed to make way for the new highway, displacing seven thousand Black Richmonders. This was effectively the last nail in Jackson Ward’s coffin, and its location as the center of Black business and culture declined. Unfortunately, much of Jackson Ward’s historic Black business was not just displaced, it actually closed due to lack of access to clientele, property and capital. 

The context of Richmond‘s history and the decline of Jackson Ward is critical to understanding why a business incubator program for young Black women in a space owned by Black women is not just innovative, but necessary in Virginia’s capital city. As Maggie Walker understood, the connection between economic prosperity and healthy, vibrant communities is inseparable. She also understood the importance of women entrepreneurs in carrying a voice that is representative of and can advance the wellbeing of their community. Since 2000, Girls For A Change has created safe spaces for Black girls and delivered proven asset-based programs meeting their needs. Initially delivered in schools, in 2018, GFAC centralized programming in a rented facility in Chesterfield county. On March 1, 2022, we took the bold step of purchasing that building. Black property ownership matters now more than ever as a critical step in addressing historic, systemic racial wealth gaps, and educational and health disparities. Supportive community space is vital to support the Black girls now increasingly vulnerable from the pandemic (Burnett, 2021), and facing historic reductions in life expectancy and possible learning loss (Brookings Institute, 2021).

With building ownership, and updated, expanded facilities, GFAC’s annual programmatic growth can increase by about 40%. Among the critical spaces needed in our expansion is our Immersion Lab business incubator. The Immersion Lab offers solutions to the digital divide and career skills gaps that Black girls face. It aims to disrupt the poverty cycle by proactively equipping young Black women with tools and resources they need to thrive instead of merely survive. The Immersion Lab offers participants professional growth opportunities, a support network and professional certifications. A larger Lab work space with twenty-five workstations will allow more girls access to needed equipment and support to be successful at closing the digital divide. Training and certifications offer access to essential opportunities for Black girls; even more important as their communities recover from the impacts of the pandemic. While many communities were able to work or learn from home during the pandemic, GFAC’s experience showed Black girls were more successful when in the center. At home, they faced varied access to equipment, internet access or quiet spaces for working. When offered opportunities with choices between in- person or online, we found the highest degree of participation happened in-person. The updated spaces will allow the girls in our incubator program the needed access to reach viable retail clientele along both the Midlothian Turnpike corridor and in Bon Air. Much like Maggie Walker saw in Jackson Ward, we envision our incubator as an opportunity to build a vibrant community of young Black women entrepreneurs. We have found tremendous support in both the Chesterfield community in which our building is located and the greater Richmond community. 

Changing demographics in our neighboring communities demonstrate urgent need for this innovation

for Black girls in our region. Chesterfield County has thrived for decades on a reputation as Richmond’s prosperous neighbor, with lower unemployment and higher average income. While the west side of the county prospers with high-dollar subdivisions, state-of-the-art schools and booming retail corridors, to the east there is an ever-starker divide with areas of concentrated poverty and growing numbers of poor people struggling to feed their children. It’s a side of Chesterfield that is largely unknown to many.

The growing east-west divide threatens more than Chesterfield’s carefully burnished image of a flourishing, suburban county. The cost of failing to adequately address poverty is an increasing burden on the county’s already-stressed budget and school system.

“More and more schools are going to deteriorate. Housing is going to deteriorate. The county will decline, pure and simple” said John Moeser, a professor at the University of Richmond who has studied local poverty trends for years. “The status quo is not going to work over the long haul for western Chesterfield County. Fewer developers will want to go in. The wealthy enclave is over time going to get squeezed.”

The county’s ten poorest elementary schools — where between 50 and 90 percent of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch — are all located in eastern Chesterfield. The western half is home to the ten elementary schools with the fewest low-income families, where no more than 1 in 5 children are eligible for free or low-cost meals. The number of students from low-income families rose nearly 80 percent in Chesterfield in the past decade, outpacing its neighbors in Henrico County, Hanover County and Richmond. Chesterfield now has just 1,084 fewer poor students than the city of Richmond.  We are committed to our partnership with Chesterfield County Schools and our  continuing commitment to Richmond Public Schools to offer Black girls access to the opportunities offered at the Immersion Lab.

Currently, the Immersion lab is mobile in two school districts in the Richmond metropolitan Area, Richmond City and Chesterfield County.  Due to transportation barriers, the curriculum is implemented in two ways. Currently we partner with schools to offer the program during the school hours or after school. We provide the computers and assist with broadband services to ensure that participants can continue with our virtual weekly sessions, assignments,  research and are equipped with all the tools necessary to work towards building their businesses. 

For high school girl students that have more availability on Saturdays and are eager for more, we offer  opportunities on-site at our GFAC location in Chesterfield. On-site opportunities include training, access to more tangible resources or equipment, direct work with their mentors, and additional tutoring to prepare and attain tech certifications. We provide multiple ways to provide each participant access to opportunities that eliminate historic systemic and cultural barriers faced in school or the workforce. We also build a safe and encouraging community to close the gap Black girls face now- and will- as they enter adulthood. The Immersion lab location is a great resource for the Richmond metropolitan community, specifically for Chesterfield County residents. 

We envision the Immersion Lab as a capstone program in our work with Black girls in central Virginia. Many girls will participate in our Immersion Lab program for the duration of their highschool experiences. We aspire to create alliances with other Richmond business incubators, so our Immersion Lab entrepreneurs may continue to receive support as we assist them in making a successful transition into adulthood. 

The entrepreneurial programming in the Immersion Lab is executed by a team of Angela Patton, CEO and Na'Kera Richardson, Director of Operations, and Chelsea Vicente, Program Manager. Angela Patton is an author, business leader, licensed nurse, TedxWomen speaker, and an award activist for Black Girls. President Barack Obama awarded Ms. Patton the Champion of Change for Enrichment for Marginalized Girls in 2016. Na’Kera Richardson is a longtime Richmond resident, Teach For America alum, and champion of the rights of Black girls. Both women have spent their adult lives advocating for Black girls and women within their own community. They have built a varied and strong network with community leaders from business, government, non-profit and religious sectors. GFAC staff draws upon our community relationships and our values to assist in the development and delivery of culturally responsive programs that holistically respond to the intersectional biases against Black girls. With the lived experience of confident, self-determined Black women, our team has a holistic understanding of how to implement asset-based programming in the social context of Black girls’ lived experiences. Our board supports our work through regular engagement and annual retreats. 

Girls For A Change builds trust within the community we serve and among small business owners through sincere, active, and dynamic interactions. We work to cultivate relationships with Women-based organizations and organizations connected to the cause of preparing Black girls for the world, and the world for Black girls. We do this by sharing regular updates, especially personal stories of girls in our organization who achieved accomplishments or overcome obstacles.  We engage our donors to activate their networks on our behalf. We provide invitations to no-cost cultivation events and volunteer opportunities to expand engagement within our community. We believe in being transparent with our annual reports and audited financial statements. We believe in an ethos of respect, authenticity and engagement, and plan interactions to foster those principles

The Immersion Lab’s chief impact goal is to strengthen Black women-owned businesses in Richmond, Virginia. Multiple solutions to existing obstacles will ensure a pathway to self-sufficiency. In 2022, twenty entrepreneurs will receive financial planning, technology and upskilling opportunities. They will access heightened visibility and facilitated opportunities, such as pitch sessions with investors, to secure capital. Mentorship and networking opportunities will provide additional resources to ensure each business plan is fully prepared to create and operate an effective business. Through annual iterations of the incubator program, we will level the Richmond, Virginia, playing field for minority-owned firms. Over the next five years, the Immersion Lab incubator will fuel economic growth by building a broad consumer movement of support for Black Women Owned businesses. We envision a scalable model that will readily expand as the economy rebounds, thereby creating a more just and equitable economic system in Central Virginia.

Girls For A Change’s team is uniquely positioned to understand the lived experiences of the Black girls in GFAC programs. Our senior leadership includes Angela Patton, CEO,  Na'Kera Richardson, Director of Operations, and Chelsea Vicente, Program Manager. Angela Patton is an author, business leader, TedxWomen speaker, and an award winning activist for Black Girls. President Barack Obama awarded Ms. Patton the Champion of Change for Enrichment for Marginalized Girls in 2016. Na’Kera Richardson is a longtime Richmond resident, Teach For America alum, and champion of the rights of Black girls. Chelsea came to Virginia to pursue her education. She has spent over five years volunteering as a mentor and facilitator for youth programming and rites of passage programs focused on young Black girls. GFAC staff draws upon our community relationships and our values to assist in the development and delivery of culturally responsive programs that holistically respond to the intersectional biases against Black girls. With the lived experience of confident, self-determined Black women, our team has a holistic understanding of how to implement asset-based programming in the social context of Black girls’ lived experiences.

We are requesting support from Truist Foundation and MIT Solve to remove the current barriers arising from lack of adequate space and equipment in our current space; to more effectively deliver the Immersion Lab incubator program to a larger number of participants. With an adequately equipped  studio space and laptop seats for 25 participants, we could comfortably accommodate  two to four cohorts per calendar year; feasibly launching between 50 to 100 potential black women entrepreneurs in the greater metropolitan Richmond area. Increased technological capacity would enable us to enhance our technical training, certifications and other offerings; for example, GFAC could leverage its relationships with the Fortune 500 companies that are invested in our mission, such as Target. We  could invite industry experts remotely  to present, offer training and expose the girls to  evolving retail technologies. We would still be able to offer remote opportunities from a hub that allowed for in person participation, a preferred environment for our participants, as our data has indicated to us over the course of the Covid pandemic while we offered hybrid models of learning.

We seek relationships with vibrant STEAM organizations to help Black girls to acquire the skills, experience, and professional networks they often lack. We are interested in developing networks with design, technology, information systems, retail, retail support services and many more organizations to develop internships, professional networks and mentorship experience. We also seek partnerships with potential investors who are willing to offer capital to potential emerging entrepreneurs.