DOWNTOWN TALLAHASSEE, FL — What do you want to be when you grow up? It's a big question, and for sixth-graders like A'zaria Mandy and Grace Desir, it can feel like a lot of pressure. But a Girls Out Loud event in Tallahassee Wednesday looked to make that question a little easier and inspire young girls thinking about their future.
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The two students got a rare chance to explore potential careers and see women thriving in fields like medicine, art, and farming.
"It helped me, like, think about what I want to do, especially since I don't know what I want to do yet," Desir said.
The day was anything but a typical classroom experience.
Students made lip balm alongside a pharmacist, designed makeup bags with a graphic artist, and experimented with plant dyes with a farmer. Each activity was a reminder that there's no single road to success.
One of those professionals, farmer Bashia Marks, wanted students to see that agriculture isn't just a man's world.
"Farming is the foundation of everything. That's how we eat. That's how we live, so it's a very important job. It's one that we often associate as being very male-dominated, but it is absolutely the field that women and girls can get into," Marks said.
For A'zaria Mandy, seeing women excel across so many different fields was a turning point.
"My biggest takeaway was exploring women empowerment and seeing how they have such big jobs that it shows that women do just as men do," Mandy said.
For many of the sixth graders there, Girls Out Loud wasn't just a career day it was the kind of experience that sticks with you.
Organizers hope the connections made between students and mentors will follow them long after the event ends, fueling their confidence, curiosity, and ambition for years to come.
"I just want these women who are doing these things look back at the new generation who's coming and reach their hand out and say, 'Grab my hand, young lady. I'm going to show you this career.' So that way it's like: each one teach one. We're pouring into the next generation," organizer Quashier Flood-Strouble said.
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