Moorea Dickason

As the Executive Director of One Circle Foundation and a former teen participant in Girls Circle, watching the FX docuseries Social Studies by Emmy Award-winning filmmaker Lauren Greenfield felt like a powerful confirmation that teens still need safe, meaningful spaces to express themselves, and they’re not finding them in their digital worlds.

16 years ago I was intimidated, excited, nervous, and honored to be given the opportunity to facilitate my first Girls Circle with eight 16-17-year-old girls, all of whom were on probation. They were required to attend as a condition of their probation and we met in a classroom on their high school campus right after school each Wednesday. Going into that first session, I did all of the extra things that I could think of

Articles continue to pop up on my newsfeed about how the pandemic has been detrimental to the mental health of many, especially young people. The isolation, lack of connection with peers, and the uptick in violence within homes and racism within communities during the last 2+ years have led to a mental health crisis for youth.  According to the 2021 CDC Adolescent Behaviors and Experiences Survey (ABES) of 7,705 high school students, nearly half reported they persistently felt sad or hopeless and experienced emotional abuse in the home, while The Trevor Project’s 2021 Survey showed that 70% of LGBTQ+ youth stated that their mental health was “poor” most of the time or always during COVID-19.  In October 2021, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) declared a national emergency in children's mental health. AAP President, Gabrielle A. Carlson said, “We are caring for young people with soaring rates of depression, anxiety, trauma, loneliness, and suicidality that will have lasting