Eleven young women from all parts of the Tri-State area attended The Prizm Project's third annual Human Rights Retreat at the Douglass College campus of New Brunswick, New Jersey.

   A college student who will assist in starting the first Prizm chapter at Georgian Court University also added her valuable experience and insight to the retreat. The intense three-day program included insightful conversations about body image, social action, and the importance of community organizing.

   The events of the retreat kicked off with a viewing of Lord of War, which plunged the group head-first into profound discussions about human rights. The participants also had the opportunity to discuss the importance of recognizing human commonality with Olubayi Olubayi and Denniston Bonadie of the Global Literacy Project. Katherine Sameh, founder of a feminist bookstore, and Danielle Gougon, Director of Global Affairs at Douglass College, helped show the ways in which participants could transform their passion for human rights into meaningful careers. Balancing hard work with equal time for fun, the young women learned the basics of capoeira, how to perform step dance, had an impromptu freestyling session, and were inspired by the creativity of Verbal Mayhem, a local poetry slam group.

   Much of the retreat was spent organizing the participants' social action projects which include various collection drives, the creation of an International Awareness club, and the organizing of feminist discussion groups. Each participant left the retreat with a clear course of action for her social action project as well as a list of resources, networking tools, and plenty of passion and energy for social change!

   For a more personal account of each young woman's experience, keep a eye on the "alumnae" section of The Prizm Project website!



   For the third year in a row, the Prizm Project will be holding a human rights retreat for 20 high school women from the Tri-State area on the Douglass College campus of Rutgers University. The young women will attend the three-day retreat from March 30th to April 1st.

   As in the past, the retreat will feature speakers from local human rights organizations, media literacy workshops, film screenings, insightful discussions and a healthy dose of fun and creativity! During the course of the exciting weekend, each young woman is encouraged to design a social action project to implement in her community. Prizm alumnae and program directors serve as mentors to these young women as they use the skills and energy they take away from the retreat and go on to create meaningful and healthy change in their communities.

   Check back to see the progress of these incredible women as they enter the 2007 human rights retreat as independent, hopeful beams and emerge as one strong, vibrant and cohesive spectrum!



      Prizm field organizer, Sheran Oradu--a 21-year old Kenyan native--launches Prizm's first ever global retreat in the Teso District in Kenya.The over 50 young women who participated learned about their human rights, how to stand up for them, and how to impact the world positively.

   The first ever program of its kind in the area, the retreat was organized in conjunction with the Global Literacy Project's Leadership Conference, which drew in over 100 participants in total. Sheran will lead another retreat in the district in late 2007. Prizm is holding a Feminine Sanitary Products Drive in New Jersey for the young women participants of the upcoming retreat.
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    Prizm's around the world will be able to have organizing tools at their fingertips thanks to the third grade at Hazelwood Elementary school. The students of the the third grade collected hundreds of items in to help launch Prizm programs in South Africa. The students collected the supplies after learning about human rights in South Africa. Prizm hopes to connect participants from the South African program and the elementary school for a video pen pal program.