Youth Leadership Academy projects
Leadership projects
Your leadership project is a youth‑driven, locally focused initiative designed to address an issue you’re passionate about. Through the Youth Leadership Academy, you’ll gain the skills to create a solution‑oriented project that advances gender equity and drives meaningful change in your community. The tools you develop will support you not only in this project, but throughout your future work as a changemaker, advocate and young professional.
Many Youth Leadership Academy fellows begin with small, local projects — and continue expanding their impact as active alumni.
Global Girls Initiative
Aanya, a 2021 YLA participant and former Youth Advisory Board member, discovered the widespread impact of period poverty both abroad and in her own U.S. community, which inspired her to take action. Through large‑scale product drives and awareness efforts, she collected more than 50,000 period products and distributed them to 37 low‑income schools.
After the Youth Leadership Academy, she expanded this work by founding the Global Girls Initiative, a nonprofit that continues to provide menstrual health support to underserved communities.
