A Mighty Girl's top picks of new biographies about Mighty Women for adult readers.

It's been another incredible year of books celebrating mighty women! From a fascinating biography of the woman leading today's new scientific revolution to gripping accounts of clever spies who outwitted the Nazis to powerful memoirs by women grappling with grief to upbeat autobiographies by beloved popular figures, this year has seen a diverse range of new biographies for adult readers about extraordinary women. And, just as our Mighty Girls love reading books about smart, confident, and courageous girls and women, we know that our adult supporters love their stories too! Continue reading → Continue reading

Ruth Coker Burks cared for over 1,000 people during the height of the AIDS epidemic, most of whom had been rejected by their families.

In 1986, Ruth Coker Burks' discovery of a hospital room door with a "big, red bag" over it and her encounter with the dying young man inside changed her life — and led her to becoming the final caregiver for hundreds of people dying of AIDS, most of them young gay men who had been abandoned by their families. When Ruth, then 26 years old, learned how many young men were being left to die alone and often were not even being claimed for burial, she recalls thinking, "Who knew there’d come a time when people didn’t want to bury their children?” Over the next ten years, Burks estimates that she helped care for over 1,000 people dying of AIDS and even dug the graves for 40 of them herself in her family's cemetery. In recognition of World AIDS Day, we're sharing Burks' inspiring story — and the powerful and timeless lesson it teaches about the power of compassion to overcome fear and prejudice. Continue reading → Continue reading

Twenty books that explore poverty and hardship in local communities -- and cultivate kids' desire to lend a helping hand to those in need.

For many kids, poverty and hunger are things from long ago or far away, but the truth is that financial hardship exists in our own communities as well: behind closed doors, many families struggle to provide the necessities. Divisions due to class differences can appear any time — after all, when a new “must-have” toy or clothing brand becomes popular, there are always classmates at school who can’t have it. And yet, talking to kids about poverty and class is difficult for many adults because the issues behind these problems seem too complicated or uncomfortable to explain. Continue reading → Continue reading

The driver who alerted police to the 16-year-old girl's plight did not understand the hand signal popularized on TikTok but he could tell that she was in distress and needed help.

The rescue of a kidnapped 16-year-old girl in Kentucky last week is raising awareness about the importance of staying vigilant for signs of distress and taking action if you see them. While the story went viral after the teen's use of a hand signal that was popularized on TikTok was originally credited as alerting the driver who called the authorities, it turns out that he hadn't understood the gesture but he could tell that the girl needed help. “I didn’t recognize a gesture,” 50-year-old David Isaacs, the driver who called 911 explained in an interview this week. “She was mouthing ‘help me.’ She said ‘help me, help me’ twice. I think she even lip-synced ‘call 911.'... It looked like she had been crying." Continue reading → Continue reading

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When she was 12 years old, Vinisha Umashankar watched an ironing cart vendor throw out burnt charcoal in her hometown in southern India. She started thinking about all of the ironing vendors across India who use charcoal to heat an iron and press clothing for a fee and the tremendous environmental impact of the common practice. "It made me think about the amount of charcoal burnt every day," Vinisha recalls, "and the damage it does to the environment." The science-loving Mighty Girl decided to come up with an environmentally friendly alternative and, after poring through college level physics textbooks to understand how solar panels worked, she designed a new ironing cart that uses solar panels to power a steam iron. Three years later, the now 15-year-old has gained worldwide acclaim for her invention, which she hopes to start manufacturing within the next few months, and even addressed COP26, the U.N.'s climate change summit in Glasgow, Scotland. Continue reading → Continue reading

A Mighty Girl's 2021 Halloween Gallery is now live! A small sample of the many hundreds of photos submitted can be viewed in our Halloween Highlights blog post.

Thank you to everyone who submitted photos of their Mighty Girls in costume to our 2021 Halloween Gallery! We were awed by the creativity and variety of the Mighty Girl costumes submitted to the gallery. As we've always said, Mighty Girls know that their costume possibilities are limited only by their imaginations and with costumes ranging from ones based on favorite superheroes to ones inspired by historic role models, these Mighty Girls clearly know no bounds! Continue reading → Continue reading

"'My Best Friend' is about the instant heart connection between two girls who meet for the first time."

After her daughter came home in tears from preschool because she didn't have "magical pretty princess hair" like her friends, Kelly Greenawalt searched for a picture book to share with her starring a princess with natural puffy curls — and when she couldn't find what she was looking for, the mother of seven decided to write one. Kelly's first picture book, I Am Truly, created with her friend and illustrator Amariah Rauscher, became a surprise hit and has now grown into an early reader series as part of Scholastic's Acorn line. Continue reading → Continue reading

Our top picks of history-inspired Mighty Girl costumes from our own Halloween costume collection and photos of Mighty Girls in costume shared by our community!

Halloween provides a chance to imagine yourself as a different person — and for young history buffs, that can mean dressing up as a favorite figure from history! She might be imagining herself as a specific person, like Amelia Earhart or Susan B. Anthony, or she be intrigued by the culture of a time and place, from Ancient Rome to the prairies of the pioneers. Whatever she chooses, history can provide a tremendous amount of inspiration! Continue reading → Continue reading

How you can help Razia Jan educate the girls of Afghanistan.

Until recently, if you walked into the Zabuli Education Center in the rural district of Deh'Subz outside of Kabul, you would have seen bustling classes from kindergarten through the twelfth grade, full of girls who were attending free of charge. The school was the brainchild of Razia Jan, an Afghan-American entrepreneur and the founder of the Razia's Ray of Hope Foundation. Founded in 2008, Jan's school now educates nearly 800 impoverished girls every year. Over time, it's also changed attitudes in the community about the value of educating girls, especially among men who went from skepticism and even hostility toward the school to bragging about its graduates. "From the day I opened the doors of the Zabuli Education Center, my effort was and is to provide security and the best education for these girls," she said when she was named one of CNN's Heroes of the Year. "With hard work, I have proven to the men of seven villages surrounding the school that this is the best thing that’s happened for their daughters." Continue reading → Continue reading

Books for kids and adults about the lives of women and girls under Taliban rule - and how you can help Afghan girls and women today.

After the Taliban's swift takeover of Afghanistan, culminating in the fall of Kabul to these brutal extremists this week, Afghan girls and women are facing a terrifying future with the likely return of laws requiring that all women cover themselves in burqas and restrict their freedom of movement, education bans on girls, and forced marriage and rape. Shamsia Hassani, Afghanistan's first female graffiti artist, shared a powerful painting entitled "Nightmare, Afghanistan 2021" that captures the grief and fear of Afghan women, reminding everyone that Afghan women's precious freedoms – all too recently kindled – are being brutally snuffed out. Continue reading → Continue reading