United Way Executive Director Elizabeth Monaco, DSS Employee and The Place Board Member Lois LoPresti, The Place Teen Program Coordinator and Girls on the Run Coach Julie Dealing, Perry Browne Music Teacher and Girls on the Run Facilitator Karen Clark, and Child Advocacy Center Case Manager and Girls on the Run Coach Liz Simcoe with the Perry Browne Girls on the Run team. (Photo by Sarah Genter)

NORWICH — The Perry Browne Elementary School Girls on the Run team spent their season preparing for a 5K, learning life skills, and gathering food to donate to the United Way food cupboard.

Girls on the Run is a "physical, activity-based, positive youth development program that inspires third through eighth grade girls to be joyful, healthy, and confident using a fun experience-based curriculum which creatively integrates running."

Coaches and facilitators spent the season meeting with a group of 19 third, fourth, and fifth graders at Perry Browne preparing for a 5K run on Sunday, June 4 in Oneonta.

"We don’t care if they run. They move forward. They hop, they skip, they jump. Whatever it is as long as they’re going forward. They walk. It doesn’t matter," said Perry Browne Music Teacher and Girls on the Run Facilitator Karen Clark. "Every single time they come they were making a goal and then they’re doing their laps. 'Did I make my goal?'"

They also learned various lessons relating to empowerment, empathy, and advocating for themselves in a positive way.

"It’s a program for young women to come together and empower each other. So the running part and the 5K part is a goal for them, but ultimately every single time we meet, there’s lessons on different life skills for the girls. Specifically on how to empower yourself and empower others," said The Place Teen Program Coordinator and Girls on the Run Coach Julie Dealing.

She said the girls also learned about the concept of "Star Power," or personal positive energy.

"One of the things we talked about was activating our ‘Star Power.’ So in this sense it’s kind of like your positive energy, and then we also talked about how clouds can cover that. Like how negative things can affect our positivity," Dealing explained. "The girls come in every day and they’ll ask us coaches, 'how’s your Star Power today?' Like, how are you feeling today?"

"They’ve really grown in the short period of time we’ve been together, and I think it’s just amazing," she continued. "It’s really amazing watching these girls from the beginning to now. We ere unsure with like integrating the different grades tog how well they were going to mesh, and by the end now they’re all one big team. They all support each other."

In addition to learning life skills and gearing up for the 5K, the Girls on the Run team also completed a Community Impact Project, which aims to find a local cause to support while also teaching the girls about compromise.

"A few weeks ago our lesson was on compromise, and so we did exercises on that, and that all led to them coming to an agreement for the population of which they wanted to serve," said Dealing. "They decided they wanted to bring in food."

"The past like two weeks or so [they] have just been bringing in what they're able to," she continued. "It’s really about using what we already have, so ultimately these girls came together and donated their own food."

The team was able to fill a box and large grocery bag with food, which was then donated on Thursday to the Chenango United Way to be put in their food cupboard at 83 North Broad Street in Norwich.

"On the front porch there’s a blue cabinet, and in that blue cabinet we are going to put this food, and pretty much every day we have people that come to that cupboard and they need food," said United Way Executive Director Elizabeth Monaco. "Sometimes we have boxes of clothing too, or shoes, or blankets, or pillows. So we take donations of those things."

"We put those things out because we have a lot of people in need in our community. Some people are homeless, some people have lost their jobs. Some people have little kids or babies that they need help taking care of, and so that cupboard and those boxes on the porch are for people who need help," she added. "So this food is going to be really really helpful for those people."