School District

School District’s Pomona Peer Resources program recently encouraged positive living, promoted college and career goals and motivated 250 eighth-, ninth- and 10thgrade female students to be own paths to success during the second annual Young Women’s Empowerment Conference.

“Conferences like this are critical for all students, in particular women,” said Roberta Espinoza, Pitzer College professor and morning keynote speaker. She also described what it was like growing up being told she was too poor to go to col lege and how she overcame those obstacles.

“This conference is an opportunity to learn, explore your passions are,” she told the students. “It’s time to start believing in yourselves and be proactive in being successful.”

Workshops on health Held at the Village at Indian Hill Conference & Technology Center, the event included 30 work shops focusing on healthy minds, bodies and souls.

The workshops included such topics as “Women in STEM,” “Financial Literacy,” “College Access,” “Drug and Alcohol Safety,” “Learning to Love Yourself” and “Your Body and You,” among others. The healthy souls workshops included “Identifying Healthy Relationships,” “Dealing with Grief,” “Standing up to Bullying,” “Immigrant Youth Issues” and more. All workshops helped guide female youths to examine issues of equity, access and achievement.

Pomona Catholic High School students also participated.

“Some high school students don’t take full advantage of their education,” said Garey High School senior and peer counselor Sara Vidrio. “But after this event, they learn the importance of it and want to make a change. When you’re getting advice from someone your own age, they listen to you, and I like helping them avoid going down a bad path.”

Pomona Peer Resources (PPR) is part of a comprehensive (academic, social, emotional and personal) approach to peer intervention.

Organized in April 1999, the action group draws from the rich 20-year peer intervention history at PUSD. PPR works with the District’s middle and high schools to provide more than 20 individual peer intervention programs, which include communitybased activities that address the issues and needs of PUSD’s adolescents.