Kelly talks to Jenny Raymond from the Harnish Foundation and Julie Dumais Osborne from The Second City Training Center to talk about a new partnership that offers free improv-based leadership training for girls in grades 3 through 8 in Chicago called Funny Girls. The best part: IT’S FREE! For more information or to sign up your school, go here: https://thehf.org/funny-girls/secondcity/ 

Jenny, what got the Harnish Foundation into leadership training for girls using improvisation?

“One of our areas of primary philanthropic investment has been women’s leadership. And we’ve supported thousands of women and lots of different cohorts and programs. And the women were always like: ‘This cohort’s amazing. This program is fantastic. And I wish we’d done something earlier.’ So, we decided to do something about that kink in the pipeline. And we developed Funny Girls, which, as you said, is a program that teaches leadership skills through improv comedy to girls from third to eighth grade.” 

Julie, how does The Second City Training Center fit into this partnership? 

“So, the feminist roots of the Second City really align beautifully with Funny Girls. Viola Spolin used the techniques of improvisation to facilitate play between children, immigrant children at Hull House in Chicago, working with Neva Boyd back before Second City existed. These folks did not have shared language, but the language of play is universal, and through that play, they foster connection and confidence, discovery, and communication. And that’s something we still do now through classes for all skill levels, all ages, anywhere in the world really with the virtual training center.” 

Can you talk about the problem you are trying to solve with this program? 

 “Well, how much time do you have? I love talking about Funny Girls. I guess I’ll back up just by saying there is very well-documented research around the drop in confidence in girls. This confidence gap shows up between third and eighth grade. So about 8 years old to about 13 or 14, girls who are full of vim and vigor at 8 slowly start to winnow towards twindom. They stop raising their hands in class; they’re not participating as much; there is increased risk aversion; the whole fear of failure; and this pressure to be perfect. And so, our goal is to squash the confidence gap. And we’re like, how do you do that? And one way we think is cultivating a sense of voice and presence, right? Cue improv.”