An advocate of youth leadership training, Jacqui Irwin, former Mayor of Thousand Oaks and a remarkable California mentor to young adults, recently spoke to Melinda Crown on Girls in Power Radio. Jacqui is currently a member of the Thousand Oaks city council, and works with various youth outreach groups to try and provide positive opportunities for youth leadership training and empowerment through mentoring programs.

Jacqui, who formerly worked in engineering, is a member of the Thousand Oaks City Council, and manages to be a great mom to three kids at the same time. Having raised children in the area, she became aware of the need for youth empowerment opportunities and youth leadership training in the area. While she has previously worked with youth mentoring programs trying to prevent underage drinking and to educate parents, she is now turning her attention to creating positive opportunities for kids and teens to empower themselves!

Jacqui has contributed to the area’s Rotary Youth Leadership Awards, as well as setting up an internship program for High School students in the 11th grade. For 6 weeks, 25 students will work as interns in positions at companies around the Conejo Valley in order to learn leadership skills that can be applied to their future lives and careers. Jacqui is part of the push for the city of Thousand Oaks to invest in the youth that will build the future.

However, today’s youth face lots of difficulties in their lives, and girls especially have a hard time finding themselves and figuring out how to achieve their goals. Not everyone has the time or ability to attend a youth leadership training program. When asked how she found the courage to become empowered as a young girl, Jacqui told Melinda about her high school goal of creating a girl’s swim team. For weeks, Jacqui visited her principal daily in an attempt to convince him to create a girl’s swim team. Finally, he agreed! Swimming was a positive outlet for Jacqui as a teenager, and it gave her the courage and conviction to be persistent in her goal. She also became a leader for other girls who would not have had the opportunity to take part in the sport! The courage she developed from becoming a leader helped her to succeed in the male dominated field of engineering, and to later tackle the field of local politics.

As a teen, it can be difficult to understand what goals you can start to achieve. A great way for girls to feel empowered is to give them an avenue to develop their leadership skills and goals. Jacqui and Melinda are both great examples of empowerment for girls. Having the courage to take on leadership and achieve your goals can sometimes be difficult. A great way to move forward is to have a positive outlet. For Jacqui, it was sports. For Melinda, setting up Girls in Power and designing workshops for girls continues to be a positive outlet for her and for many other volunteer mentors.

Finding something that inspires you outside of your responsibilities at school or at home not only gives you something to do to relax and have fun, but can also give you an opportunity to learn leadership skills and to become empowered. If you have a passion, make it happen! From art to sports to volunteer work, a positive outlet can lead you to create goals you would have never dreamed of, and allow you to share the passion that stems from these goals with others with youth leadership training in mind.

If you would like to listen to Melinda interviewing Jacqui Irwin, or to find out more about the youth leadership training opportunities Jacqui has helped create in the city of Thousand Oaks, check out the GIP radio show below!

Get more information on Workshops HERE

Download a FREE 55 Minute Audio Preview of Melinda’s book “Empower Your Girl” Here

Visit Melinda’s Empower Your Girl Blog HERE

Check out Melinda’s TV interview on the Get Moving TV Show HERE

“We feel it is much easier to empower a youth than it is to repair an adult” ~ Melinda Rae