Arts, Culture & Fun Film Series: "A Girl's Life"

Join Queens Arts, Culture & Fun for a PBS Women's Empowerment series with film screenings from Emmy award-winning Community Cinema.

A Girl’s Life
Girls growing up in America today have more opportunities than their mothers and grandmothers ever imagined. They do well in school; by fifth grade they’re equal to boys in math and science, and they’re significantly better at reading and writing. They have more career choices, more flexibility in family roles and more female role models in positions of political power. But even as doors open, girls may not be able to walk confidently through them. When they get to middle school, girls’s self-esteem plunges. Twice as many girls as boys attempt suicide. Twice as many show signs of depression. Girls have a higher risk of abusing alcohol and drugs, and violent physical assaults by girls have skyrocketed since 1990. Rachel Simmons has been studying girls’s relationships, behavior and psychology for more than a decade. In A Girl’s Life, Simmons goes back into the field to introduce audiences to four typical teenage American girls. The girls tell their own deeply personal tales of dealing with issues like cyber-bullying, body image and violence. Simmons also interviews parents, psychologists, teachers, and social workers. As viewers trace the thorny new challenges girls face, the girls themselves reveal an inspiring supply of strength, energy, smarts and support for each other. With courage and determination, these girls reveal their hopes and dreams for a powerful future.