Access the 2020 Issue Brief:
Girls and Gender Expansive Youth and COVID-19
The Girls and Gender-Expansive Young People at The Margin
G@TM uses the term “marginalized” not to describe girls and gender-expansive young people, but to call attention to their treatment by decision makers, communities, families, and the systems charged with their care. Many are survivors of child sexual, physical, and emotional abuse and/or persistent neglect; many grow up in homes marked by domestic violence and other forms of childhood adversity. These challenges persist as they continue to experience violence, including becoming victims of sex trafficking. Many live in poverty as young adults, and many are young mothers with limited resources. As a result of childhood trauma, these young people may also become involved in foster care, juvenile justice, mental health, and multiple other systems, where they are often denied safe and supportive services appropriate to their needs. They are disproportionately young women and gender-expansive youth of color, identify as LGBQ, and/or are girls with disabilities.
Who We Are
Girls @ the Margin National Alliance (G@TM) is a connector of, and resource for, local, state, and national organizations and advocates working across sectors and systems to address root causes of the complex issues confronting marginalized girls, young women, and gender expansive youth.
What We Do
G@TM provides resources, support and connection to advocates, service providers and others working to center the wellbeing of girls and gender-expansive youth. Learn more about how to engage with us.
Girls at the margin need systems, services, and programs that are
gender and culturally-responsive, trauma-informed, strengths-based, and developmentally appropriate
The History
G@TM was founded in 2010 by National Crittenton and Rights4Girls, and has been led by a steering committee that includes the National Women’s Law Center, Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality, and Girls Inc.
In 2021, G@TM began a strategic planning process to assess how the Alliance should evolve to be of the most benefit to young people. In the course of this process, it was decided to dissolve the steering committee to provide for flexibility in developing an infrastructure most impactful to support the evolving Alliance. Read the full statement from the steering committee here.
The Current Design Process
National Crittenton, as one of the G@TM founding organizations, is taking the lead on implementing a two-phase design process with the goal of developing a new vision for a youth-led, intersectional, cross-sector alliance of local, state, tribal and national advocates and stakeholders who will work together to eradicate the harms experienced by girls and gender-expansive youth.
Phase I includes information gathering to inform the vision for the Alliance, and Phase II focuses on the development and implementation of a design team that will create the strategy and infrastructure for how the Alliance will work most effectively and create the biggest impact. The design process will be guided by previously developed values for G@TM, linked here. These values are likely to change through lessons learned in the design process, but serve as a guiding post for the initial stages. The re-envisioned Alliance is anticipated to launch Fall-2022 with expanded ways for collective engagement and advocacy. During the re-envisioning process, G@TM continues to be active and welcomes those who would like resources, support and connection.