Beginning its 11th year, Shine On! is a unique program of SUNY Plattsburgh designed to combat negative mental health behaviors among pre-teen girls by increasing self-esteem, confidence, and resiliency in young girls, before they face societal pressures of middle school. It blends higher education with character education and civic engagement through an applied learning approach. Shine On! consists of three components:

The heart of the program features a free, overnight conference on the Plattsburgh campus attended by 200 girls in grades three through five from Plattsburgh and surrounding areas. The girls attend workshops on media and marketing literacy, character strengths and communication skills from trained college mentors and community professionals. Girls build resiliency, character, and confidence to help them make better choices regarding materialism and peer pressure, social media use, choosing kindness, upstander/bystander, resisting self-destructive behaviors, appreciating differences and more.

Shine On! serves a critical need in rural northern New York. According to the Clinton County Health Department, up to 24 percent of adolescent females suffer from self-destructive mental-health disorders, such as eating disorders, self-mutilation early pregnancy and addiction. The program is also thoroughly integrated with a year-long, credit-bearing applied-service learning course at SUNY Plattsburgh. Through the course, students receive hands-on experience in marketing, public relations, grant writing, fundraising, and special event planning.

The second component is a school outreach program. Through a series of semester-long workshops held at North Country elementary and middle schools, college women take the lessons of Shine On! on the road. In 2018, the NYS Dept. of Education issued a K-12 mandate for students to receive instruction in social-emotional learning and mental health education, as part of overall health and wellness. This new mandate includes promoting positive mental health through an increased sense of self-esteem and self-confidence, which aligns perfectly with the mission of Shine On! As a result, educators in local schools are utilizing our program to help meet these new requirements.

The third component is a series of workshops geared toward parents and guardians to assist in raising resilient girls. Workshops are researched, created and taught by SUNY college women and community professionals.

The Shine On! program is a wonderful example of how civic engagement and academic service learning can combine to meet community needs and provide college students with countless examples of experiential learning. Shine On! is ready to expand throughout the SUNY system.