What is Girls Belong Here?

Girls Belong Here is Plan International Canada’s youth leadership initiative for girls, young women, and gender-diverse youth ages 14 to 24. It connects young people with leaders, workplaces, and decision-making spaces where they can share their perspectives, build skills, and grow their confidence.

How long has Girls Belong Here been running?

In 2026, Girls Belong Here is celebrating 10 years of creating opportunities for young people across Canada. Over the past decade, more than 300 participants have taken part in leadership experiences through the program.

What do participants do through Girls Belong Here?

Participants step into spaces such as boardrooms, legislatures, innovation hubs, and workplaces. They are paired with CEOs, government officials, and senior leaders, where they exchange ideas, learn from mentors, and see leadership up close.

How does Girls Belong Here support youth empowerment?

The program helps young people overcome barriers such as self-doubt, accessibility challenges, and imposter syndrome. By giving participants access to decision-making spaces, it helps them see that their voices, ideas, and experiences belong there.

How does Girls Belong Here benefit leaders and organizations?

Participating in Girls Belong Here gives organizations and their leaders the chance to learn directly from young people. These exchanges have proved to challenge assumptions, broaden perspectives, and encourage more inclusive approaches to leadership.

Girls Belong Everywhere: 10 Years of Youth Mentorship and Women’s Empowerment in Canada

What you need to know

More than 300 girls and youth have participated in Girls Belong Here over the past 10 years.
The program gives young people direct access to leaders, workplaces, and decision-making spaces.
Participants describe overcoming barriers such as self-doubt, accessibility challenges, and imposter syndrome as they advocate for girls’ rights.
Their stories show that when young people are trusted, they develop confidence, expand their perspectives, and discover that they belong.

Ten years ago, Girls Belong Here began with a simple idea: What happens when young people are invited into rooms where decisions are made?

The last decade has shown us exactly what happens when doors of boardrooms, legislatures, and workplaces are swung open to youth across Canada. It produces a new generation who may enter those spaces first as visitors, but emerge as young leaders ready to shape the future and advocate for girls’ rights. And everyone benefits.

On the 10-year anniversary of the program, we’re looking back and celebrating 10 Girls Belong Here partners and youth alumni.

Catherine McKenna: “Do things your own way”

Catherine McKenna has experience breaking barriers. As the former Minister of Environment and Climate Change, she knows first-hand how difficult it can be to find your footing as a young person.

“It is incumbent on current leaders and organizations to help young people get those opportunities and help them get their second and third and fourth job,” she says.

As one of the first leaders to sign on for the inaugural Girls Belong Here cohort in 2016, she saw how the program provides access to opportunities, networks, and experiences that help girls grow their leadership skills.

McKenna, who is also an author and climate advocate, has some advice for those afraid to be themselves: Don’t be.

“Run like a girl. Do things your own way. Have confidence and believe in yourself. You don’t have to be quiet,” she says.

It’s a lesson she wishes every young woman could hear in the fight for girls’ rights and one she hopes they carry with them as they step into all the rooms where they belong.

A woman speaks at a podium with a microphone beside a Canadian flag. She is wearing a dark blazer over a patterned top and is addressing an audience in an indoor setting — For Catherine McKenna, leadership is about learning, adapting, and taking on new challenges. She brought that message to Girls Belong Here participants across Canada.

Mentorship provides encouragement to keep going

A portrait of a woman standing outside in a light cream-coloured sweater with long braided hair taken in natural sunlight, with trees and a blurred park in the background. — Grace Ayoo is a medical student at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ont., and a former Girls Belong Here participant.

When Grace Ayoo graduated from university in 2020, she wanted to become a doctor. But when she applied to medical school, she didn’t get in.

It would have been easy for her to see that rejection as a sign to stop trying. Instead, she started looking for opportunities that would challenge her, build her confidence, and help her see what else was possible. One of those opportunities was joining Girls Belong Here.

Through the program, Grace spent a day alongside Gary Wade, president of Unilever Canada, participating in conversations and stepping into leadership spaces she had never imagined herself entering.

“What surprised me most was realizing that leaders are regular people too,” she says. “When you get there, you realize you are just as capable as they are if you’re willing to put in the work.”

During their day together, Grace learned that every leader faces setbacks, but the key is to keep trying. She applied to medical school again.

Today, Grace is a medical student at Queen's University in Kingston, Ont..

Grace’s story is one of more than 300 journeys that began with a simple idea: that young people belong wherever decisions are being made.

Gary Wade has been the president of Unilever Canada since 2017, which was also the first year the organization participated in Girls Belong Here. The partnership continues this year.

For Gary, every Girls Belong Here participant who has walked through Unilever’s doors over the past decade has reinforced a simple idea: Leadership can come from anywhere.

The first year he was president of Unilever, in 2017, was also the first year the organization partnered with Girls Belong Here – a relationship that continues today.

As a longtime champion of gender-parity initiatives such as HeForShe, a global movement created by UN Women, to engage men and boys as proponents of gender equality, Gary sees participating in Girls Belong Here as a natural fit with his leadership style.

“It’s really important that leaders give people an opportunity to see what is possible,” he says. “And it’s important for men to understand what challenges women face.”

Nine years later, Unilever remains one of Plan Canada’s longest-standing partners through Girls Belong Here as well as multi-year initiatives such as The Power Within.

Youth empowerment and innovation begin with inclusion

A woman with long light brown hair wearing a floral dress sits in a powered wheelchair. — Disability advocate Marya Bangash says participating in a Girls Belong Here Innovation Hub helped build her confidence and open doors to global leadership opportunities.

One of the most powerful outcomes of youth programming like Girls Belong Here is helping young people gain access to spaces they may never have imagined being in.

For disability advocate Marya Bangash, Girls Belong Here became a pathway to global leadership opportunities.

Marya helps others understand the barriers that people with disabilities face in public life and when accessing education and health care. She has spoken at community centres, schools and universities across Canada to help educate people on how to remove barriers for people with disabilities.

Despite her accomplishments, Marya still struggles with imposter syndrome. Many of the advocates she worked alongside had travelled internationally and spoken on global stages.

“I didn’t think it was possible,” she says, “because I’ve never seen people like me get to these places.”

Through Girls Belong Here, her mindset began to change. The program opened doors to opportunities she had never imagined.

In 2021, she was selected to join an international youth cohort at the United Nations’ Summit of the Future in New York. On a global stage, she shared her lived experiences and championed disability inclusion, bringing an important perspective to conversations about the future.

Gaby Bourbara, president of AstraZeneca Canada, has invited youth into the organization for three innovation hubs to get their unique perspectives. He also partnered with Plan Canada to create the Eureka Fellowship to help youth develop leadership skills as global citizens.

Navigating those spaces as a wheelchair user required thoughtful planning and accommodations, but Marya knew it would help create a path for future participants like her.

Before taking her advocacy to the global stage, Marya had participated in Girls Belong Here’s first in-person Innovation Hub, hosted by AstraZeneca Canada. Innovation Hubs bring together groups of youth to speak directly to leaders on key issues facing their organization. The experience helped Marya build her confidence and expand her network, and it demonstrated AstraZeneca Canada’s commitment to inclusive leadership.

As president of AstraZeneca Canada, Gaby Bourbara spends a lot of time thinking about the future and believes that different viewpoints help the company challenge assumptions and drive new ideas.

“Simply put, diverse teams bring different perspectives, solve problems better, and accelerate innovation,” he says.

That belief helped spark AstraZeneca's multi-year partnership with Plan International Canada, which started with Girls Belong Here and led to the development of the Eureka Fellowship. The fellowship helps support young leaders working across Canada to address issues such as health equity, climate action, community well-being, and social inequalities.

Creating space for young women to lead

A portrait of a young woman wearing a black blazer over a red shirt. She is standing indoors against a softly blurred office background, facing the camera. — Charlotte Peng is a law student and former Girls Belong Here participant.

Marci Ien is the former Minister for Women and Gender Equality and Youth and a youth leadership advocate.

In 2023, Charlotte Peng had the opportunity to attend the Women Deliver conference in Rwanda alongside Marci Ien, then the Minister for Women and Gender Equality and Youth. Watching the minister engage with youth leaders from around the world showed Charlotte what inclusive leadership looks like.

As a young woman and visible minority entering the legal profession, Charlotte encountered many barriers. It didn’t help when even her peers called her a “diversity hire” after she was selected for a coveted articling position at a prestigious law firm. But she didn’t allow the naysayers to hold her back.

“Now, as I reflect on my time at the firm and the contributions I have made to client matters and our office culture, I know that I belong in this space. Not because I check a box, but because I am intelligent, capable and have earned my place at the table.”

Charlotte credits Girls Belong Here for teaching her the soft skills she relies on today.

For Marci, mentorship success isn’t just about encouraging young people to knock on doors. It’s about opening those doors for them. That belief drew her to partner with Girls Belong Here.

“I know how it felt not to have anybody,” says the former minister and television broadcaster. “So I thought I could show young women out there what’s possible when you push.”

Learning across differences

Talah Hasanni is a medical student who participated in Girls Belong Here in 2025.

Strong mentorship is not about agreeing on everything. It is about creating opportunities to ask questions, challenge assumptions and learn from different perspectives.

Jeff Lawson, executive vice president for corporate development and chief sustainability officer at Cenovus Energy, believes that the strongest organizations aren’t the ones with all the answers. They’re the ones willing to listen, learn, and evolve. That’s what drew him to Girls Belong Here.

What stands out most to Jeff isn’t a single moment over the years that Cenovus has participated in the program but the young people themselves. “They asked insightful questions and shared perspectives grounded in both optimism and realism,” he says. “Their willingness to question things they didn’t know was refreshing.”

He strongly believes in investing in women’s leadership initiatives. One of those investments was spending a day at Cenovus' offices in Alberta with Girls Belong Here participant Talah Hasanni.

Going into the experience, Talah admits she had strong assumptions about the oil and gas industry and the scope of the sustainability practices within the industry. But her candid conversations with Jeff challenged her perceptions and showed her the value of approaching difficult conversations with curiosity rather than judgment.

“I think about [Jeff] on a weekly basis,” she says. “He answered every question I had and completely changed my perspective.”

Jeff encouraged Talah to share her assumptions, and she says he addressed them in a non-judgmental manner, with fact-based evidence. Talah came away from the conversation with a nuanced understanding of the company’s sustainability efforts – and she has since shared her knowledge of those efforts with peers and friends.

Talah has carried her Girls Belong Here experience into her own advocacy work, knowing that meaningful change starts with curiosity.

From youth participant to leader

For Aiza Abid, her involvement with the Girls Belong Here program was never intended to be just a one-day commitment. She had always been an advocate for girls’ rights and wanted a career that would allow her to pursue this passion.

In 2017, she joined Plan Canada’s youth programs. Today, she is an integral member of the youth team at Plan, helping create the same opportunities that once inspired her.

What does she tell the young people she works with as a youth engagement manager? “Trust that you belong, even when the room wasn’t built with you in mind,” she says.

These stories from Girls Belong Here youth participants and partners remind us that leadership and advocacy start long before one has an official title or position. It starts with opportunity, curiosity, and the confidence to take up space. After 10 years, Girls Belong Here continues to help young people do just that.

Two young women walk through a busy office workspace during a Girls Belong Here placement. — Aiza Abid's Girls Belong Here experience with senior leadership at the Royal Bank of Canada helped her see new possibilities for her future and build confidence in her voice. Years later, she carries those lessons forward in her career and leadership journey.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

1. What is Girls Belong Here?: Girls Belong Here is Plan International Canada’s youth leadership initiative for girls, young women, and gender-diverse youth ages 14 to 24. It connects young people with leaders, workplaces, and decision-making spaces where they can share their perspectives, build skills, and grow their confidence.
2. How long has Girls Belong Here been running?: In 2026, Girls Belong Here is celebrating 10 years of creating opportunities for young people across Canada. Over the past decade, more than 300 participants have taken part in leadership experiences through the program.
3. What do participants do through Girls Belong Here?: Participants step into spaces such as boardrooms, legislatures, innovation hubs, and workplaces. They are paired with CEOs, government officials, and senior leaders, where they exchange ideas, learn from mentors, and see leadership up close.
4. How does Girls Belong Here support youth empowerment?: The program helps young people overcome barriers such as self-doubt, accessibility challenges, and imposter syndrome. By giving participants access to decision-making spaces, it helps them see that their voices, ideas, and experiences belong there.
5. How does Girls Belong Here benefit leaders and organizations?: Participating in Girls Belong Here gives organizations and their leaders the chance to learn directly from young people. These exchanges have proved to challenge assumptions, broaden perspectives, and encourage more inclusive approaches to leadership.

The impact of Girls Belong Here, 10 years later

In a recent survey of Girls Belong Here alumni across Canada:

100% say the program helped them grow their confidence and see themselves as leaders.
95% say it strengthened their advocacy and deepened their understanding of global issues affecting girls.
90% say it expanded their networks, strengthened their connection to Plan’s mission, and inspired them to continue advocating for girls’ rights.
85% say it increased their readiness for leadership, jobs, and future opportunities.
100% still draw on the skills, confidence, and connections they built through the program, even years later.
75% say they now mentor other young people.
70% say the program helped them be confident about speaking at events or on panels.

For Anjum Sultana, Plan Canada’s director of policy, advocacy, partnerships, and youth leadership, Girls Belong Here’s greatest accomplishment is not the more than 100 partners it has engaged over the past decade but the young people who have participated and gone on to do incredible things for girls’ rights.

“The advocacy doesn’t stop: This was the initial spark that got them activated in a lifelong mission to ensure that all girls, no matter who they are and where they live in the world, can succeed,” she says.

Sultana says Girls Belong Here alumni have gone on to influence national and global policymaking and to advocate for issues such as refugee rights, climate action, girls’ rights, global education, and inclusive health care for all.

“Imagine being in high school and then experiencing being a federal cabinet minister for a day,” she says. “It completely changes the trajectory of what you believe you can be.”