Lipscomb University hosted Volunteer Girl State (VGS) for the second year, and hopefully not the last. For the past 59 years, VGS was held at MTSU, but LU hosted the 2010 session. That session was deemed so successful that the VGS returned this year.Kathy Issaacson, Co-Director of VGS, is uncertain about whether next year’s session will be held at Lipscomb, but she says it is definitely a possibility.
“We certainly enjoy it and we have been more than happy with all the accommodations here at Lipscomb,” says Issaacson. “We really appreciate the intimacy of the campus, its smallness, and its beauty and we think it really adds to the Girl State experience.”
Wrenne Bartlett, a junior from Brentwood says she loves everything about Lipscomb and has enjoyed having Girl State here, even with all the cicadas.
“You get around them… you avoid them,” laughs Bartlett. “You learn just to step around them or kinda wack them out of your face and get over them the best you can.”
VGS is a one-week program offered to young women who are rising high school seniors. Girls from high schools all over Tennessee spend the week learning about state government, citizenship and how they can positively affect their communities by forming and running a mock government.
Jordan Jowers, a junior from Lexington, TN, explains that all 550 girls or “citizens” are divided into two political parties and 12 cities to help them learn about government.
“We get to elect mayors, a governor, and a Supreme Court, and we just go through all the roles of government,” says Jowers. “We develop a respect for politics and government in the state of Tennessee and all over the nation.”
Delegates had the opportunity to listen, learn, and meet several distinguished speakers throughout the week. The Speakers for 2011 LAA VGS included Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam, Master Sergeant Regina Coonrod, former Major Kathy Isaacson, Cathryn Rolfe and Amy Piper.
Even though VGS requires a lot of hard work and seriousness, VGS still makes learning fun for the delegates by including activities like “Fast Song” and the “Olympics.” Both of these activities require creativity and teamwork- helping the girls to bond with one another.
“My favorite part was the Olympics, it was so much fun,” says Bartlett. “Our whole city came together and got to cheer each other on and just have fun and dance and sing; I’ve made a lot of friends!”
Tennessee’s Girl State is unique. All the staff and councilors are former delegates; even VGS Chairwoman Julia Wells came as a former delegate from her high school back in the 1950s.
“Where many Girl States struggle to get councilors, we have people beating down the door to be part of our program and we think that is what makes us very strong,” says Co-Director Kathy Isaacson.
The councilors all agree that VGS changed their lives and helped transform them into more courageous and passionate women. Natasha Zivanovic, a councilor from Knoxville, TN was a delegate back in 2006.
“I developed this drive from Girl State and it stayed,” says Zivanovic. “When I got to UT, I used what I had learned from Girl State in college.”
Isaacson believes that Girls State is something that is not only educational, but supremely rewarding.
“It’s more than a citizenship program, it’s a journey of self-discovery,” says Isaacson. “We try to impart girls to push themselves a bit farther… that there is a lot they themselves, even as young women can do now to impact their communities. We try to empower them to return home with that spirit of citizen involvement.”