What Parents Need To Know

Science Club for Girls will definitely not do any harm to your wallet! "Why?" you ask. The clubs are free and open to all girls in grades K-8 throughout the Boston area. Girls in the 7th - 12th grades may work as Junior Mentors in the Club. Those in Cambridge stay until about 5pm once a week to participate in the Career Exploration, Leadership and Life Skills (CELLS) program. Junior Mentors receive a small stipend for their work.

Where and when do the Clubs take place?

Our clubs take place in public schools, community centers and churches in Cambridge, Boston, Lawrence and Newton after school and on Saturdays. See the Sites page for details.

Enrolling your daughter

We encourage parents to complete the registration form in a timely fashion to ensure that you daughter is enrolled before the first day of clubs. ALL Registration Forms must be received by Wednesday, September 24th. Forms received after this date may cause your daughter to miss the first day of clubs, which we strongly discourage.

To register for our programsCLICK HERE
Once completed, follow directions on the form to turn in at your daughter's SCFG site or mail the form directly to Science Club for Girls for processing. You will receive phone and email confirmation that your daughter is fully enrolled in Science Club for Girls.

If your daughter is in the 7th - 12th grades: Girls in 7th grade are eligible to work as Junior Mentor in Training (JMITs), while girls in 8-12th grades are eligible to work as Junior Mentor (JMs). Both of these programs also start after school and JM/JMITs stay another 30-60 minutes. Furthermore, they receive a small stipend for their work. Each girl who desires to participate as a JMIT or JM is required to fill out a contract and job requirement understanding.

Parents' Obligations

If you decide to have your daughter participate in the Club, please make sure she arrives and is picked up on time. In addition, it is absolutely fine if your daughter also participates in Extended Day or After School programs, but please be sure to let us know so we can coordinate with the appropriate program.

Please be sure that your child understands that, during the Clubs, her science club volunteer-mentors are in charge. This means that she must stay with the group in the classroom and follow all directions and guidelines.

Snacks

At our Cambridge sites, we ask each family to provide a snack for their daughter's class for at least one week. We suggest that this includes juice and munchies for about 8-10 girls. We provide cups and napkins. Please be sure to sign up for a snack day when you pick up your daughter. The Junior Mentors in your daughter's Club will sign you up for a specific week to bring snacks. If providing snacks is a hardship, please let us know and we will make appropriate arrangements. It's important that your daughter be able to join us.

Donations

As a parent-founded, free afterschool program we are dependent upon the support of donations to thrive and grow. Science Clubs for Girls is a 501(c)3 organization; therefore any contribution is tax deductible. You may also write checks and make money orders payable to "Science Club for Girls." You can also make an online donation. We appreciate donations of all sizes, but would really welcome a recurring donation of $10 or more per month! Thank you!

Parent Involvement

We would love to have parents more involved in the Clubs. If you would like to help out by being a parent-volunteer or to join any committees, please contact our Program Director, Karen O'Neill.

Although we welcome parents to volunteer for the Clubs, we do not usually place parents as mentors in their daughter's club. While we encourage parental participation, we have found that if parents stay in their daughter's club, their daughters have less interaction and teamwork with other club members.

Thank you for your interest and we hope that we will be hearing from you soon!