By Rebecca Goldfine,Staff Writer

NORWAY – You are awesome just the way you are.

That might be the motto of the Norway Summer Program for Girls.

The program has its share of regular summer camp fodder – art projects, field trips, impromptu dancing with a lot of giggling – but it’s flavored with a dose of personal talk.

“This is all about you,” the program coordinator, Jeanie Stone, said recently to a small group of attentive girls sitting around a table at the Norway town office. “This is about discovering who you are as a person.”

The girls were all different – one had dyed strawberry-red hair, another had her long hair kept back with a bandanna. Some wore baggy T-shirts, others were in tank-tops and shorts. A few girls appeared uncertain and uncomfortable, speaking up rarely, while others raised their hands more often, eager for the chance to say something about themselves.

For the last four years, Stone has been running the Norway summer program, a five-week course designed to help girls in fifth through ninth grades who might benefit from a little extra attention.

All the girls attending the program had been signaled out by school guidance counselors as students appropriate for the free program.

“My goal is their self-esteem will be raised,” Stone said, who is also the school-based educator for the Rape Education and Access Crisis Hotline. “That they’ll be able to make healthy choices in their lives, including everything about their health, everything. That they walk away feeling hopeful and good about who they are as human beings.”

Stone said the program came about after Main Street was vandalized five years ago by young people – both girls and boys. A group of citizens met to discuss the issue, and Stone offered to run a summer session to help these kids, who were considered to be at-risk for possible future problems. Stone, a former owner of a children’s clothing shop, organized activities where the children interacted with Main Street business owners.

The program quickly became girls only, and since then, has crystallized into what it is today, a type of camp meant to instill self-respect and self-awareness.

“I think they live in a society where they’re getting these messages daily, to be thin and beautiful and sexual,” Stone said. “The idea of this program is to focus on themselves as individuals.”

Stone said the summer program costs about $4,000, with funding coming from donations to the town and the police department. The girls pay nothing to attend.

Jennifer Pirella, 15, said she has come back every summer for four years – her choice, she added.

“It’s helped me be more courageous, to be open to others,” she said. “It’s made me feel like I was part of the community.” She said she finds it easier now to meet others.

Another long-timer, Tiffani Mitchell, 12, said she has changed since attending the program for the first time three years ago.

“I used to be worry about being a Barbie doll,” she said. “And wearing the right clothes. It’s teaching me to be myself and not worry about what others think about me.”

She continued, “When people hear about it being a girl program, they probably think they sit around and do girly stuff, but it really helps you.”

Stone said she brings in positive role-models, from nurses to artists, to work with the girls. Stone is assisted by a University of Maine Farmington education major who teaches about health and fitness, as well.

On the first day, the girls filled out a questionnaire asking for information, like what makes them proud, fearful, or embarrassed, and what they think their best character traits were. They then voluntarily shared their responses.

On the second day – the program runs three days a week, in the morning for the younger girls, in the afternoon for the older ones – artist Sarah Shepley came in to have the girls paint self-portrait mandalas.

Shepley, a bookmaker from Paris, said she works with young girls and art to nurture self-images unique to each individual. “We’re here to explain who we are inside, apart from the media images,” she said to the girls.

Or, as Stone had said more than once “We are who we are, and that’s great. You are awesome the way you are. Remember that.”