Me Project Promotes Girl Power At Hillhouse

Sharon Bradford-Fleming’s own high school pregnancy inspired her to support teen parents in her retirement. ​“There is a stigma still attached to teen pregnancy,” said Bradford-Fleming.

“A lot of kids can’t talk to their parents.” So Bradford-Fleming fills the void. She meets young adults on their own turf, or court in the case of the Me Project — an event that took place at Hillhouse High School on Thursday.

In the school’s gymnasium, 14 vendors, including Bradford-Fleming, lined the perimeter. Pink balloons and tablecloths covered the basketball court. In celebration of Women’s History Month, the Me Project converted the gym into a space for girlhood empowerment. 

Organized by Hillhouse Parent Liaison Brittiny Johnson, speakers at the event spoke honestly about the occasional blurry boundaries between student-life and parenting and how to navigate challenges in both spheres. 

As a social worker and program coordinator, Bradford-Fleming works for New Haven Public Schools’ (NHPS) Support for Pregnant & Parenting Teens Program. The organization offers teens access to childcare, parenting and reproductive education, and healthcare resources. A major goal of the program is to increase school retention and completion rates in the city’s public school district. She informed students at Hillhouse on Thursday, ​“If they’ve had a miscarriage or are deciding whether they want to have the child or not, we also provide counseling services from the time they enter high school until they graduate.” 

Johnson founded the Me Project to help young girls rebound from hardship. She, herself, had a stroke three and a half years ago and needed to rebuild her self-confidence. ​“It wholeheartedly makes me feel great knowing that I am putting things in place for women, for girls, to feel the way I’ve learned to feel.” 

Johnson liaises between students and their parents, but she also works with students who are parents. ​“They don’t know how to show up for themselves,” said Johnson. She gives them space in her office to talk, cry, or journal silently. ​“I always want them to be able to let it out.”

And Johnson, though an adult, is also a full-time student and mother. She currently attends Gateway Community College with the goal of becoming a school administrator. 

Similarly, Hillhouse ​‘06 alum and Me Project Keynote Speaker Twonisha Wright started her nursing journey alongside her parenting journey. She worked as a certified nurse and then as a registered nurse and then got a masters degree, all while caring for two young children. Now as a family nurse practitioner, Wright wanted to share her story to inspire Hillhouse students to persevere in the face of adversity. 

Brenda Zecua, a junior at Hillhouse, enjoyed Thursday’s conference, not only because she won a facemask kit during the raffle. She said, ​“I think it has changed me in a positive way because I’m going to be working more on myself.”

Though Johnson created this event to help young girls follow their aspirations, the Me Project also forwarded Johnson’s own ambitions. ​“I put on events all the time, but I put on events for different people and for different courses at Hillhouse,” said Johnson. This event, however, was the first one she got to imagine entirely on her own. Synthesizing the day, Johnson said, ​“It’s a mix of women dressed in pink teaching you how to love yourself.”