Club Overview: Girls With Melanin

Dorothea Watson, junior, has always been an ambitious person, and hasn’t let the Coronavirus pandemic slow her down.

Watson founded her own club at HHS over the summer. “Girls With Melanin” was created with the intention of giving girls of color at HHS a place to talk about their shared experiences, problems, or just to bond.

“Girls of color needed a safe space to come together and talk about hardships that we deal with,” Watson said. “People who don’t look like us can’t understand. It’s not separated by Black, Latina, or anything — all girls of color are welcome.”

Girls With Melanin holds weekly virtual meetings to bond and discuss various topics. Despite the club being created during a pandemic, she’s had a good turnout each time, but doesn’t need big numbers to be satisfied.

“I’m always happy when like 10 people show up,” Watson said. “I love hearing why they join. Talking with all of them really warms my heart. It really feels like a sisterhood.”

That’s not all she’s been up to, as Watson is also a member of the HHS Student Council. Just like her club, the Student Council has also been doing weekly virtual meetings.

Student Council, shortened to StudCo by members, has done their best at keeping kids connected with HHS. So far, they’ve had to get creative, organizing drive-in movies, Instagram games, and football watch parties, which were limited to 250 masked attendees.

“We’ve [Student Council] been trying to find a balance between being fun and engaging, but also being safe,” Watson said.

She’s been in the Student Council since her sophomore year, when she was involved in another HHS club, Girls United, before she founded Girls With Melanin.

Watson said Girls United subconsciously influenced her to create Girls With Melanin, but that it wasn’t really what she was thinking about when she departed from Girls United to create Girls With Melanin.

“In the back of my mind, it [Girls United] did influence my reasoning,” Watson said.

However, Watson’s reasoning and decision to create Girls With Melanin was because she felt it was a necessary addition to HHS. 

“It’s really all just about girls of color at Hopkins coming together to connect and be heard,” Watson said.