TULSA WOMAN CREATES SAFE SPACE FOR TEEN GIRLS

A decade ago, Tulsan Premadonna Braddick organized the first Girls’ Teen Summit as a way to encourage local girls and prepare them to navigate life’s challenges. Since then, the Summit has grown into a movement that has reached approximately 2,000 young women across Oklahoma and the surrounding states. Braddick is looking for more funding to expand the program’s impact.

The 10th annual Girls’ Teen Summit is this week from June 2-4 at Tulsa Dream Center, 200 W. 46th St. N. Workshops are available for teen girls in 7th through 12th grades and their parents. Registration is free, but parents should register their teens in advance. Volunteers are welcome and can sign up here. 

Tell me about the origins of Girls’ Teen Summit.

First of all, I had no idea it would be sustained for 10 years, so praise be to God for that right there. We started at Rudisill Library in 2012 as a pilot program with McLain High School. Dr. Ebony Johnson was the principal, and I just am so appreciative to her even today of her partnering with my vision and saying, “Yes, you can have our girls for a day and just pour into them about one life skill.”

As I've mentioned before in past interviews with TulsaPeople, a lot of it started from me growing up in the foster care system, just feeling inadequate in so many different ways. I had a learning disability and a speech impediment. I just didn't feel like I belonged anywhere, coming from an abusive foster home and feeling rejected there. There was abuse in so many ways: verbal, physical, emotional abuse. I never wanted any teen girl to feel the way I felt. I always wanted to provide a safe space for teen girls. 

So sharing this vision with Dr. Johnson in 2012, we started off at Rudisill Library as a field trip for the teen girls. And we had like classes like Domestic Violence. And let me tell you, that class since 2012 has been everyone's favorite class. I'm so appreciative to Mahalia Watson who has been with me since the inception of Girls’ Teen Summit. For 10 years she's been rocking with me. She has a nonprofit called the Anti-Fist Project. She just gets real about domestic violence, and it really awakens the girls.

When did you move from Rudisill?

I was at Rudisill Library in 2012 and 2013. Then Pastor Tim (Newton) invited me to the Tulsa Dream Center. When (the Summit) went to the Dream Center, it just started growing. The difference is, when I relied on the schools, I could guarantee kids would come because who wouldn't want to take a field trip? But now I had to really step out in faith and trust they would actually come on a Saturday. I had such trepidation like, “Oh, God, will this really work?” To my surprise, we had close to 150 girls there. I'll never forget it. It was on a rainy day in March. Girls from OKC came, and then other girls just came. So that was 2014-2015.

Real Life, Real Talk became part of the whole brand of Girls’ Teen Summit. That was a monthly follow up with the girls. So we do that for a whole year, still pouring into the girls. We'll talk about mental health, drug abuse and different topics. We were able to now scale it down to a two-hour workshop where we can really delve in and talk about these different issues where we're just like kind of speeding through a little bit at the Summit — we are not able to really get into it. So we used 2015 at the time to say, “Hey, let's really take some time with these girls and talk to them and see where their minds and heads are.”

In 2015 we had our first disc golf tournament, our first fundraiser, and we raised over $5,000 or $6,000. I was really happy about that … People started taking notice of what we were doing. Then I stretched it (from a one-day conference) to two days because I was like, “We’ve got a lot of materials to share with these girls. We can't do it all in one day.” But I wanted to make it fun. I didn't want to seem like they were going to school on Saturday — college readiness, financial planning. I thought, I want some fun. So that's when we added elective classes. The girls can take a culinary class, fashion design, cosmetology, dance, acting, basketball. The girls loved it, they had a lot of fun. And we still had our other classes for career entrepreneurship, financial planning, and all that.

At some point you added parent workshops to the Summit.

One thing I've learned is that you can't just work with the youth. You have to try to incorporate the family to bring change into the family. I just believe in working with the whole family. I think it was in 2017 — I can't remember, I'm always adding and doing something — we added a parent workshop. And so in the parent workshop, we have people talking about better communication with your daughter, human sex trafficking awareness …

I have a parent whose daughter was trafficked at 14 years old, and (now) she’s 22 years old. This mom has just been beside herself. She's rescued her daughter several times. She said, “Premadonna, first of all, I want to thank you for what you're doing because there needs to be more preventative programs like what you're doing.” She said, “I raised my child in a very affluent home. I gave her the best of the best. I thought this happened to other people. But boy, was I wrong. And I wish I had the information then because I wouldn't be living this horror story.” She said, “What they don't tell you is (girls who are trafficked) often go back to their traffickers because they've been so conditioned to that. My daughter has returned to her traffickers so many times, and I've had to rescue her and rescue her. And the police do not see her as a victim because she's of age.” She has a lot of insight, so she's going to be speaking at the Summit, talking to the parents … That’s going to be on June 4. 

You also have a new scholarship fund.

My mother-in-law, who I called my mother-in-love, Dolores Nanie-Braddick, transitioned in February, and it broke my heart mainly because she has been my cheerleader, my biggest supporter, since the inception of Girls’ Teen Summit in 2012. She would drive all the way from Canada a week before my Summit and help with whatever I needed. She would put it on the calendar, and she said, “I'm not doing anything (else). This is where I'll be.” She just put a smile on those girls’ faces, gave them encouragement, just did a whole lot for the teen girls. And I did not want to say goodbye. … So our first Dolores Nanie-Braddick Girls’ Teen Summit Scholarship Fund is awarded to a graduating teen girl who attends the Summit all three full days. And then there's other criteria.

Tell me about some of the girls who have participated over the years.

By 2018 girls were graduating — girls who didn't think they were going to finish high school. I had one girl who was dyslexic, and her mom unfortunately told her, “You're not going to finish high school. You're not smart enough.” So she didn't think she was smart enough to finish high school. I started working with her in 2014. I said, “Listen, as long as you're part of my program, you will graduate from high school.” And she did in 2018. But check this out. Not only did she graduate from high school, she graduated salutatorian.

In 2018 one of my girls had a lot of issues and trauma. She said if it weren’t for Girls’ Teen Summit, she probably would have gone to jail because she was a “ticking time bomb.” I saw a lot of potential in her, but I also saw her straying a different direction. She had older sisters who were teen moms and there was just a lot of drama — that “baby daddy drama,” they say. I did not want that to become her story. So told her dad about this wonderful program (at Harvard University). At first he was hesitant, and (I said), “Listen, it may be far, but it's going to be great exposure for the rest of her life.” He agreed. He said, “You’ve been working with my baby since she was 12. I trust you.” I had her fill out the application. And not to my surprise, but to her surprise, she got accepted into Harvard University’s program for high school students. Students from all over the world, from China, from the Middle East, from Africa, from London, come to this program for high school students. And she had the opportunity to earn college credit and all As and has changed the trajectory of her life. She got excited and wanted to apply to Stanford (University, for college), and she got accepted.

One girl said she wanted to be 16 and pregnant when I was at McLain High School. She didn’t have a plan. She didn’t have an education. She just saw it around her. It looked like people are making it because that’s all she saw. And I said, “No, ma'am. That's not going to be your story.” She didn't tell me until later, but I saved her from being trafficked. She said the fact that I kept showing up helped her go a different direction in her life. Instead of her rocking a baby, she ended up rocking London Fashion Week as a model.

These stories just really touch me and keep me going because there were many times I felt like throwing in the towel.

Do you ever feel overwhelmed with the needs?

I have a strong, strong faith in God. And I do my times alone of self-care. I have to. I just spend some alone time and pray and play my worship music. That's what helps keep me going. Do I want people to help me? Absolutely. Sometimes people are not always available to be consistent. These girls need consistency in their lives. I did a radio interview with two of my girls this last week, and one thing they both said is that Ms. Premadonna was always consistent. She always showed up.

I've had people say, “Well, I want to help.” And I know their heart. They want to be there, but sometimes they're just unable to be consistent. And that's what these young ladies need. They need consistency in their lives, to know you're there because guess what? They test you. One girl tested me for two years. She wanted to see if I was really going to stay around. But she said, “Premadonna kept showing up. She never left. She kept showing up.”

You’re doing all of this with limited resources. Can you talk more about the challenges of finding funding?

When I first started a nonprofit, a lot of people tried to discourage me. But I was able to sustain myself. I uses some wise decisions and didn't overspend, and I'm still standing. I'm thankful to Onika Asamoa-Caesar with the George Kaiser Foundation. They gave us our largest grant, which was $20,000. And then we would get some grants from Zarrow (Foundation), like $5,000. Transformation Church has helped in the past, but we haven't received anything from them since 2021.

We write grants all the time, and we get denied. We always get the same thing: “Oh, we love your program. You're doing great job. But at this time that's not something we want to invest in.” That’s what makes me angry. You don't want to invest in stopping teen girls from making the wrong decisions? You’re putting all your money in for people who have already done that. I'm kind of shocked by that. … And I don't understand because I have a book (“The Cards of Life: Finding Your Winning Hand”), I have measurements, I have outcomes (to prove) this is really working.

Girls’ Teen Summit is a preventative program. For 10 years, we have saved girls from being trafficked. For 10 years, we have saved girls from being a victim of domestic violence. For 10 years, we have saved girls from being incarcerated. People who have been incarcerated, who've been on drugs — people are pouring money into that. Great. But what about pouring money into girls to let them know to dream with their eyes wide open, to let them know that does not have to be your path, just as it was not my path?

They said a person like me who aged out of foster care would either be incarcerated on drugs, just to name a few (things). I was able to beat those statistics. And that's why my whole mission is “rewrite your story.” I did not want statistics to write my story. No, I wanted to write what my story is going to look like, not what you think my story should look like.

What’s next for the Summit?

I was just the visionary of this, but there’s going to come a time when I’m going to have to pass the baton. (I tell the girls) “The Girls’ Teen Summit is for you guys, so you need to know how this has worked, how this is done. So I need more visibility from you.” So what that looks like is I have more panel discussions with the teens. I have teens co-facilitating mental health awareness, anti-bullying … They’re helping plan for the Summit. They’re doing event planning, they're making the phone calls. One of my girls said, “Ms. Pre, they don't never call back. I can’t keep doing this.” I said, “Sweetheart, if I had stopped you wouldn't have been in college.” And she said, “This is what you went through?” I said, “Welcome to the world of Girl’s Teen Summit.”