We are happy to announce a BMBF-funded interdisciplinary research project aimed at empowering and mentoring girls* of color from the 10th grade onward.

This initiative, part of the BMBF's "Integration durch Bildung" funding measure, focuses on increasing educational participation and success in academic settings and psychosocial professions.

The project features a transdisciplinary approach, developing a diversity-sensitive, intersectional mentoring and empowerment program. This program will leverage psychological coaching to identify and activate student potential, integrate role models of color to showcase successful educational paths, and address barriers to educational participation.

A key innovation is the development of a participatory digital platform for context-sensitive storytelling. This platform will allow users to create and share audio-visual narratives, supported by research-led guidelines and machine learning models. Our team is responsible for developing this platform for digital storytelling, informed by research in mental health, psychosocial fields, and intersectional discrimination. We leverage new AI technologies and study the effects of LLMs on narratives in the context of empowerment and intersectional discrimination.

The project is a collaboration between Freie Universität Berlin's Department of Education and Psychology, the Sozialpädagogisches Institut Berlin (SPI), and runs from September 2024 to August 2027.