Five days before Christmas, several adolescent girls are gathered in a warehouse at Treehouse on 24th Avenue South, off Rainier Avenue.

They aren't gossiping on their cell phones, or watching TV, or sitting idly while their boyfriends play PlayStation. Instead, with school out, they are stocking shelves with games and Transformers and hanging new coats and other garments on racks.

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The scene looks like what most of us perceive as that of a non-profit organization -- holiday gifts for needy foster children.

But there's another organization at work here -- it's the girls themselves.

Each is a member of Powerful Voices, an organization started in 1995 to "address issues at their root, by instilling leadership skills, fostering the development of critical thinking, and promoting the individual potential in adolescent girls," says the group's mission statement.

On this day, the girls are giving back to grow.

"I never imagined myself doing community service," said Ressie Brown, a 13-year-old who attends Denny Middle School.

Brown soon will tutor seventh-graders for the WASL.

All because she needed something to do when classes ended each afternoon.

Her mother had heard of Powerful Voices and suggested Brown join the yearlong after-school "Girls RAP" program.

"I was like, 'I don't know how to rap,' " Brown said.

Turns out, it wasn't about stepping up to the mike. It's actually an abbreviation: Girls Respect! Action! Power!

The participants meet one-on-one with mentors and with girls from other public middle schools to -- well -- girl-talk. They do service projects and take field trips, listen to speakers and laugh.

"It's middle-school girl stuff," Brown said with a hearty laugh. "You want to be cool and popular and lose weight. But you're OK. I keep my head up high, and everyone is OK to just be themselves. You come out of the program happy with that."

Instructional coordinator Anshu Wahi said: "We're being honest about issues and not hiding truths. We talk about hypocrisy in media, body image, and we give space to express negative feelings.

"We do community service and hear feminist speakers," she said. "They're learning and doing and through that realization; there is so much power."

Sumaiya Johnston is a soft-spoken seventh-grader at Hamilton. She said she used to be shy.

"Shy girls in the seventh grade don't feel like they have any friends or aren't cool at first," she said. "But everyone (here) is considered cool. We're one big group, and we're all OK."

Johnston said she didn't think that at first, but connecting with other girls, growing relationships and giving back to her community changed that.

The Seattle P-I's Readers Care fund has raised $5.4 million since its inception in 1978. Readers can make donations through the P-I, and the paper pays all administrative costs so every dollar donated goes to the charities.

Along with Powerful Voices, this year the fund also benefits the Forgotten Children's Fund, the Family & Adult Service Center, the Little Bit Therapeutic Riding Center, New Futures, Northwest's Child and Rise n' Shine. Read more at readers carefund.org.

READERS CARE FUND

For more than a quarter-century, Seattle P-I readers have donated generously to the newspaper's annual Readers Care Fund drive, generating more than $5.4 million for local charities. Today, we feature another one of the seven charities that will benefit from this year's drive.

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