Major Sponsor Joins Loudoun's Young Women's Empowerment Summit

LOUDOUN COUNTY, VA — The Loudoun Commission on Women and Girls has signed with Amazon Web Services to be the lead sponsor of the inaugural Girl emPower Summit on Saturday. The event is free to all young women ages 12-18 and takes place 10 a.m. to noon on Sept. 26.

The summit will feature expert-led breakout sessions focused on mental health and wellness, networking, leadership and entrepreneurship. Registration to the virtual event is still open.

“This valuable girl-led virtual event will provide an opportunity for our community’s rising leaders to connect and learn from visionary women in the community,” Donna Oldham, community engagement manager, Americas for Amazon Web Services, said in a statement.

The summit's attendees "are the next generation of founders and CEOs of startups, enterprises, and government agencies, and AWS is honored to support and inspire them toward innovation and big ideas,” Oldham said.

Arlington County is home to Amazon’s second headquarters, or HQ2, while Loudoun County has a high concentration of data centers. Amazon Web Services works with girls in science, technology, engineering, mathematics and the arts through community investment such as its Girls’ Tech Day program.

The Girl emPower Summit will kick off with a keynote from Maimah Karmo, founder and CEO of the Tigerlily Foundation. Other speakers include Nicole Lynn Lewis, founder and CEO of Generation Hope; Chanel Parks, social media editor for Pat McGrath Cosmetics; Jenni Dakes, violence prevention and outreach program manager at Loudoun Abused Women’s Shelter; and Loudoun Board of Supervisors Chair Phyllis Randall.

The Girl emPower Summit was organized by Ashburn eighth-grader Mahsa Riar, who also runs her own business called Limitless Limb LLC, which creates personalized prosthetics for children with limb differences using 3D technology.

The summit’s other sponsors are all women-owned businesses based in Loudoun County, including the Music Loft, Orblynx Academy, Backflow Technology, LLC and ARM Consulting LLC.