Rites of Passage was born from the sweat and vision of a group of young women in the Bay Area spearheaded by producer and visionary Charity Tooze.  Rites commitment to utilizing the media as a social change tool is at the heart of its mission.  As a program committed to being an empowering experience for the participant, Rites is more than a production it is a movement.  Rites utilizes popular education and first person voice to create an experience for young women where they discuss the real contemporary Rites of Passage, not those memorialized in culture but the grind of growing up in America today.  The show transforms lemons into lemonade by inspiring the participant and viewer to find solutions and resources to pressing social issues.  Research supports the obvious that creative programs get young people engaged in upwardly mobile empowerment.  Rites is a prevention program to its bones.  Currently, a curriculum is being developed that will enable others to utilize the Rites of Passage template as a teaching tool and then upload their version of Rites of Passage to our site. 

When we are given the opportunity to shine, we will shine!  Our greatness is lying right beneath the surface.  Rites of Passage is a judgment free space where young women come to tell the truth and discover themselves in the process.  The show supports exploring issues that intersect at all levels of gender, class, religion, race and sexual orientation.  Rites supports women getting involved in the film and television industry.  All of the camera people, editors, project mangers, stage managers, and technical operators are women learning the ropes to be in power in front of and behind the scenes in the field. We have created episodes on the foster system, rape, sexual health, girls in math and science, women in the media and hip-hop, young women filmmakers, depression and mental health, girl gangs, teen moms, relationships, dating violence, peer pressure, women in the arts as well as a live show.  In addition to a studio and field section Rites features poets, local Sheroes and has a troupe of Rites of Passage Dancers!