East Harlem Students Share their Vision of Responsible Beauty with ELC Volunteers

As a company with a commitment to nurturing young women in our communities, The Estée Lauder Companies (ELC) has cultivated a longstanding relationship with The Young Women’s Leadership Schools (TWYLS) — a network of all-girls public schools aimed at helping at-risk youth reach their learning and leadership potential and attend college. As part of an ELC program with the organization, 85 12^th graders studying at TWYLS of East Harlem participated in Project Beauty: The Beauty of Responsibility, an annual creative hands-on activity in which the students came up with a cause-related campaign for an imagined beauty brand.

After inspiring presentations by Aveda Ambassador and influencer behind Mo Knows Hair, Monica Stevens, and Vice President of the M·A·C AIDS Fund, Andrea Flynn, students worked in teams to create their campaigns. Their ideas were then presented to a panel of guest judges to decide on a winning team who was presented with a certificate.

The winning team came up with a fictitious beauty brand that creates face masks targeting acne scars, and embraces loving your own skin and self-acceptance. The team tied their product to raising awareness about domestic violence and included the number for the National Domestic Violence Hotline on their poster. They utilized the concept of scarring, both physical and emotional, to create a seamless connection between the product and their philanthropic cause. Furthermore, they crafted a meaningful hashtag, #freeyourscars, to reiterate their brand’s message.

As an ELC executive who has participated numerous times in Project Beauty workshops, Andrea Flynn reflected on her experience: “Our company’s partnership with The Young Women’s Leadership Network is an outstanding example of the impact that we can have when we work together to support girls education.  As a first generation college graduate, it has meant a great deal to me to work for a company that places such a strong emphasis on supporting girls’ education and women’s leadership. The Project Beauty participants are a true inspiration, their passion for learning and leading is remarkable – these girls have the power to change the world!”