A Message From the Founder of Discovery Girls Magazine

I started Discovery Girls when my daughter Alexa was eight, because I wanted her middle-school years to be different from mine. When I was that age, I’d often felt alone. It wasn’t until years later that I realized that other girls went through confusing times and struggled to fit in, too—I just hadn’t known it back then. I was sure there must be a magazine that connected girls and showed them they weren’t really alone. To my surprise, though, I couldn’t find one. The magazine I wanted didn’t exist—so I began to think about creating it myself.

Right from the start, I knew we’d need to consult real girls to keep the magazine fresh and—well, real. So I got together with 12 girls from our local middle school, and we spent hours huddled around my kitchen table, snacking on pizza or popcorn and talking about everything they were going through.

Working with those girls was such a great experience that I hit upon the idea of traveling around to do our photo shoots. That way, we’d have girls from all over sharing their ideas and experiences. They’d even be our fashion models and cover girls.

Almost ten years have gone by since then, and how things have changed! Instead of being a great little publication no one has ever heard of, Discovery Girls is an award-winning national magazine with a readership of more than 900,000 girls! Through it all, one thing has remained constant: our connection to our readers. Nearly 700 girls have been Discovery Girls, and many, many more have contributed to the magazine in some other way. They’ve shared their stories, their opinions, and their dreams with us. Most of all, they’ve shown true caring for other girls. They continue to inspire all of us at DG every single day. Without them, Discovery Girls would still be just a dream!

We want them to always remember: They are not alone!

—Catherine

P.S. One of the wonderful things about the Internet is that it gives us another way to connect girls to each other. But as a parent myself, my primary concern in creating this site was your daughters’ safety. I wanted to create a place where girls would be able to share their thoughts and opinions with each other in a safe environment. For that reason, everything submitted to the site is reviewed to make sure that no personal information is disclosed and that inappropriate content does not appear. In addition, the site is fully COPPA-compliant. Please be assured that your daughters will not only learn more about themselves and have fun when visiting DiscoveryGirls.com—they will be safe, too.