A Note to Parents of Pre-Teen and Teen Girls,

Thank you for your interest in Teen Girl University™. My name is Dr. Carla Stokes.

I help young women and girls growing up in the digital age make healthy choices, strengthen social-emotional intelligence, and develop their leadership potential so they can thrive during adolescence and beyond.

I understand that raising a daughter in this time of uncertainty can be overwhelming. Fortunately, you don’t have to figure everything out on your own! Your daughter’s tween and teen years don’t have to be  difficult if you have an expert and trusted advisor in your toolkit to guide you and your daughter along the way.

I am here to help!

I operate Teen Girl University™, a unique professional coaching, speaking, and consulting practice devoted to helping young women, girls (pre-teens and teens), and their parents thrive through life’s pressures and transitions. I have educated and mentored thousands of youth and girls for decades (since I was a teen) and I would love to help your daughter build confidence, make healthy choices, and reach her full potential. I designed my unique programs to help your daughter fall madly in love with herself from the inside out, get motivated, improve her relationships, and make healthy choices so she can create a bright future and achieve her dreams!

I am highly skilled in connecting with students from diverse backgrounds and guiding them to view themselves and the world around them in new ways that inspire them to recognize the true source of their personal power, move past whatever is holding them back, and transform their untapped potential. From peer pressure, friendship drama, academic stress, social media, and body image concerns, I teach girls how to think critically, live authentically, and trust their inner wisdom, so they can consciously navigate girl world with confidence, overcome societal pressures, and achieve their goals. I have personally mentored young women and girls who have started national organizations, been honored by President Barack Obama, won national awards, earned highly competitive scholarships and fellowships, and graduated from top colleges, universities, graduate schools, and medical programs. 

After decades of empowering girls and speaking professionally to youth, educators, and caring adults, scaling my life-changing work is more important than ever during these unprecedented times when girls are collectively in crisis around the globe, their mental health is in jeopardy, and women’s and girls’ rights are becoming increasingly threatened. 

As we emerge from the pandemic, I am committed to getting my empowering message into the hands of as many girls who need support, guidance, and encouragement as possible. After receiving countless requests from parents, girls, and schools, and many years of work and preparation behind the scenes, I am excited that I will finally be expanding my Teen Girl University™ coaching practice and workshops to include group coaching online!

Please sign up for the waiting list below to get updates about when the doors open...

“Dr. Carla is fun, lit, inspirational, amazingly talented, and the QUEEN of speaking to girls.” – Natalie, Grade 7

"Dr. Carla is a dynamic, fun, and surprisingly relatable speaker. She has a different approach to empowering girls that is really needed for teenage girls now." - Anjali, Age 16 

"I noticed a positive difference after Dr. Carla spoke at my school. There are a lot of girls that never talked to each other before who are talking to each other now and we are more confident. It really got to all of us and we had fun with you, too. Thanks for coming!" - Tatianna, Middle School Student 

“If you are thinking about inviting someone to speak to girls, Dr. Carla is the only one I would pick to do it. She is amazing!” – Meagan, Grade 7

"Honestly, Dr. Carla brought more unity to us girls more than ever. She inspired me to be true to who I am." - Manda, High School Student

"Dr. Carla's appearance at my high school made a huge change! The girls are making sure that other girls who didn't feel like they are part of something are involved and make sure that they feel safe to talk about anything they need to." - Makena, High School Student

“Dr. Carla opens the eyes of young girls and teaches them to rise up against bullying. If you’re thinking about bringing her to your school, do it! Her words are powerful and her message gets through to girls really well.” – Maggie, Age 17

“Dr. Carla helps girls in a creative way and makes it fun to help others. She’s very fun and inspirational and has changed the way us girls interact.” – Aubrey, Grade 8

“Dr. Carla is someone who changes girls in an amazing way!I learned that I am always enough and beautiful on the inside.” – Kaitlynn, Grade 8

"Dr. Carla's presentation was the most AMAZING experience. It was more than we could have ever imagined!"

“Dr. Carla was very interactive. As she told stories and also let our students have a voice as well. The interaction between Dr. Carla and the girls was so positive that at the end of the assembly, one little girls stood up and said, 'I'm autistic and this is the first time in four years I've ever felt safe at school' and every one of the girls in that auditorium started applauding her. And that was how the whole assembly went!  

Dr. Carla was professional. She spoke to the students' needs and talked about things that our females really needed to hear. The girls shared with me afterwards that they could relate to Dr. Carla because she talked their language. They perceived her as someone who told them things they needed to hear.

I knew that Dr. Carla had really impacted our girls when every time I ran into a student, they said, ‘OMG, Mrs. Woolpy, I LOVED Dr. Carla!’ 

The girls got excited and it was amazing. You could feel the positive energy in the room that Dr. Carla had created for every one of those 600+ girls sitting there in the auditorium.  

If you are thinking about bringing Dr. Carla to speak at your school, please do not hesitate. She reaches, inspires and motivates young ladies. My 600 girls at RHS could not stop talking about Dr. Carla and that's what all principals want for our students. 

Before Dr. Carla came to our school, we had some situations with our girls involving their self-esteem, bullying, and sexting. She relayed her message to our students about what the students can do to help prevent them from getting into bullying and girl drama. She helped our students feel empowered and important and she did it in an atmosphere where she generated all kinds of positive energy! 

-- Mrs. Rae Woolpy, Principal, Richmond High School (Richmond, Indiana)

About Dr. Carla 

Carla Stokes, PhD, MPH is an internationally acclaimed girls' studies researcher, highly sought-after professional speaker, leadership coach, and health educator. As the founder of Teen Girl University™, she specializes in helping young women and girls thrive through the pressures and transitions of adolescence. Dr. Carla has educated, mentored, and coached thousands of students for decades. 

For 15 years, she served as the founder and former Executive Director of Helping Our Teen Girls In Real Life Situations, Inc. (HOTGIRLS)®, an award-winning 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the health and lives of Black young women and girls by helping them develop leadership skills, create positive social change in their communities, and realize their full potential.

Dr. Carla is respected as an authority and trailblazer in the fields of adolescent health and behavior, girl culture, and positive youth development. She has a long track record of applying cutting-edge underground trends in youth culture to her work with girls in schools and community-based organizations. She is an innovator and pioneer in the fields of hip hop education, digital girlhood studies, and online public health dating back to the 1990's when these unconventional approaches were newly emerging and considered radical. 

Dr. Carla is known for translating academic research into innovative, inclusive, and youth-friendly programs. Through her transformational work, she helps young women and girls build resilience, make healthy choices, and reach their full potential. She also teaches parents, educators and youth-serving professionals how to better understand and effectively connect with young women, teens and girls. As the creator of the A Heart for Girls™ Business Academy, she is the premier business coach and consultant for speakers, coaches, mental health professionals, educators, and women who want to start or grow a successful girl-serving business.

A sought-after, engaging, entertaining, down-to-earth, and memorable speaker, Dr. Carla has spoken widely around the United States to diverse audiences of women, youth, girls, parents, educators, health care providers, mental health professionals, and concerned adults at conferences, schools, community-based organizations, and scientific meetings and national conferences of professional associations, including the American Public Health Association, The Center for Civil and Human Rights, American Anthropological Association, National Council for Research on Women, and Ms. Foundation for Women.

Dr. Carla graduated from Spelman College with a Bachelor of Arts degree and departmental honors in Psychology. She earned Doctor of Philosophy and Master of Public Health degrees with distinction from the University of Michigan Department of Health Behavior and Health Education, with a cognate in Social Work. She completed her public health practicum and a two-year post-doctoral research fellowship at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Division of Adolescent and School Health and the Division of HIV/AIDS Prevention). 

Her doctoral dissertation research was funded by a competitive Johnson & Johnson Dissertation Grant in Women’s Health and won honorable mention in the University of Michigan Distinguished Dissertation Awards competition (selected from more than 660 dissertations in 2004). Dr. Carla has been awarded prestigious research fellowships and grants focusing on racial health disparities from the National Institutes of Health, Centers for Research on Ethnicity, Culture & Health, Congressional Black Caucus Foundation (Public Health Fellow), and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation (Health Policy Research Fellow).

Dr. Carla taught courses on Black women’s health and representations of women in hip hop and popular culture as an instructor in the Department of Women’s Studies at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Her pioneering scholarly research on the intersections between hip hop culture and social media with Black girlhood, adolescent girls’ health, sexuality, self-definition, and body image has been published in academic journals and books, including the international peer-reviewed journal, Culture, Health & Sexuality, Girl Wide Web 2.0: Revisiting Girls, the Internet, and the Negotiation of Identity, edited by Sharon Mazzarella, and Sex Matters: The Sexuality and Society Reader (4th Edition), edited by Mindy Stombler, et al. Her digital girls’ studies research is assigned as required reading in sexuality studies, digital studies, women’s and girls’ studies, and multidisciplinary courses at institutions around the world ranging from Ivy League universities to small liberal arts colleges.

Dr. Carla has been featured in respected international media outlets, including The New York Times, NBC, CBS, Fox, Woman’s Day, Reuters, Ebony, Yahoo! Parenting, ATTN:, Heart & Soul Magazine, and Daughters. Her work has also been recognized by the National Association of University Women, National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), Outstanding Atlanta, and many other professional organizations. 

Find out more about Dr. Carla and download free tips and resources for parents, educators and youth-serving professionals at DrCarla.com.