Girls in Aviation Day: What It Is and How to Participate

What is Girls in Aviation Day?

Girls in Aviation Day (GIAD) is Women in Aviation International's flagship youth outreach program, held annually on the fourth Saturday of September. WAI launched the event in 2015 to give girls ages 8 to 17 direct, in-person contact with working pilots, mechanics, dispatchers, air traffic controllers, and aerospace engineers — the people doing the jobs the program wants girls to consider.

The format is intentionally decentralized. WAI provides branding, an activity guide, and an event toolkit; local WAI chapters, flight schools, FBOs, corporate flight departments, museums, and Civil Air Patrol squadrons host the actual events. That structure is why GIAD scales: in 2023, WAI counted more than 25,000 participants across 130-plus events in 35 countries. The 2024 edition expanded further, with host sites at major hubs including Boeing Field (BFI), Van Nuys (VNY), Teterboro (TEB), and Farnborough (FAB).

When is Girls in Aviation Day held?

GIAD falls on the fourth Saturday of September each year. The 2024 date was September 28; the 2025 date is September 27; 2026 will fall on September 26. WAI anchors the date so chapters and corporate hosts can plan a year out, and so the event aligns with the start of the academic year when school-based recruiting has the most traction.

Some host sites run a half-day program (typically 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.); larger sites — the Museum of Flight in Seattle, the Smithsonian's Udvar-Hazy Center, and the Frontiers of Flight Museum in Dallas have all hosted — run full-day programming with multiple session blocks.

What actually happens at a GIAD event?

Programming centers on hands-on stations rather than lectures. A typical event includes static aircraft displays with cockpit access, flight simulator time, paper-airplane aerodynamics activities, weather briefing demonstrations, and panels with women working in the industry. Larger corporate hosts add ramp tours of business jets — a Gulfstream G650 or Bombardier Global 7500 on display does more recruiting work than any brochure.

Private aviation operators have leaned in hard. NetJets, Flexjet, Wheels Up, Jet Aviation, and Signature Aviation have all hosted or sponsored GIAD events in recent years, typically opening hangar space at their main FBO locations. Bombardier's Wichita and Montreal facilities have run events; Gulfstream's Savannah campus has done the same. For girls in the 14–17 bracket, exposure to corporate flight departments matters more than airline-track programming, because the jet-card and fractional sector hires from a much smaller talent pool and pays comparably to mainline carriers once a type rating is in hand.

Who can attend, and what does it cost?

GIAD is free to attendees and open to girls ages 8 to 17. Most host sites require pre-registration through the WAI event finder at wai.org, primarily for ramp-access head counts and catering. Parents and guardians are welcome and, at airport-side events, are typically required to accompany participants under 13.

Boys are not turned away at most sites — WAI's guidance to hosts is that the event is designed for girls but siblings and friends shouldn't be excluded. The programming, however, is built around addressing the specific representation gap: women hold roughly 5.3% of FAA airline transport pilot certificates and approximately 9.9% of all FAA pilot certificates as of the most recent FAA Civil Airmen Statistics. The numbers in maintenance are worse — women are under 3% of certificated A&P mechanics.

How do you find a GIAD event near you?

WAI maintains a live event map at wai.org/giad each summer, with host sites typically posted by July for the September date. Searching by ZIP code returns the closest registered events with host contact information, age requirements, and registration links. If no event appears within driving distance, WAI's chapter directory lists local WAI chapters that may add an event late in the cycle.

For families in markets without a WAI-affiliated event, several adjacent programs run similar September outreach: EAA's Young Eagles offers free discovery flights year-round and often clusters flights around the GIAD date; The Ninety-Nines chapters frequently co-host with WAI; and Sisters of the Skies runs targeted outreach for Black girls considering professional flight careers.

How can a company or flight department host?

Hosting requires registering as an official GIAD site through WAI, which is free for WAI corporate members and carries a nominal fee for non-members. WAI provides the activity guide, liability templates, marketing assets, and a participant tracking system. Hosts supply the venue, volunteers, aircraft access, and refreshments.

For a corporate flight department or FBO weighing whether to host, the practical bar is modest: one hangar bay cleared, two to three aircraft available for cockpit tours, six to ten volunteer staff for a four-hour event, and coordination with airport operations for ramp access. Most first-year host sites budget $2,000 to $5,000 for catering, swag, and activity supplies. Returning hosts typically scale up — Textron Aviation's Wichita event has grown past 800 attendees, and the Boeing-hosted Museum of Flight event regularly exceeds 1,500.

How does GIAD connect to scholarships and follow-on programs?

GIAD is the top of WAI's funnel; the scholarships are the conversion. WAI's annual conference, held each March, awarded more than $1.4 million in scholarships in 2024, including type-rating scholarships funded by NetJets, Flexjet, FlightSafety International, and CAE. The Ninety-Nines' Amelia Earhart Memorial Scholarship Fund covers advanced ratings and jet transition training. Sisters of the Skies awards flight training scholarships specifically for Black women pursuing professional pilot careers. ISA+21, the international organization of women airline pilots, funds type ratings and training scholarships annually.

Girls who attend GIAD are funneled into WAI's Aviation for Girls magazine and app, the organization's year-round content channel, and into the WAI Girls in Aviation Club program — a school-year-long follow-on for ages 8–17 that local chapters run between September events. The intent is to convert a one-day exposure into a multi-year relationship that ends with a teenager applying for a $20,000 ab-initio scholarship at the WAI conference, not a one-off photo op on a ramp.