In America, it’s not odd to see young girls create teams and spend an hour screaming and laughing on a basketball court, but in Jordan, this scene is rarely possible.

“I see that girls want to do the same things as boys, they want to go outside and play, but they feel they can’t,” Mindy Ko, 24, said.

Ko is a Peace Corps volunteer from Utah. She has been volunteering as an English teacher in a small Jordanian town for two years. She said her time in Jordan made her want to advance equality. She and five other Peace Corps volunteers put together the first GLOW Camp in Jordan, which stands for “Girls Leading Our World.”

Ko said she took the idea for the camp from a Peace Corps program used in a lot of Eastern European countries and “tailored” it for Jordan. The week-long camp, which ended Saturday, provided young high school students a chance to get away from home, experience college life, and learn how to express their goals and aspirations.

“It’s not just about wearing a t-shirt and shorts, it’s about being given the same opportunities,” Ko said. The camp targeted young women from smaller villages that are often overlooked by other camps that bring in youth from more cosmopolitan areas.

Loma Madanat, 18, attended the camp last week. In many ways she is your average teenager. She finished high school this spring and dreams of studying chemistry in college. However, in her small village, Karak, Jordan, her dream of becoming a chemist is considered a “boy’s” goal.

“In Karak I don’t know any girls that do this major, Madanat said. “In Jordan yeah, I think there are a lot of women that do this major, but personally I don’t know any girls that work in chemistry lab.”

Despite huge increases over the last ten years, The Center for Women’s studies at the University of Jordan claims women make up only 14 percent of the country’s work force, compared to 73 percent in the United States.   Dr. Rula Quawas, Director of the center, said that up until recently, many women in her country were expected to give up their jobs if their husband or father was unemployed. It is a matter of honor in Jordan’s patriarchal society that the man be the breadwinner of the family. This is especially true in the rural communities outside of the capital of Amman, which houses almost half of the countries five million citizens.

“In some of the villages women are very downtrodden, they live only in the private sphere,” Quawas said. “Some women are stuck in a belief of the cult of true womanhood-they can only stay home and take care of the children and do housework.”

Quawas also says this part of the culture is entrenched in the country.

“It’s hard sometimes to break the wall of silence because of the culture of shame. It’s within the family, the traditions that don’t want to give women the rights that our government allows. It’s a stigma.”

Although only 18, Madanat said she sees inequality in her daily life.

“In this country, there’s really not a lot of chances for us because we are in Jordan (which is) in Arabia and so they look at us like we are weak and the boys can do everything but us no, we can’t,” she said.

Naseem Houd was a Jordanian volunteer at the camp. She said she wanted to excite young girls about their dreams and career goals because was once a part of programs like Camp GLOW. She went to a UNICEF camp for women that helped her pursue a future in science and technology.

“Women are equal, but they don’t know how to use their opportunities,” she said. “We have to enhance their abilities here to find their opportunities.”

Quawas said that while the government provides for women’s rights on paper, women must still actively fight for equality on a daily basis.

“Yes, you have equal rights, but then again, you have to work very hard because you are not going to be given these rights on a silver platter. You have to be the one to forge ahead, you have to be the one to venture out,” she said.

She called Jordan “the icing on the cake” in the Arab world when it came to equality, noting women’s inability to drive in countries like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait or to pursue a career without permission or a male escort.

“I can drive, I can run, I can swim. Maybe I can’t do everything I want like wear a pair of shorts outside, but that’s not important. What’s important is that I have the intellectual right to an education and to make a difference.”

But in recent years, women have only pushed for this intellectual right in small numbers. For example, while many women go to college in Jordan, only some of them use their degree in the work force while others choose to stay at home.

Quawas said she hopes the number of women’s rights will increase as more women combine education with demands for a change in society.

“Women now believe, ‘I can do it,’ Something was holding them back a long time ago because they’d think about their family and they would stop because they did not want to bring shame to the family,” she said.

Almost half of the population is under 16 years of age, and the young king and queen help make the country seem like a kingdom of youth.

“Now, there are vestiges of this (resistance), but it is fizzling out because women are saying, ‘I am going to do this and I am going to do this within the framework of my culture, my traditions, my religion, because I have the right to make waves.’”

The tides of change washed into the camp as the young girls, once quiet and timid, made colleges showing their future professions. A flood of magazine clippings filled the room as cut outs of police officers, doctors and fashion designers decorated the girls’ tables.

Madanat smiled as she called herself and her peers “the future of Jordan.” Through Camp GLOW she said she learned how to accomplish “real things in real life.”

“I think that if the girl believes in herself, she will do what she thinks because we are the same as boys. Just the difference between boys and us is our shape, and shape, I think, does not affect what you do and what you can do,” she said.

For Ko, the camp organizer, just putting the idea of equality in the minds of these young women was a success.

“Yeah, it’s a step by step process,” she said. “You can’t force any of your ideals onto a society and you can’t expect them to make a 180 degree turn in two years.”

Despite their different backgrounds, all women agree: Jordan is ready for progress. This progress is not just a step ahead for Jordan, it is a step forward for the United States and the Middle East.  A modern, equal Jordan will bring more stability to the country, which women's activists say will likely spread throughout the Middle East. Although Jordan doesn't fit the mold of an American-style democracy, this progress shows that a monarchy with elected representatives is a positive model for growth in the Middle East.

As the United States continues to become intertwined with the Middle East's destiny, Jordan's advances serves as a beacon of hope for America.