But what exactly do Girl Scouts do with your $3.50 a box these days?
“One of the misconceptions is that all we do is the three C’s: cookies, camping and crafts,” says Karen Wolford, development manager for the Girl Scouts of Western Ohio. “We may do all of those things — very successfully! — but what’s missing is what those experiences do for girls.”
The Dayton region’s $2.5 million annual budget helps young women enjoy regular troop activities — including field trips, leading major community service initiatives as part of their badge work and Gold Awards, or climbing ropes courses, learning orienteering and going canoeing. “Our intention, even as it was with (founder) Juliette Low back in 1912, is that girls grow with courage and confidence and character,” Wolford says. “I look at what we do now in Dayton and what she did then, and while the activities have changed because the world evolved, we’re still making sure that girls have values, have meaning and direction to their life, and they get to explore the world around them.”
99 years of Girl Scouting
Today marks the 99th anniversary of the very first troop meeting in America. On March 12, 1912, Juliette Gordon Low, inspired by England’s Girl Guides program, invited 18 young women to gather in Savannah, Ga., to help each other grow physically, mentally and spiritually.
While the first Girl Scouts came from isolated areas with few such opportunities, today’s girls often grow up in cities and suburbs with a plethora of athletics and after-school activities. That’s become a challenge for the Scouting organization, which sees a steep drop in membership as girls enter middle school.
“I first joined (Girl Scouts) in second grade,” says Gold Award scout Nia Holt, now a psychology major at the University of Dayton. “I enjoyed going camping and the friends I met there. Over the years, girls started to explore other things, but I decided to stick with it. It was a way to learn about new things and explore things I probably wouldn’t have gotten into otherwise.”
Wolford says structural changes are helping Girl Scouts improve retention in recent years, from improved uniforms (green skirts are out; khaki pants and beige sashes are in) to shifts in the membership requirements.
“In the past, you signed up for a year (at a time),” she says. “If you missed a meeting, you couldn’t come back for two meetings. We’ve stopped all those things that were going on. You may have a girl on a soccer team during the fall; that doesn’t mean she can’t come back in the winter.”
Council-level training for leaders, almost all of whom are female volunteers, has also evolved to address the needs of older girls.
The ‘Eagle Scout’ of Girl Scouting
Last Sunday, kicking off Girl Scout Week, dozens of girls from the Buckeye Trails Region gathered at the University of Dayton for a Silver and Gold Awards ceremony. These awards honor the highest achievements in Girl Scouting and require months — if not years — of effort. Gold Award candidates must complete at least 30 hours in a community leadership role, 40 hours of job shadowing and career exploration and 65 hours developing and leading a sustainable project in the greater community that requires organizational, leadership and networking skills.
And those projects can be pretty sophisticated. As the girls shared with their families and state dignitaries Sunday, the Dayton area has benefited from more than 1,700 hours of Gold Award volunteer efforts. Some of the projects included:
• A summer camp called “¡Hola Español!” that taught Spanish language skills and Hispanic culture to 37 second- through fifth-graders
• Renovations of waiting areas at three local medical clinics for underprivileged children
• Created a high school buddy program to help special-needs students with social skills and homework
• Reconstruction of a trail bridge at Taylorsville MetroPark.
Among Sunday’s honorees were Madelynn Vandenbrock and Michelle Hurtubise, juniors at Archbishop Alter High School, who designed the Gold Award project “Helping Those In Need To Read.” The pair collected more than 2,250 books for three local women’s and children’s organizations.
“Most people know about the Boy Scouts’ Eagle Scout (rank),” Vandenbrock says. “But I don’t think anyone understands how many hours we put in to the Gold Award projects. I want people to know how many hours and how much work we put in. It took us a year and a half.”
Being an example
Girl Scouts advocate for girl-positive media images, safety and involvement in the maths and sciences, and tout the fact that more than two thirds of all U.S. Congresswomen so far were once Girl Scouts.
Wolford’s own 32-year career with the organization began not long after college, when an instructor told her to give up her lifelong dream of becoming a band director — then a male-dominated field.
“He told me, ‘You’re not going to be able to do what you want to do.’ I didn’t want any other girl to ever have to hear that again,” she says. “And I found a way to do that. I’ve traveled the world; I learn from girls; hopefully girls can learn from me.”
Independence — with limits
The learning often starts with the iconic cookie sales, which Wolford calls “the largest financial literacy program in the United States.” According to the Girl Scouts of America, 30 percent of the money raised goes to the national bakeries that produce the cookies each year. The rest is split between regional councils and the troops that sell the treats.
While most troops only receive about 60 cents for every box sold, the girls themselves decide where their troop’s money goes — field trips, prizes, community projects — and how to manage their budget.
“Girl Scouts is different because you’re working toward goals together, and it builds your friendship,” says Carmen Brooks, a Chaminade Julienne Catholic High School senior and Gold Award winner who co-led the Spanish-language camp. “It teaches you to not just think about yourself but be ready to help other people — and to form a bond with other girls. And it teaches women independence.”
But not too much independence. Unlike the Boy Scouts of America, Girl Scouts do not automatically deny participation if members or leaders disclose that they are not heterosexual. But its standards do “not condone or permit sexual displays of any sort by its members during Girl Scout activities, nor does it permit the advocacy or promotion of a personal lifestyle or sexual preference.”
And despite an eruption of accusations last year that Girl Scouts are connected with Planned Parenthood, the organization maintains that issues of sexuality and sexual health are to be dealt with outside its purview.
“We believe that it is a family’s responsibility, not the Girl Scouts’,” Wolford says. That means no badges in sex education anytime soon. The policy has the support of the Catholic Church — as the Archdiocese of Cincinnati issued a statement in October assuring the faithful that Girl Scouts “does not take a stand on abortion or birth control. At the same time, Girl Scouts respects the moral teachings and theology of the Catholic Church. We support the right of pastors to verify that troops in their parishes are in compliance with church teaching.”
That support brings up another hot-button issue for Girl Scouts: How to honor its spiritual foundations in a nation of religious tolerance.
The same letter from the Archdiocese points out a number of Catholic-specific opportunities for girls to grow in their faith through Scouting. And the Girl Scout Promise has retained its traditional religious wording, including the phrase “On my honor, I will try to serve God and my country.”
In the 1980s, however, the Girl Scouts adopted a national policy allowing members to replace the word “God” with another name they believe in, or simply remain silent. That recognition of spiritual diversity went too far for some families. The American Heritage Girls, a Christ-centered Scouting group with strong patriotic themes, formed in 1995 in West Chester Twp. in protest. It has about 10,000 members nationwide today.
Uplifting girls at any age
For the most part, however, Girl Scouts in the Dayton area are going about business as they have for the past 99 years: learning outdoors skills, practicing teamwork and helping out the community. Just don’t look for them to wear the old-fashioned green.
“It really is worth it to stick with it, even if it’s not what everyone else is doing,” Brooks says. “It’s made me a better person than if I hadn’t stayed with Girl Scouts. I think my priorities would be different, I wouldn’t be as involved in service, and I see life now as more what can I do for people?”
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