Girl Scout Troop 11032 Starts a Journey
Hershey, PA
Troop 11032 is a troop in Derry Township, Hershey PA. They are a group of 20 girls most who have been together since they started in Kindergarten as Daisy’s. They are now a group of 10 years old Juniors.This year as Juniors they have started to teach their own badges to their fellow scouts. This got them excited and started to teach them how to work in small teams, organize, and present their information in an effective manner.
As a troop we decided to go on a Girl Scout Journey (Agent for Change) and earn the bronze award in Girl Scouts. The girls got a chance to research a herstory which was a girl/woman who has made a difference in another part of the world. The girls were challenged to look deep within themselves to find out what their super powers are so that they could earn the Power of One award within our Journey. We also learnt the importance of team work by having an obstacle course built by the girls team work, and having them team up to go through the obstacle course blindfolded. They had to make a decision in groups of 2 of who was the better communicator vs the better listener.
During this time the girls have been given homework assignments to work on. The homework centered around ways in which we could help our community. We drew a community map and talked extensively about what makes our community unique (and there was a lot of unique qualities to our community), and also where there were places for improvement within our community that we could make a difference. That lead us to the idea of recycling/reusing, and to the idea of a lending library. Our girls were so excited by the idea that they began brainstorming ways we could accomplish this goal.
The girls said they wanted to do it inside that way we could use a bookshelf/dresser to house the books. The girls are a compassionate and empathetic group and asked to tie the lending library into a great local charity Cocoa Packs. Cocoa Packs is a charity that gives food to local kids who need nourishment after school, or on the weekends. Cocoa Packs fills a need in the community to have no child go hungry. We had a handful of girls volunteer to reach out to Cocoa Packs and the Derry township schools administration to get our lending library started.
The girls continued to brainstorm about the construction of the lending library by weighing options for different materials we could use. They decided on wood for the shelf/dresser, but would settle on metal as a backup. They want to have wheels on it too. We decided on a logo, and a slogan by coming to a consensus within our group. The logo is a red fox reading a book, and our slogan is Books, books, are good for your heart the more you read them the more you get smart. The girls will also be taking marketing strategies we worked on earlier this year to create posters to advertise our lending library, and our efforts to get book and food donations. The girls also will be making book marks for people to take with their books, and a box top collection spot. We plan to have a drop off donation bin for food & books connected to the lending library.
As we wrapped our meeting the girls added that this library is something they want to operate until they are seniors in high school. We contacted Christine Drexler who started Cocoa Packs and asked her if she would be interested in our idea of the lending library collaborating with Cocoa Packs. She was so gracious and thankful for the girls wanting to do this, and was genuinely excited for this collaboration.
The troop will continue to work towards their bronze award by bringing to fruition the lending library at the Cocoa Packs distribution center.
