Cancel Girl Scout Cookies?

 

It is that time of year again, time for Girl Scout Cookies.  It is also time for the yearly barrage of Facebook posts claiming that Girl Scouts supports Planned Parenthood (for the truth, read this post), that it exploints child labor, and now, some about how Girl Scout Cookies use palm oil (an ingredient found in the majority of store-bought cookies).  Maybe the cookie sale has outlived its usefulness and it is time to move on.  

Making Friends, Social Butterfly and Holiday Party

 One thing I've noticed about my troop is that there is an "inside" group that has been together since kindergarten and an "outside" group that has joined the troop later.  Its not like anyone is mean, its just that they really aren't one group and I'd like to do something to work on that.  Unfortunately, facilitating interactions and friendships is probably my weak point as a leader.  

Since we usually have a holiday party, I thought we could tie it into the Making Friends and Social Butterfly badges.  Let's take a look at them.

What Girl Scout Leaders Think of the Brownie Program?

 This is the second post in a series that involves surveying members of Girl Scout Facebook groups about their opinons of the current program. You can read about the Daisy program here.  

Who Replied?

With any survey, knowing who responded is important.  My gut feeling, based on replies to other surveys I've done and responses to posts on those Facebook groups was that people who responded tended to be more experienced than most leaders, and probably had a bigger committment to the program than most leaders.  

What Do Girl Scout Leaders Think of the Daisy Program

 

One part of Girl Scouts that has changed a lot in the last 15 years is Daisies.  Originally it was a one year program focused on learning the Girl Scout Law.  The only "badges" were the petals and since it was often October or November before troops were up and running, they were really enough for the year.  

When my sixteen year old was in kindergarten, the current program started and Daisies became a two  year program.  The awards expanded to include the leaves and the three original Journeys (actually one was added per year for three years so my daughter could have only earned two).

A few years later GSUSA went though a couple of years of "girls' choice" badges and added Buddy Camper and Outdoor Art to the Daisy portfolio.  Then they substantially expanded badge choices at all levels focusing on STEM, and Daisies got even more badges, an Outdoor Journey and three STEM Journeys.  

I was curious what badges and Journeys Daisies work on, how they do them and what they think of them.  Since surveying Daisies is hard, I surveyed leaders who are members of various Facebook groups for Girl Scout leaders and at the time I started the post, I had 168 responses.  While I did not gather data about the leaders, in past experience with surveying members of these groups, I have found that those who reply tend to be older than the average Girl Scout leader and tend to have been leading longer than most.  Whether that is true of the respondents to this survey I do  not know.  

How Much Does Girl Scouts Cost, and How Should We Pay?

Girl Scouts is a multi-level organization that has councils all over the USA and on military bases overseas.  It  is headed by a  national organization--Girl Scouts USA---which sets direction, develops programming, does research and otherwise handles high-level big picture items.  GSUSA is headquartered in New York City and is staffed by paid professionals. 

Under GSUSA are separately incorporated councils, which are local non-profits that own and operate Girl Scout camps or other properties and which recruit, train and support adult volunteers and girls.  Councils also have paid  professional staff. Most Girl Scout programming is led by volunteers who serve the object of the organization--the girls.  

Budding Entrepreneur vs Inventor

One complaint I have about recent GSUSA programming is that it seems to be much of the same. The Think Like a Programmer Journey, Robotics progressive badges and Coding for Good progressive badges all focus on algorithmic thinking and simple programming concepts like looping. You could run a troop focused on programming and fill eighteen meetings following VTK plans. I realize few if any troops would do that, but especially as the activities repeat (move something through a maze) I have to wonder if that's what GSUSA thinks troops want.

One of the new badges this year for Brownies was Budding Entrepreneur. While I've never done the Inventor badge, I've looked at it a few times, and when I looked at Budding Entrepreneur I thought they looked similar, so I decided to do this post as a comparison. 

Brownie Bugs Badge

 

Because other troops have enjoyed it and because our troop did not do it during their Daisy years, I started my "Brownies only" meetings this year with the Bugs badge.  According to Badge Explorer, there are the requirements: