Posted on 09/28/2008 5:05:49 AM PDT by Kaslin
Three weeks ago, my mother brought me two small jewelry boxes from home filled with “treasures” from my childhood. The necklaces, bracelets and pins brought back memories. There were two ballerinas, one cross, and one butterfly necklace. Included in the treasures were my Brownie and my Girl Scout pins, still in one piece and working, if a little dull and tarnished.
That same week, my eight year old daughter told me, “Mommy, I want to be a Brownie.” It seemed like such a simple request. After all, there are a few Brownie troops in the school, certainly I could just call around and find a troop for her to join. After a few calls and conversations, I found out that all the troops were full, except for one that was disbanding. Before I knew it, I had agreed to be a co-leader, the troop was reforming and adding a few girls.
My initial reason for agreeing to co-lead was to make my daughter happy: she wants to be in Brownies; this is what it takes. Soon, I discovered that this would be a learning journey for me as well. After registration forms were filled out, the next step was purchasing a uniform for her and books for both of us. Once everything was home, I began to go through the material, refreshing my knowledge of Brownies and Girl Scouts (it has been quite a while since I was one). The more I read, the more excited I became about the adventure that we were about to begin.
The mission of Girl Scouts is to build girls of courage, confidence and character to make the world a better place. Attending the service unit meeting with dozens of other troop leaders, I realized how many women in our local community were involved in the same mission of building girls of courage, confidence and character.
Our troop began the year with an induction ceremony for the new Brownies during which they held lit candles while reciting the Girl Scout Promise and the Girl Scout Law.
The Girl Scout Promise
On my honor, I will try:
To serve God and my country,
To help people at all times,
And to live by the Girl Scout Law.
The Girl Scout Law
I will do my best to be
honest and fair,
friendly and helpful,
considerate and caring,
courageous and strong, and
responsible for what I say and do,
and to
respect myself and others,
respect authority,
use resources wisely,
make the world a better place, and
be a sister to every Girl Scout.
The Promise and Law create a high expectation of behavior, but, knowing that perfection is an unattainable goal, start with words that underscore the fact that we will fail on occasion. The promise states, “On my honor, I will try,” and the law begins, “I will do my best to be...”
It is important to remember that we all fail on occasion and make mistakes. Trying and doing our best does not equate to being perfect, but rather with picking ourselves up after a mistake, learning and moving forward.
How did Girls Scouts begin? Through the efforts of one woman. Juliette “Daisy” Gordon Low began the Girl Scouts on March 12, 1912 with a local Girl Scout meeting in Savannah, Georgia. Today, there are almost a million Girls Scout volunteers, and 2.7 million girl members. Since its inception, more than 50 million American women have participated in Girl Scouts.
It going to be a fun year, learning and growing with the girls, and I know that my time invested in this will more than pay off in the long run. While I am sure that I will forget things, become overwhelmed and possibly even lose my temper, I know that today, more than ever, we need girls of courage, confidence and character.
All over our community, city and nation, adults are involved in the time-consuming, but important work of building boys and girls of courage, confidence and character through in-school and after-school activities. I am glad to be able to do my small part. Knowing that along the way, while I am helping others, that I will be learning and growing, and will be reminded of the important promises and values in life.
I look forward to the day I visit my daughter, and carry a box of childhood treasures to her, including her Brownie pin.
On my honor, I will try, to do my best. A motto we should all say every day.
Good for you and best of luck! I’m on the same journey with my son. You’ll need to convince other parents to be so like minded.
This is about as beautiful a post as you can get. Thanks. It brought back memories for me.
It all sounds so dreamy and wonderful doesn’t it?
Until the libs get at your daughter and start talking Planned Parenthood.
My girls had a wonderful experience in GS. Last year they earned their Bronze Award by working a local food bank many times a year. We had a great troop.
But choose carefully which troop you put your daughter into. Some are liberal social clubs. Ours are Christian based and for homeschoolers but I still knew that they would never get to Cadets. The Juniors are far enough for me. I replaced GS with Latin classes and that’s that.
Personally, I would choose 4H if it was still available. Getting Mall badges, rollerskating and movie badges have nothing on the 4H experience.
What my wife and I saw their disturbed us. When we picked her up at the end of the weekend, my daughter asked NOT to be a Girl Scout. I think her exact quote was, "Mom and Dad, let's get out of here. These people are creepy."
Let's just say that the Girl Scout groups we saw there were at the opposite end of the spectrum from The Boy Scouts.
The women all had three names and they seemed to just gush Liberal/Socialist ideology at every opportunity.
The men were not people I would consider 'men'.
Just a very uncomfortable and eye-opening experience. But then, this IS Massachusetts.
Original Girl Scout Promise (before 1972):
On my honor, I will try:
To do my duty to God and my country,
To help other people at all times,
To obey the Girl Scout Laws.
Original Girl Scout Laws:
-A Girl Scout’s honor is to be trusted.
-A Girl Scout is loyal.
-A Girl Scout’s duty is to be useful and to help others.
-A Girl Scout is a friend to all and a sister to every other Girl Scout.
-A Girl Scout is courteous.
-A Girl Scout is a friend to animals.
-A Girl Scout obeys orders.
-A Girl Scout is cheerful.
-A Girl Scout is thrifty.
-A Girl Scout is clean in thought, word, and deed.
We quit Scouts when the Girl Scouts took God out.
thanks for sharing this. I became a GS leader 3 years ago for much the same reason. Too many girls, not enough troops to serve them. Without adult volunteers, there are no troops.
Girl Scouts on the national level has taken a bad rap for some of the decisions made at that level. But down at the grss roots, many of us are working to make it the same experience for girls as we had when we were children.
???
God is still in. Just not mandatory. Any girl who wants can remain silent. I haven’t yet been to a gathering where any were.
I have a 2000 Brownie handbook right in front of me. You are absolutely correct, God is in the pledge.
Our son has joined Boy Scouts only because they have stuck to their original, God-honoring philosophy. Then, we’re quite lucky to have 4-H as well.
If they had Girl “Boy Scouts” mine would be in there in a heartbeat. Boy Scouts actually learn something more than what movie is playing at the mall.
There are Venture Scouts which are co-ed, for age 14 and above.
As for GS- Parents and girls who want more challenging GS activities, rather than complaining about the shortcomings of other volunteers inmeeting this needs, often start new troops. In our Council a minimum troop is only 5 girls.
My troop’s main interests are camping, earning often exotic badges by doing new things (like caving, marine science, and dogsledding! in Maryland) and doing service projects. However, the girls DO get to vote on what they want to do with their earned money, and “Build a Bear” (ecch) is on the schedule this year.
Girl “boy scouts” is called the Explorers. It is coed, for older boy and girl scouts, and is often career-based. For example, our son attended an explorer group centered around the local volunteer ambulance corps, with the goal of becoming a paramedic. Our daughter attended one associated aviation.
I was a Brownie Leader is Mass. when my oldest was little. We went to one of the camping weekends in eastern Mass. and I was shocked to find that some of the other leaders had brought all kinds of liquor.
There change in promise and laws reflects the changes in society.
Girl Scout Promise (before 1972):
On my honor, I will try:
To do my duty to God and my country,
To help other people at all times,
To obey the Girl Scout Laws.
Revised: From duty to serve and obey to live by:
On my honor, I will try:
To serve God and my country,
To help people at all times,
And to live by the Girl Scout Law.
Girl Scout Laws(before 1972):
-A Girl Scout’s honor is to be trusted.
-A Girl Scout is loyal.
-A Girl Scout’s duty is to be useful and to help others.
-A Girl Scout is a friend to all and a sister to every other Girl Scout.
-A Girl Scout is courteous.
-A Girl Scout is a friend to animals.
-A Girl Scout obeys orders.
-A Girl Scout is cheerful.
-A Girl Scout is thrifty.
-A Girl Scout is clean in thought, word, and deed.
Revised: The Girl Scout Law
I will do my best to be honest and fair,
friendly and helpful,
considerate and caring,
courageous and strong, and
responsible for what I say and do,
and to respect myself and others,
respect authority,
use resources wisely,
make the world a better place, and
be a sister to every Girl Scout
We found Planned Parenthood feminists at the Girl Scout fair. My daughters asked not to “have” be involved with Girl Scouts.
Most do. I really think it depends on the leader. Ours is taking a while to get going. Of course, around here homeschooling is huge. A lot of us homeschoolers are into scouting, so her den has around 15 boys in it. 9 year old boys.
sheesh...
I don’t go to den meetings any more. I told hubs it was the “man thing” LOL.
You know, when I was reading the Girl Scout Promise in the original post, I new it had changed, and found out I still remembered the original. Thanks for pointing out the changes.
>>As for GS- Parents and girls who want more challenging GS activities, rather than complaining about the shortcomings of other volunteers <<
Ooooo, smack!
Hon, I was a Daisy leader and co-leader in Brownies with another lady. In the years my girls were in, I volunteered as a sub and ran many a meeting.
I am a volunteer.
However, I am not speaking of my troop (did you see where I said ours was great?)
I am speaking about the general theme of Girl Scouting. Where a night at the mall earns you a badge, being “eco-friendly” is more important than “human friendly” and making big bucks by charging volunteers to run a troop while financing the “dues” but not the costs (I covered that) is not what I want my children involved with.
Sorry, GSs perpetuate GSs. Nothing more. Down to the big 10% a troop sees on cookie sales, they are greedy and it shows.
If we don't like Council events or we can't afford them with our money we raise, we do our own or go to events sponsored by other organizations, including Boy Scouts.
$.50 a box on cookies isn't much but- many of the girls like to sell, it does give them a feeling of accomplishment, it does give them “troop money” to decide how to use - and with the all volunteer leaders working for free- it pays for their field and camping trips.
My GS troop are now ages 9-11 and far more involved in self government, leadership, group decisionmaking and service- then my son's Cub/WEBELOS pack which takes parents along to “help” with everything.
I sure hope GS perpetuates itself.
On a soccer team or dance studio, my girl does not get exposed to making value-defined decisions for herself, selling her ideas to a group of peers, modeling what she believes and earning recognition in front of adults and the community, figuring out how to do activities that represent the GS laws, and becoming aware and self sufficient in the woods.
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