Welcome to part 2 of Going for The Gold Award Series! If you missed out on part one, you can click this link to read that article where I talk about what the Gold Award is!

Today, in this article, I will be explaining how my idea developed! There are many steps in this process, as my project was on paper for over one year before it actually went into action!

First, you must have an idea. You must find an issue you believe is important and can be changed in your community, find the root cause of this issue, and propose a plan to improve your community.

After my freshman year, where I struggled with seeing my individual beauty and feeling not worthy enough, I decided that I never ever ever want anyone to feel like I did; I wanted everyone, especially young girls, to know that who they are, as a beautiful creation of God, is enough and beautiful beyond compare. I believe the root cause for these feelings is a lack of encouragement of individuality in our society and more specifically, our school community. This thought, this simple belief and message, became the basis of which my project evolved and blossomed from.

Awesome! So I had this idea and the root cause was identified; now all I needed was a solid plan! My plan was simple: educate the cuvillies (seventh and eighth graders here at NDA for our non-NDA readers) about individuality with encouragement of community in a fun and simple workshop-like atmosphere! Sounds easy, right? I proposed this idea to Mrs. Colin, received her approval and guidance as my community adviser, and continued on developing my idea and plan further before presenting to council.

I was confused as to how I wanted to attack educating the Cuvillies, so I met with a woman who I met my freshman year who I thought could help me. Her name is Katy Shamitz and she owns Skills for Living, an after school social skills program. She came to speak at an event my freshman year about individuality which is where I saw her passion for individuality!  In that meeting, she told me to break this theme up into three major parts: know who you are, acknowledge what your obstacles are, and how to overcome them and encourage others to do the same. She is absolutely genius and I left that meeting exploding with ideas and absolutely pumped up for this project.

After much researching and time spent writing up outlines and ideas, these ideas soon formed a three-part workshop. Workshop number one was called “Discovering Differences” in which the Cuvillies would be able to discover their talents and passions and learn to respect those of others. “Overcoming Obstacles” was the next workshop where we looked at a harder topic: what we struggle with and encouraging one another in those obstacles. And in the last workshop called “Improving Our Communities”, we brainstormed small and simple ways we can improve each part of our school community!

Each workshop comprised of a self-knowledge quiz to get the girls thinking about what we would be talking about that day. Then they had some time in small groups to talk about the topic a little and sometimes do another small activity. After this time, we played games or sometimes did crafts on the topic. We ended each workshop with a closing reflection to think about what we learned!

I typed up my nine-page proposal for council, got it signed by Mrs. Colin, my troop leader, and myself, and I sent it to council anxiously awaiting an email to hear what day my interview would be. I received an email a week or so later for April 9th even when I had put down June as my preferred date! It was so soon and I was so nervous!

I remember my interview day so clearly, I was a mess at school because I was so nervous. I was not able to focus at work either, and on the car ride there, I read over my proposal at least ten times to make sure I would be able to answer all of their questions. I had even made flashcards! Flashcards!

I walked into the Girl Scout Headquarters, if you will, and someone lead me to the staff kitchen where I waited for the girl before me to finish up with her proposal. I believe her proposal was not accepted because she looked kind of sad and her mom was hugging her as she came out. My nerves went way up as the Head of Awards, Joan Reilly, came out to bring me into my interview.

Stay tuned very shortly for Part 3- The Interview!!

Thank you so much and definitely check out my instagram page!