Higher Awards and Direct Solicitation Debate

Every three years, the National Council convenes to discuss and vote on business that comes before it at a meeting called the National Council Session (NCS). This year, three proposals are on the agenda. One has to do with licensing cookie products, and I recently wrote about that proposal a few weeks ago. I also covered the one dealing with membership dues. Last, but not least, is a proposal called Girl Scout Highest Awards Solicitation of Contributions sponsored by the Girl Scouts of Eastern Pennsylvania council. You can read the text of the proposal here on GSG.

To summarize, this proposal would allow girls working on their Bronze, Silver, or Gold Awards to directly solicit donations (monetary or in-kind) with permission from council leadership. Currently, only girls working on their Gold Award are allowed to directly solicit donations. This is a relatively recent development based upon a decision by the National Board in 2018. This particular proposal extends it to Bronze and Silver Awards.

The National Board doesn’t have a position on this proposal and remains neutral. And I’m going to be honest. I really struggled writing this blog post. It’s definitely not my best work. Originally I was going to write about the membership dues proposal by itself and then combine the last two, but I ended up writing more than I thought in the second one and published it as a single blog post. I have distinct thoughts about this proposal, but I realize it’s just an opinion with not much to back it up. Also, I broke my ankle about two weeks ago and ended up having surgery, so it’s possible the pain meds are affecting my writing and motivation. In case you’re wondering, I still plan on going to the NCS and the convention. I’ll be in a walking boot by that point so no slowing me down. Everything is non-refundable; therefore, I’m going come hell or high water complete with OFFICIAL scarf.

I’ve heard arguments against this proposal with one being that it would create a substantial amount of work for council staff in fund development. There are also concerns that there will potentially be donor overlaps causing headaches for councils who rely on organization and corporate donors for revenue.

While I can’t speak for the staff perspective, one concern of mine has to do with the Bronze Award specifically. I’ve led girls through all three awards, and while I think girl solicitation for the Silver Award would be beneficial, I’m not so sure about Bronze. We’re all about progression in Girl Scouts, and the higher awards are no different. The Bronze Award is supposed to be an introduction to sustainable projects that solve an issue in the local community. Also, Bronze Awards are meant to be troop/group based whereas Silver and Gold can be earned by girls working individually. Allowing individual girls to solicit money and donations for the Bronze Award takes the focus away from it being troop/group based. Note that troops are allowed to fundraise on their own now (depending on local council guidelines). It’s just that this would allow girls to individually raise money on their own. And I also wonder if it will be the parents and troop leaders doing the solicitation because 4th and 5th graders cannot open online donation accounts such as GoFundMe on their own.

I also question whether there’s a real need for girls to individually solicit donations for a Bronze Award project. Bronze Award projects are not meant to be massive in scope and shouldn’t be expensive. Will we have an arms race for bigger and better Bronze Awards that really are Silver and Gold Awards in scope? Where do you go from there? I don’t want to dampen the enthusiasm of a troop that wants to shoot for the stars, but at the same time, the size and expense of the project shouldn’t be the emphasis of a Bronze Award project.

When my council’s National Delegates presented the proposals to our local delegates, other leaders felt the same way I did and agreed with some of my points. So it wouldn’t surprise me if at the NCS there’s a motion to Amend to strike Bronze from the proposal language leaving just Silver and Gold.

Well, that’s it for me. I’ve run out of juice when it comes to this proposal. Talk amongst yourselves.