December 15 2020

Moving from Membership Dues to Membership Cards

National Operations    13 Comments    , , , ,

Recently GSUSA updated myGS and the system was down for a couple of weeks.  But volunteers didn’t notice, because nobody really uses it anyway.  There was a big to-do about the upgrades, and they were covered during our recent Town Hall.  But after a while, my brain started to wander as it normally does for Zoom meetings so I didn’t catch everything.  Once I actually fell asleep during a Zoom Town Hall.  Embarrassing.  I knew I should have turned off my video.

Anyway, back to myGS.  So the system came back online again, which again, no volunteers really noticed because they forgot it was down in the first place.  But my IT curiosity got the best of me, and I logged in to see what the big fuss was about.  I started clicking around and came across a place where you could print off membership cards for your troop’s girls and leaders (note: I’ve blurred all member ID numbers):

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December 7 2020

None of These are Like the Other

Experiences as a Leader    5 Comments    ,

When I first started as a leader back in the fall of 2010, the new program centered around Journeys and an entirely new set of badges had just rolled out.  Last year when I was cleaning out my badge inventory, I noticed that badges cost $1.50 my first few years when I checked the price tag.  The cost creeped up to $2.00 and then to $2.50 along the way.  A few years later, there were some complaints about the badges being made in China, so GSUSA brought production back to the United States.  The cost rose to $3 per badge, and there was a distinguishable difference between the Chinese and USA badges.  Some of the embroidered designs looked distorted.  The merrow edging (the embroidered border) on the Chinese badges was thicker and bled all the way to the edge of the badge.  The USA badges have a small border of fabric at the edging.

Recently, a friend of mine sent me a picture of three badges including the new Cadette STEM Career Exploration Badge that her daughter recently received at an event.  The first one is the newest STEM badge, the second one is from a USA vendor, and the third is a China-made badge.  Continue reading

November 30 2020

A Fall Product Sales Surprise!

Reminiscing    1 Comment    , , , , ,

In case you’re unaware, Girl Scouts sell more than just cookies!  We also run a fall product sale involving nuts, candy, magazines, and whatever knick knacks are in the catalog.  Every year there’s a collectible tin filled with chocolate mints (that I must say are very good).  I’ve gotten one each year that I’ve been a leader, and I have absolutely no idea what I’m going to do with all of them.  Some I use for SWAPs and others for patches that I haven’t sewn on yet.  The rest go up in the attic for some later use (aka collect dust), much to the chagrin of my husband.  This year’s featured a Brownie uniform.

I ordered one of the tins from my daughters, and after the fall product came in, I left it in the box for a while after we delivered the other orders.  The other day I pulled it out, and when I went to take the cellophane off to eat the delicious mints, I noticed something.  The troop number of the Brownie uniform is… TROOP 20!!!!!!!!!  Continue reading

November 17 2020

Now is the Time to Take Action on Camps

Opinions    9 Comments    , , , , ,

Well, I mighta sorta lied (again) about not writing about topics on the national level.  But I felt moved after I posted something on The (UNOFFICIAL) Outdoor Journey Idea Facebook Page regarding how covid-19 has created a crisis in Girl Scouting and what this possibly means for camps.

Advantage Emblem patch

I’ll basically rehash what I said but go into a little more detail.  Covid-19 has created a catastrophic membership crisis in Girl Scouting in case you’re not aware of this fact.  Many troops are on life support due to being Zoomed out.  Some councils still do not allow in-person meetings, and after spending all day in virtual school, the last thing girls want to do is sit in front of yet another virtual meeting for another hour.  Leaders by and large do not like hosting meetings on Zoom.  Like I said in my last blog post, a few troops in my service unit folded because the leaders didn’t want to deal with the hassle on top of trying to manage the stressors of life in this day and age.  And for the troops that are allowed to meet in-person, some parents don’t feel comfortable with this arrangement, so they’ve pulled their girls.  Continue reading

November 15 2020

Before There Were Virtual Troops…

Traditional Stuff    2 Comments    ,

Since the pandemic started, many troops have met via Zoom or some other conference software.  Over the summer, I served as the admin for one of our council-wide virtual troops.  Additionally, I led a few meetings in the spring with our own troop.  With our new council-wide Trailblazer troop this year, we have one meeting via Zoom and one in-person activity a month.  I have to be honest – virtual meetings are not my favorite thing to do, and I haven’t met any leaders who really enjoy it.  In fact, we had some troops fold in our service unit because they don’t see the point in continuing if it’s going to be this difficult.  It’s a discouraging situation all around really.  We’ll muddle through it and then hopefully rebuild at some point.

But it turns out that there’s been other times in Girl Scouting’s history where girls had meetings that weren’t held in-person.  I happened across this story while researching Lone Girl Scouts thanks to the help of Ernie A. and the Girl Scout Collector’s Guide on pg. 90.  Continue reading

November 9 2020

Letting It Run Its Course

National Governance, Opinions    3 Comments    , ,

I just wanted to drop a short note to let you all know that I will be taking a sabbatical of sorts here on GSWAC (Not a Council).  I might post things from time to time, but I don’t really see me writing any sort of editorial on a national scale for a while.  There’s really nothing left for me to say as I’ve been saying it over and over for the past five years now.

A friend of mine once said that making changes at GSUSA is like turning an ocean liner.  It’s a slow process in order to get it headed in a different direction.  But recently I feel like I got pushed off the boat, sucked under, and chopped up in the propellers.  Continue reading

October 31 2020

A Message From the Founder of Girl Scouts

Traditional Stuff    2 Comments    ,

Happy Halloween and more importantly, Happy Founder’s Day!  This is a message from J-Low from the October 1923 edition of The American Girl:

My dear Girl Scouts:

My message to you today must be a very personal one because it concerns the day of my birth.  So setting modesty aside, I must talk a great deal about myself.

When one thinks of the 31st of October, one associates the day with All Hallow-éen when fairies, imps, and witches fly about.  And on that night I made my first appearance in the world!

Long before I was born, lads and lassies of ancient times celebrated the night by testing their fortunes bobbing for apples, and playing many a joke on the credulous person.  Little did I dream when I, myself, was young and tried these Hallow-éen pranks that I should live to see that day turned into a Girl Scout Founder’s Day.  So you will understand what a thrill of gratitude comes over me.

One’s birthday should be the day for good resolutions.  And there is a suggestion by Arnold Bennett which may be of use to you as it has helped me.  He calls it an aid and says, “The deliberate cultivation of the gift of putting yourself in another’s place is the beginning of wisdom in human relations.”  To put yourself in another’s place requires real imagination, but by so doing each Girl Scout will be able to live among others happily.

 

 

 

October 27 2020

2020 NCS Wrap-Up Brought to You by Generation X

National Governance    3 Comments    , , , ,

Here’s your 2020 National Council Session wrap-up by yours truly.  This will be a full blown Generation X (of which I am a proud member of) exercise in cynicism, questioning authority, and sarcasm.  And some bitterness thrown in.  You’ve been warned.  I have to get it out of my system though so that I can move on.

Unless there’s some crazy reason for it, this will be the last post about the 2020 NCS.  I might make references, but there will be no more dedicated to it.  THANK GOD.

Now you have this song in your head.

First, here are a few titles I thought we could have used for themes:

  • 2020 NCS: Brought to You by the Volunteer Toolkit
  • 2020 NCS: Abandon Hope All Ye Who Enter Here
  • 2020 NCS: Sloth Edition
  • 2020 NCS: The Never Ending Story
  • 2020 NCS: Resource Team? Are you there?
  • 2020 NCS: Stand at Ease
  • 2020 NCS: Revenge of the Interruption Mic

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October 26 2020

GSUSA ‘Tis a Remorseless Eating Machine

National Governance, National Operations, Opinions    7 Comments    , , , , , ,

Well, I thought I was going to take a break from the blog for a little while, but I now feel like I need to write some more to help me sort through things.  The frustration of this past National Council Session made a lot of personal feelings come to the surface, and I now want to speak out about them.  Over these past two years, I saw a parallel to what I experienced as a council delegate, so maybe this is why all of this is bubbling up.

I built the framework of GirlScoutGovernance.com behind the scenes after receiving a scathing censure letter from our council’s board of directors back in the summer of 2018.  At that point, I gave up on trying to make a difference in our council on the governance level.  In addition to questioning what was going on, I had also tried to educate fellow volunteers and delegates about governance, and I feel like I failed miserably.  It was obvious that the deck was stacked against me.  I still tried my best on the troop and service unit level, but I realized at that point I was dead in the water when it came to council governance.  Even after retreating, the harassment intensified until I resigned as a delegate and National Delegate in January of 2019.  It was an extremely difficult decision because I felt like I was “giving up,” but it turned out to be the best one because it lifted a huge weight off of my shoulders, and I could then freely write on my blog again and work on GSG out in the open. Continue reading