Founder’s Day Scout’s Own
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ann robertson, ceremonies, halloween, history, j-low
Today is Halloween, but for all of us here in Girl Scout land, it’s really Founder’s Day aka J-Low’s birthday. Birthday wishes are sent out via multiple sources on Facebook and shared multiple times by everybody! Halloween is always a very hectic day in my household due to trying to get everybody home from school, home from band practice, and attempting to cook dinner and eat it in time to get ready for trick or treating. I got all of this done and was checking my email when I realized I had completely forgotten to write up something for the blog. I always try to post something on March 12th and October 31st because I would hang my head in shame if I didn’t.
So I quickly flipped through a bunch of books and nothing jumped out at me. Then I remembered the GS Leader Magazine Archive hosted by the GS History Project which is run by the fabulous Ann Robertson – who will now get her own tag here on GSWAC (not a council). I’m sure she winced when she read that last line. Continue reading
In 2009 Girl Scouts of Greater Chicago and Northwest Indiana (GSGCNWI) started their 
This will be a quick hitter, but I just wanted to share that I’m creating a YouTube series. I try to present some sort of enrichment after each of our service unit leader meetings, but not everybody can make them. Last year, I sent out a survey to our service unit asking how they wanted to receive UNOFFICIAL trainings, and I was surprised at the number who wanted a webinar format. Well, webinars are hard to schedule, so instead I thought I’d record my presentations instead. I figured recording them live at the meetings wouldn’t be very effective, so maybe I’d try out recording the presentation directly from my laptop the same way I recorded the goofy 
But how do we do this? That was the $64,000 question. Everybody these days is struggling to get volunteers. Many parents want to find troops, but there aren’t very many that want to step up and take the reigns to start a brand new one. I realized that we needed to take a new approach. In the past, it seems like our organization just relied on recruiting girls but crossing our fingers that the leaders and new troops would follow. We needed to be more aggressive. We go all out to show that Girl Scouts gives girls opportunities and an experience that they wouldn’t necessarily have elsewhere. Well, what if we showed women that they’ll also get that in return if they become a leader? Side note: I realize men can be leaders too. In fact, we have a male leader in our service unit! But for this, we specifically targeted women.
You may have noticed I’ve been AWOL lately. It’s been one crazy summer, but not like the John Cusack movie. June started off kinda slow, but then July has gone into overdrive. Here’s what I’m in the middle of right now, and I’ll keep it somewhat short because I’m going in a thousand directions all at once. But I wanted to briefly check in so that you all didn’t think the Girl Scout mafia finally caught up to me.
GSUSA has recently put a focus on bringing civics education to the forefront. On June 3rd, they hosted a webcast that was livestreamed entitled Civics Education: Preparing the Next Generation of Informed and Engaged Citizens. It’s described on GSUSA’s website as such: “This nonpartisan event is an opportunity for community leaders, public officials, and education experts to consider how out-of-school civics programs can prepare the next generation to be involved citizens with a deeper understanding of their government —both now and for the rest of their lives.” It’s archived on their website and can be found here: