Girl Scouts do more than just sell those delicious cookies. They are building and shaping young ladies into important parts of society.

I met with Troop #592 from Lakeland, Florida to get an inside look at exactly how Girl Scouts is impacting the ladies in this particular troop. Their troop leader, Lisa Yutzy, invited me to a local seminar on making your own rain barrel where part of her troop was attending in order to learn information for their Environmental Fair.

These seven fifth, and sixth, grade girls are planning and putting together their own Environmental Fair on May 17th, 2008 at Lake Parker Park. They have gathered their resources, gained support from various donors, planned and are preparing to implement their fair in order to earn the Bronze Award.

“The Bronze Award is the highest merit a Junior Girl Scout can earn,” said Mrs. Yutzy. For those who are unfamiliar with Girl Scouts of America, there are merit badges they earn for the various service projects and fun activities they do throughout their time as a Girl Scout. However, these girls are earning much more than just another patch for their vests, they are gaining valuable life experience.

They have learned the value of health and exercise through several camps where they learned how to water ski, knee board, sled, kayak, and much more. They have also traveled to St. Augustine, Florida and Savannah, Georgia where they learned about the history of the Girl Scouts organization, the history of the two states, how people lived in colonial Florida, and visited Marine Land to learn about ocean life.

Recently the troop went to C.S.I. Camp at Camp Wildwood and learned about DNA, fingerprinting, chemistry, and how to map out dominant and recessive genes. Almost subconsciously these young ladies are learning history, science and other skills in ways that are innovative and fun.

At their weekly meetings, the girls take turns leading the others in various activities to teach them how to be responsible leaders. They have taught one another how to cook and have even spent their meeting time providing food to Lighthouse Ministries in Lakeland.

During another meeting, the girls cut an apple in half, rubbed their unwashed hands on the fleshy inside of it, and left it out till their next meeting, one half untouched and the other defiled by their dirty hands. By the next week the dirty half was significantly different from the clean half.

“We could see how many germs we have on our hands,” said Stephanie Yutzy, Mrs. Lisa Yutzy’s step-daughter who is also one of the girl scouts. This simple science project taught the young ladies much about cleanliness and hygiene.

“This week we’re going to make box ovens,” said Hayley, one of the girl scouts of troop #592. This will prepare them for their next camping trip so they can actually make one and cook with it out in the woods!

Clearly these girls’ lives are being impacted by their involvement with Girl Scouts of America and they are being taught how to positively impact their own community of Lakeland through Girl Scouts. The experiences, life-skills and social skills they have accumulated through this nonprofit organization are priceless.

After the girls learned about water conservation and the use of rain barrels at the seminar I previously mentioned, I sat down to talk to them about the impact of Girl Scouts on their lives and this is what they said:

To see more examples of activities Girl Scouts participate in see the youtube.com video below: