Take Action Projects

I get asked all the time, "what does a Silver Award Project" look like?  So I thought I'd post some samples from time to time.  Some good, some not so good.  I'll start with a GREAT one!

Did you see the GSUSA blog post on Sept. 27 about "Utah Girl Scout raises thousands of dollars for community garden."  This 13-year old Cadette has a passion for fighting hunger in her community, so she  did two projects to earn her Silver.

The first was to work with a Park community that offers tillable plots for about 2 dozen families.  Morgan enlisted the help of about 40 volunteers to dig rows and plant produce, and got donations from Girl Scouts and Zion Bank.  The second part was to create a garden in an underserved community that then produced more than 150 pounds of food for the Food Bank.  She used her middle school classmates as her team.

Great projects!  And great process!  Here's my take on how she created and executed her project:
She started with her passion:  fighting hunger.

She did some community mapping to see where the greatest need was.

Morgan then located non-profits in the community who could serve as her partners.

She wrote grants for funds.  Now, very ambitious for the Silver Award!  And truly, a Silver Project shouldn't take very much money to put together.  That said, applying for the grants, probably thru the non-profit partner, was a great idea!

Morgan created a team.  She put her leadership into action as she educated her team about the need and how she wanted to fill that need.  Morgan got a commitment from her team members to help her with this project.  And she put together a schedule, so that everyone could participate in turns.

These were measurable projects!  24 plots planted for families.  150 pounds of vegetables donated to the local Food Bank.

And sustainable!  Hopefully she taught the plot owners/non-profit volunteers how to plant, water, harvest and then re-plant so that there would be a succession of successful seasons to harvest.

I bet Morgan had a really good take on the global aspect of this project.  She probably understood and could clearly state how gardens like these could be planted all over the US and around the world.  And I bet Morgan could put together a whole program about how to do it elsewhere.

This reads sort of Gold Award Project-like!  Which makes me very interested to see which Journey she takes as a Senior (I'm betting Sow What!) and what her Gold Award Take Action Project might entail.