Senior won't do her Gold Award

[fgoodwin]

My daughter is a junior in HS and refuses to work on her Gold Award.

 

My wife was her Troop leader in Maryland for three years, but since we moved to TX (summer of 2003) and my daughter joined a new Troop, she's completely lost interest.

 

I've begged and cajoled her to no avail. My wife has tried the scholarship angle, but it falls on deaf ears. At this point, I'm thinking you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him (or her) drink.

 

In my own life, since I became an adult I've regretted not being a Boy Scout and earning Eagle (I was a Cub Scout who dropped out to play football). My daughter already has her Silver, so she knows what to do -- she doesn't want to do it. She wants to do the project but not the required badges.

 

I worry that missing this chance will be something she'll later regret and for the rest of her life. But right now, she doesn't care and she feels like she'll never regret it.

 

My wife has tired of bugging our daughter and has also given up. Should I also back-off and let her be?

 

What have others done?

[SemperParatus]

Same situation for over a year. We backed off completely (as in never mentioned again) and then SHE decided to do it six months later. If she hadn't, that would have been her decision and one that I would have totally respected. Life is not about the awards and recognitions we earn along the way.

 

(With all due respect to my Lone Star friends, you should have stayed in the Old Line State)

[ScoutNut]

Oh my - BTDT !!! We had 4 girls in our Senior Troop & for 3 years we nudged, mentioned, reminded, encouraged, etc, etc.

 

They had done their Silver in 7th-8th grade along with their religious medal & decided that although they DID want to earn their Gold, they wanted to take Senior's slow. Fine. They started on their last religious medal and fiddled with bits & pieces of different awards. We went camping, out to ethnic dinners, bowling, swimming, etc, & they had fun. Meanwhile, time is passing & we are reminding & encouraging, etc. They are all very busy girls, honors/AP classes, sports, jobs, school clubs, etc.

 

Slowly, slowly, they finally finish their last religious medal & receive it in a very nice area wide celebration. Finishing this seems to revive their "drive for the Gold" & they finally start finishing up the various different parts needed. All this time they would periodicaly talk about their project. It went from one thing to another, from joint to individual and back again. They finally decided that they would do a joint project, that way they could encourage each other. They also figured that it would help keep them going because they knew each of them had to hold up their end of the project. They could not just quit without letting down the others who were depending on them.

 

Close to the end of their Junior year, they had finished everything but the project, which there were STILL ongoing discussions about. Finally, we sat them down with a calendar and showed them that in order to be able to be recognized in their Senior year & to be able to put the Gold Award on College apps, they had to fish or cut bait & do it SOON! It got them moving. They made it & were EXTREMELY proud of themselves!

 

None of them received scholarships directly because of the Gold, but let me tell you, when they finished listing all the awards they earned & the leadership they had done as Girl Scouts it was pretty darn impressive! Every one of them was accepted to every university they applied at and received some nice scholarships based, in no small measure, on their community service & leadership as Girl Scouts!

 

All of that said, your daughter is the one who has to finally make up her mind. IMO, the IP's are the least of it. After 3 years of high school, if your daughter goes thru the IP book I bet she will find that she has pretty much finished up any IP she needs. The most time consuming part is the leadership requirements. If she has finished those then all she has left is the project. Sit down with her to see exactly what she still has to do. It could very well be, that once everything is sorted out she will be a LOT closer than she thought!

 

Good Luck!!

 

 

[AnneinMpls]

Don't forget that young people move through cycles of equilibrium and disequilibrium, in roughly yearly cycles. Add excessive pushing at the wrong parts, and you might keep them stalled in that disequilibrium swing of the pendulum!

 

In the meantime, take a step back, and quietly observe your kiddo:

Sounds like you've just gone through a major upheaval - is she still finding her feet in a new school and new friends? Well, dunno...sounds like it was a couple years ago now...maybe?

Take a look at everything that is going right for her - make a list if it helps

What are her areas of competence? The stuff she most enjoys doing - the things that are seemingly effortless - umm, I'm trying to think of that concept of "flow" - when you are caught up in something that is your center of competence and you "make it look easy". I wasn't able to get much of a sense of who your daughter *is* from what you wrote above...

*After* you have this kind of vision, you'll be better able to offer encouragement to her to pursue the Gold.

And, yup, the Interest Projects can come across as a real pain but if the focus is on her interest (which is really the point...) the requirements begin to make sense: exploring how that interest ties in to potential career choices, giving service - passing on skills to younger girls, etc.

She might also need some help with realistic expectations: Be honest! At work do you put 110% into *every single task*, or are you allowed to shorthand some of it, get someone else to do some things, and focus your energy are the things you know are really the most important? Sometimes youg people can be very "black and white" in their thinking, expecially under stress. If Dad wants her to achieve, she might overinterpret that to mean every single piece of it ought to be a pinnacle of excellence and then it starts to look pretty impossible.

You might try an experiment this week: see if you can find 3 opportunities for her to catch you "taking a lick at a snake" in order to get something done. Let her hear you use phrases like "that's good enough", "let's just get it done, it's not brain surgery", etc.

Hope some of this is helpful!

Peace and blessings to you and yours,

Anne in Mpls

[scoutldr]

My philosophy is the same for Eagles. If the parent has to beg, threaten, cajole, plead, etc, is it really the scout's "accomplishment"? We can all do amazing things if we are threatened with enough pain. But the mark of the Eagle is to show initiative, leadership, skill and organization. It's not about how well the picnic tables are constructed. It's has to be her decision and about her choices, if it's to mean anything.