Girl Scouts See Need For Change

[fgoodwin]

Girl Scouts See Need For Change

 

http://www.courant.com/news/local/hc-girlscout1008.artoct08,0,2536561.story?page=2&coll=hc-headlines-local

http://tinyurl.com/8g3le

 

National Convention Focusing On Ways To Attract The New Generation

 

By PENELOPE OVERTON

Courant Staff Writer

 

October 8 2005

 

Endonesia Octave joined the Girl Scouts in first grade.

 

The bubbly 15-year-old Hartford girl recalls three things about that short-lived experiment: playing Barbie computer games after troop meetings, singing at local nursing homes and being the only African American in her troop.

 

"It wasn't exactly a sister thing," said her mother, Sophia Taylor-Edwards.

 

Endonesia fell away from Girl Scouts after about a year. As she grew, she joined other leadership development groups, including Girls Inc. and a church youth group. For Endonesia, Girl Scouts was ancient history.

 

But Girl Scouts is not the same organization that Endonesia left eight years ago. It's not as traditional, or as white, and more changes are planned to modernize the 94-year-old organization.

 

This weekend, during a national convention in Atlanta, the Girl Scouts of America launches a six-year discussion on how to update its image, recruitment strategies, fundraising philosophy and organizational structure.

 

Declining national membership is the reason for this overhaul. Last year, the Girl Scouts of America saw its numbers go down for the first time in two decades and this year's forecast isn't looking much better.

 

A few years ago, the organization took a long, hard look at itself and realized that it had to do more to recruit minority girls and parent volunteers and shore up the ever-shrinking ranks of older Girl Scouts. It began testing new programs for possible solutions. To bolster stagnant membership, several Connecticut chapters agreed to try the new programs on a trial basis.

 

As a result, the state's five councils overall can report an increase in their membership and the number of older girls and minorities. Some of the Connecticut councils are now ahead of national averages.

 

"Cookies, campfires and crafts just doesn't cut it anymore," said Jeanette Archer-Simmons, the CEO of the state's largest Girl Scout chapter, Connecticut Trails Council. "We have to adapt to today's generation of girls."

 

That means creating new kinds of Girl Scout troops that meet in unusual places, such as malls, behavioral health clinics, juvenile detention centers and homeless shelters. It means recruiting Spanish-speaking troop leaders.

 

It also means creating programs that will give older girls a reason to stick with Girl Scouts, said Terry Terrell, the CEO of the Connecticut Valley Council, which serves about 8,500 girls in the Greater Hartford area.

 

It has always been far easier to get a 6-year-old girl to become a Brownie than persuade that same girl to stick with scouting as she approaches her teen years, even though that is when she may need it most, Terrell said.

 

Many pre-teens and teens would rather hang out with their friends or get involved in the after-school activities, said Tannin Kueffner, 14, a sophomore at E.O. Smith High School in Storrs.

 

"We always choose the new over the old," said Tannin, a Girl Scout since she was 8. "Plus, girls want to grow up so fast. Girl Scouts is kid stuff, so we drop it thinking we'll look sophisticated. It's silly, but true."

 

Older girls also are scared away by the glue-gun stereotype, Tannin said. Outsiders think Girl Scouts sit around making homemade jewelry whenever they're not climbing mountains or selling cookies, she said.

 

"Some girls are embarrassed," Tannin said. "They don't tell their friends they're in it. They call it youth group. They'd rather die than wear their uniform. Hey, I love Girl Scouts and even I don't like the uniform."

 

When people make fun of Tannin for being a scout, "I tell them I went to Busch Gardens in Virginia last year with my troop and that pretty much shuts them up."

 

But some Connecticut troop leaders and Girl Scouts cling to the old ways. Ruth Leue, 50, a former Girl Scout from East Hampton, is a good example. She teaches a troop of a half-dozen 12- and 13-year-olds.

 

She doesn't want to stop the new programs, but she doesn't want them shoved down her throat. She prefers to have her girls build their courage, confidence and character "by doing stuff, not just talking about it."

 

"Teach a girl how to camp and you have an independent, self-reliant girl," Leue said. "Having them write about self-esteem in a diary, what's that going to do? Every teenage girl has a diary. Not every teenage girl can camp."

 

It's not just troop leaders who have reservations. Katie Hippler, 18, of South Windham, said the Girl Scouts helped her decide to become a nurse, but she questions some of the new programs.

 

"They're trying too hard to be hip. Instead of earning badges and patches, you get charm bracelets. Charms? No offense, but that's really girlie-girl," said Hippler, a Girl Scout for 13 years. "They're going to lose a lot of girls."

 

Hippler said the organization must find a way to expand its offerings, not force the membership to choose between tradition and trend. There should be room enough in a group of 3.7 million people for the old and the new.

 

For a few, Girl Scouts has already strayed too far. When the national arm granted the flexibility in 1995 to omit God from the Girl Scout Promise, a band of Girl Scouts broke away to form the American Heritage Girls.

 

Finding a way to peaceably blend the old and new will be the subject of much discussion at this weekend's convention.

 

Endonesia came back to the Girl Scouts last year when her mom walked into a North End pizza parlor and saw a Girl Scout poster advertising a bus tour of East Coast colleges.

 

"That's what my baby needs," Taylor-Edwards said she thought as she read the poster. "I was like, `Wow,' now that's real girl power," she said. "Back when, Girl Scouts was all about camping and earning badges and that uniform. That's nice, but this was something that could change my baby's life."

 

She discovered the Girl Scouts had changed. Taylor-Edwards went to the headquarters of the Connecticut Valley Girl Scout Council and saw an array of smiling black faces and a book of exciting programs aimed at older girls.

 

Endonesia paid her $10 membership fee. She mounted a two-week, 350-box, cookie-selling blitz to cover the $180 cost of the college tour, which was an eye-opening, heart-racing experience she says she'll never forget.

 

In the last year, Endonesia has gone on two college tours and attended a "Law & Order" program where she spent a day touring Superior Court in Hartford, the state women's prison in Niantic and Quinnipiac University Law School.

 

"Girl Scouts makes me confident about who I am and where I'm headed," Endonesia said. "People think we're all about cookies and little-kid stuff, but it isn't, not anymore. It's not everybody's thing, but it could be. It works for me."

[Greying Beaver]

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