Boca Raton Girl Scout Earns Gold Award
Boca Raton, FL – Girl Scouts of Southeast Florida recently recognized the 2022 Class of Gold Award Girl Scouts. This year, 27 Girl Scouts earned the organization’s highest award for girls and their collective projects contributed just over 3,000 hours to local communities where help was desperately needed. They partnered with dozens of local organizations with projects that impacted thousands of lives.
Boca Raton resident Savannah Garrett from Troop 20962, created a Gold Award Project entitled Open Your Heart, Open a Book. Her goal was to address childhood trauma with the power of books. Because childhood trauma often has a negative impact on in-school learning, making a child more easily distracted and less likely absorb new information, books can be a powerful tool. Savannah saw books as an outlet for children to understand their emotions and mitigate anxiety and depression.
Partnering with the Aid to Victims of Domestic Abuse, Inc. (AVDA) in Delray Beach, they installed a ‘booknook’ for children whose parents or guardians are involved in the sometimes lengthy “intake” process. The space is now filled with a wide range of books with comfortable, private, quiet spaces for reading and ‘escape’ for children of all ages. Savannah created an informational website to explain the value and need of books for children in stressful situations and to gather donations. Inside each book, Savannah placed a sticker with a QR code that leads children to another section of the website offering book recommendations, empathy, compassion, and encouragement to use reading to help relieve anxiety.
The Girl Scout Gold Award is the highest award a Girl Scout in grades 9 – 12 can earn. It is accomplished by completing a service project with a minimum of 80 logged hours. The project must fulfill a need in the community, create change, and be sustainable with long-term possibilities. Gold Award Projects demand the highest level of organizational, leadership, and project management skills. The level of commitment to complete a Gold Award project is so great that less than 6 percent of all Girl Scouts earn this most prestigious award in the world for girls.
About Girl Scouts
We’re the preeminent leadership development organization for girls who believes that every girl can be a go-getter, innovator, risk-taker and leader with the power to change the world. More than any other organization in our community, Girl Scouts of Southeast Florida empowers girls ages 5 to 17 with vision and voice—girls who command their future, engage their communities and inspire others. We offer every girl a chance to practice a lifetime of leadership, adventure and success. Girl Scouts of Southeast Florida serves more than 6,000 girls in Broward, Palm Beach, Martin, St. Lucie, Indian River and Okeechobee Counties. To explore opportunities to volunteer or partner with Girl Scouts, call 561-427-0177 or visit www.gssef.org.
