ST. LOUIS, MO ─ Locally, Girl Scouts of Eastern Missouri is proud to recognize the 25 members of the 2023 Girl Scout Gold Award class who make a sustainable impact, addressing causes they care about in our communities.
Nationally, Girl Scouts of the USA (GSUSA) is recognizing the 3,500 members of the Gold Award Girl Scout class who identified the root cause of pressing issues in their communities, created sustainable solutions, and took action to earn the Gold Award: Girl Scouts’ highest achievement. This year’s class of world-changers invested over 300,000 hours in addressing real-life problems such as environmental sustainability, racial justice, mental and emotional wellness, and gender inequality in STEM.
The 2023 Gold Award Girl Scouts demonstrate the breadth of issues American teens feel are most prevalent in society today. Through their efforts, our girls are demonstrating a higher commitment to service and leadership.
Whether girls are: renovating the children’s playroom for The Women’s Safe House, creating a unique STEM board game to teach the basics of programming and illustrating a children’s book on limb-length discrepancies, they are using their passions to identify and solve problems in their corner of the world and beyond.
This year, Gold Award Girl Scout Meghan Jachna, a 2023 graduate of St. Joseph’s Academy, was a recipient of a $10,000 national GSUSA scholarship. Jachna partnered with the Missouri Botanical Garden to create educational activities on what plastic film is, the life cycle of a plastic bag, and how to reduce, reuse and recycle it. Jachna also taught visitors to the garden about the negative impacts the product can have on human health. To ensure she had accurate information for the activities, Jachna interviewed an expert, the director of the plastics sustainability team at the American Chemistry Council.
Jachna then used all the gathered information to share handouts with her audience that covered how to make reusable bags and getting involved with organizations to work to change policy to reduce the amount of plastics companies are using. Jachna gathered data that her presentation was impactful by having visitors scan a QR code to test their new knowledge after completing the activities. Jachna’s project will continue to be presented by the SAGE (Students at Garden Educators) program through the Missouri Botanical Garden. The students will be trained to deliver the program and provided the materials needed after they sign-up to present the program through the Missouri Botanical Garden volunteer portal.
GSUSA’s 111 councils were each provided the opportunity to nominate one of their outstanding Gold Award Girl Scouts to receive a national scholarship. The GSUSA Gold Award Scholarship recipients represent $225,000 invested, made possible by Insight Global, The Coca-Cola Foundation, and Kappa Delta Foundation.
“I believe that it is important to not only educate oneself on pressing social and environmental issues, but also take action to improve these issues,” Jachna said. “I was drawn to earning my Gold Award because it gave me the opportunity to work towards self-initiated goals and lead my own project, while staying connected with the robust Girl Scout community and supportive team of mentors and friends.”
To view the list of the 3,500 outstanding 2023 Gold Award projects, visit girlscouts.org/goldawardclass.
Girls in grades K–12 can join Girl Scouts any time during the year to begin their Girl Scout journey. As girls grow with Girl Scouts, they learn hands-on leadership skills they’ll use to make their mark through the Gold Award and beyond. To join or volunteer, visit girlscoutsem.org/join.
We’re Girl Scouts of Eastern Missouri
Girl Scouts bring their dreams to life and work together to build a better world. Through programs from coast to coast, Girl Scouts of all backgrounds and abilities can be unapologetically themselves as they discover their strengths and rise to meet new challenges—whether they want to climb to the top of a tree or the top of their class, lace up their boots for a hike or advocate for climate justice, or make their first best friends. Backed by trusted adult volunteers, mentors, and millions of alums, Girl Scouts lead the way as they find their voices and make changes that affect the issues most important to them. To join us, volunteer, reconnect, or donate, visit girlscoutsem.org.