Silver Award | Girl Scouts

Silver Award

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Silver Award

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2022 Silver Award Girl Scouts
2022 Silver Award Girl Scouts

PHOTOS
MyLee J., Leah O. | New Egypt

MyLee and Leah’s Silver Award project was a garden memorial dedicated to the Americans affected by the tragic events that happened on September 11, 2001. The girls led a team to build a garden, with a 14 by 12 square foot space filled with various colorful flowers that attract butterflies, a representation of past loved ones and hope. Included in this space also is a steppingstone pathway that leads to a 6-foot-tall wooden sign. The sign gives a brief explanation of what the memorial is all about followed by several patriotic images and inspirational quotes about life, change, and hope. Another addition to the memorial sign are two QR codes. By simply scanning either one of these codes with your smartphone camera, you will be led to a diagram of the garden's diverse plant life or an informative website/donation center about 9/11. The memorial was constructed at the front of the town's municipal building so that it will be seen by not only current town residents, but new ones as well. Another benefit is that since the memorial is at such a pivotal town location, many events will be held near it bringing more awareness. The memorial is a representation of people coming together to help others, which is very fitting for the community. The garden is designed to attract butterflies. This was done for its symbolic representation, but also because butterflies are important ecosystem pollinators. The pollinators drawn to the 9/11 Butterfly Garden Memorial will be a great help to improve the town's environment and wildlife!

Samantha B. | Marlboro   

Samantha’s Silver Award, “A Moment in Herstory,” was created with the specific goal of assisting in the abolition of underrepresentation through art. The mural itself is a multidimensional piece featuring eight incredible women in history and will be hung in the Girl Scouts of the Jersey Shore Farmingdale Program Activity Center. Kamala Harris, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Frida Kahlo, Amy Tan, Mae Jemison, Chein-Shiung Wu, Ibtihaj Muhammad, and Serena Williams are all pictured. Along with the painting is a laminated foam piece that describes the purpose of the Silver Award, along with the professions of the women, where they are from, and a brief documentation of their accomplishments. Therefore, the viewer is aware of why these women are monumental and will hopefully be encouraged to do further research or share what they have learned.  

Julia S. | Cream Ridge

For Julia’s Silver Award project, she made a difference in the community by teaching the second graders in she local elementary school about the importance of the honeybee to our food source and the rapid decline of bees. Bees are very needed in her community because many of the families that live around her are farmers. She taught the second graders that they need bees to survive and without the bee's not only the community but the world with slowly decline as well. She started her project by visiting a local bee farm and doing research on the honeybee. Then she decided that her target group would be children because they are the future generation. She reached out to the local elementary school and projected her plan to the building principal to teach the local kids about the decline of the honeybees. After approval she began to work on an escape room to educate the students in a fun way. Due to Covid, she wasn’t able to enter into the school, so she created teaching slides and presented to the kids over zoom during school for two school days. She ended her project having the students create informative posters for the community. She was able to work with four classrooms of children as well as communicate with teachers through this journey. She then shared her resources on social media sites to spread the word about the importance of the honeybee.

Brielle T. | Waretown

For Brielle’s project, she made a beneficial insect pollinator garden as well as a bench. Planting a garden with native plants helps the community use fewer toxic insecticides, which makes a healthier and cleaner environment. Pollinators continue to pollinate. A bench makes a nice place to sit and enjoy the beauty of the garden. Beneficial insects are species that perform valued services like pollination and pest control for native plants and crops. Certain species of insects help maintain the ecological balance required for sustainable and successful gardens, crop yields, and forest ecosystems. Planting a small pollinator garden with certain native plants helps with the food chain while protecting the environment with insects that are natural non-toxic insecticides. Making a bench allows comfort and admiration of the garden. 

Lisa D. | Howell

Lisa’s Silver Award project, “Bricks for Botany Seed Library,” was created in response to the lack of sustainable environmental practices. For her award, Lisa established a seed trading system or 'seed library' where community members check out seeds, plant them, and return the harvested seeds from the grown plant back to the library. The library's mission is to promote sustainable healthy practices, and indirectly curb environmental crises which are done by supporting biodiversity. The library was initially anticipated to be kept in a case made of repurposed nonrecyclable plastics as another way to promote sustainability through waste reduction. However, in response to an unforeseen hiccup, a desk organizer which would've otherwise been thrown out was repurposed for the library instead. After partnering with her middle school's Environmental Club (which sustains the library by monitoring its use), as well as collecting insight and heirloom seed donations for seed companies, agricultural organizations, and farmers, Lisa opened the seed library at Howell Middle School South. An opening ceremony was virtually held to commemorate, “The Bricks for Botany Seed Library,” as well. This library has made a passionate community of growers, raised local awareness for the environment, and benefitted local biodiversity that in turn has aided a better environment for years to come.

Erin R. | Jackson

For Erin’s Silver Award project, she chose Operation Christmas Child awareness because of her troop volunteering in Operation Christmas Child in 2020. For her project, she reached out to the organizer of the program to see what she could to assist them with and how she could assist in bringing awareness to the community. She then proceeded to work with members of the community to assist in the donations of the items that are needed to fill the shoe boxes of Operation Christmas Child. Bringing awareness to the community, she was able to secure donations from local dentist offices and community centers. She was able to assist with the packing party, guiding community members through the process of filling the shoe boxes. She made a presentation that was distributed to local Girl Scout Troops to bring awareness to Operation Christmas Child. She had also reached out to her local senior center about crafting bags and sun dresses for donations to be placed in the shoe boxes. Members of the community agreed upon a yearly donation to assist with Operation Christmas Child.

Taleen M., Charlotte R. | Little Silver

Charlotte and her partner Taleen collected donations from their local pet stores like Feed and Seed, Pets General Store, and more, and donated them to local pet shelters like Pick Your Paw Shelter and Shore saves. They spread the word about their project and made it sustainable by writing articles for their local newsletter and magazine, and also creating an informational presentation on their Silver Award to show 8th grade Cadette troops and the local community to inspire them to work on their own Silver Award and continue partnering with the shelters.

Sarah C., Aubrey H. | Little Egg Harbor

Sarah and Aubrey’s Silver Award was created because the girls wanted the residents at a local group home to have a more peaceful and interactive space. The girls designed the new space, putting up a bird feeder, flower box, deer feeder, and bought a new table so the residents would be able to watch the animals. The girls also bought a new bench for them to be able to wait for their bus to pick them up. The girls reached out to the community and received donations of $500 dollars; Lowes in supplies and flowers, Hands who supplied mulch and soil, Sandy T's supplied butterfly bushes and other flowers, Stafford medical donated the table and chairs and umbrella, Home Depot donated a $50 dollar gift card, and Tractor Supply donated deer feeder and deer feed. The girls taught the residents how to feed the animals and how to take care of the new outdoor space.

Jillian P. | Homdel

Jillian’s Silver Award, titled “Coping Skills for Anxious Adolescents,” was created to help young kids like Jillian overcome anxiety. As she struggles with the same thing, she incorporated personal experiences into this award. Her project focused on creating an informational presentation and producing videos to reach out to those who need help with facing the obstacle of anxiety. With these videos, kids can follow along at their own pace, however many times to feel safe within any environment. This journey has taught Jillian so many new things some including she is not the only kid who struggles with this. There will be others out there who need someone's assistance (like her) to understand they aren't alone. Her project has made a difference in the community by sending information to many outlets such as Girl Scouts and Guidance Counselors, and more!

Lauren H., Maia M., Sela T. | Jackson

Lauren, Maia, and Sela provided resources to cope with anxiety and stress for middle schoolers for their Silver Award. The girls collected data from middle schoolers about what stresses them out and how they cope with it. They asked the current 6th graders about particular concerns they had about moving up to 6th grade. Using this data and research, they built a website with information and resources to address the concerns. In addition, they developed a presentation for 5th graders moving up to 6th graders on the topic to be presented at school. The girls also worked with school counselors to address other issues as they worked on their award.

Lucia S. | Bayville

Lucia’s Silver Award project focused on raising awareness to the decreasing population of Eastern Bluebirds in her area and how people can help these birds. She worked with the Ocean County Parks to hold seminars to educate local families on the Eastern Bluebirds and create new habitats for the birds that they could take home. Her project consisted of two parts: holding seminars involving bluebird nesting box building and educating people on the nesting habits of the Eastern Bluebird, and creating a new bluebird nesting box trail at Cedar Bridge Tavern Park. Through her project, she developed a program that was both educational and interesting for the public and created bluebird nesting box kits that were easy for families or young people to build. She also plot out an entirely new trail at Cedar Bridge Tavern County park, built and installed all the new nesting boxes on the trail with volunteers.

Sarah C. | Jackson

Sarah’s Silver Award, titled “Dogs in Action” focuses on therapy dogs. Within her project Sarah researched therapy dogs as well as trained and certified her dog Layla to become a therapy dog. Within her research Sarah created a presentation to educate people on all the different things that therapy dogs can do, as well as how therapy dogs differ from service dogs. She dives into the mental and physical benefits that therapy dogs can provide. Sarah’s project was delayed for quite some time as the places that therapy dogs are normally found were all closed due to Covid. But, as soon as things opened back up Sarah and Layla were able to start visiting places. Sarah also brought her newly certified therapy dog to colleges and nursing homes. While at these places Sarah was able to see how much joy therapy dogs can bring to people of all ages.

Molly P. | Lakehurst

Molly knew that the new church in town needed bushes, trees, and flowers so that the butterflies, bees and birds would come as the previous landscaping was all torn out. Molly started going to the church when it opened in Sept of 2020 and she quickly made new friends of all ages. However, one special family really stood out, the Werthweins. Though Molly didn't know Mr. Ed for a long time, he and his wife made a huge impact on her life! Sadly, Mr.Ed lost his life to Covid in early 2021 and Molly knew that the garden needed to be created in his honor. For her Silver Award, Molly created the "Ed Werthwein Memorial Reflection Garden.”Molly led this project with the help of friends, family, people in the community, and a few of her sister scouts. A total of 11 people came out the day of the project. Molly worked hard on getting donations of items, meeting with managers, and discussing the importance of the garden. She was able to get 2 tons of black mulch and 2 tons of soil donated from OCRC and 60 retaining wall blocks donated by Loews, andWild Birds Unlimited donated a butterfly home. Molly’s team fixed the left front side of Proving Ground Church, made a garden bed, laid the soil and mulch, arranged two benches, planted flowers and bushes, fixed handicapped signs by repainting the old posts and placing new signs on. The elders of the church will maintain the project through the landscaper and the volunteer grounds people.

Claire B., Chloe C. | Homdel

For their Silver Award, Chloe and Claire educated other Girl Scouts on a topic they thought was very important for people to be educated on, abuse. They started with craft kits for the children at 180NJ (an organization that provides a haven for survivors of domestic abuse.) The craft kit contained materials to make a no-sew pillow, we also sent a video tutorial on how to create it. The girls were happy the children had fun creating the craft and cheered them up during a difficult time for them. Then, they created a presentation on 5 different types of abuses to teach other Girl Scouts in our community about the topic. They have learned in personal experience that kids their age aren’t get taught about abuse, even though it is an important topic in the world that we live in. The presentation also included different hotlines, organizations, and what to do if someone confides to you about abuse going on in their life. Between the two Girl Scouts, they researched and created a slideshow presentation, along with a video of themselves presenting the slideshow. The videos were posted online and shared amongst the community.

Olivia S. | Brant Beach

Olivia’s Silver Award project was created to help feral kittens and cats find a forever home and decrease the population of feral cats in the area. She spread information online by posting about the cute foster kittens up for adoption and what people could do to help them out. She worked with the Friends of Southern Ocean County Animal Shelter (FOSOCAS) and created a kitten fostering manual that is posted on FOSOCAS's website. This manual informs people on what FOSOCAS does, how important it is to foster if you can, how to foster, and how to help the foster kittens anyway you can. Olivia also fostered kittens herself to show people how it is something anyone can do. She shared her experience with her friends and handed out flyers which had the information on feral kittens and kittens in the shelter.

Grace C. | Little Egg Harbor

During the Global Pandemic, Grace created her Silver Award, called " Gardens Galore", and focused all about gardening safely and at home. Through her project, she made a difference in her community by creating her own website, informing people how to garden from their own homes. When COVID 19 hit her community, it prevented people from going outside and gathering with friends and family, resulting in a decrease in mental health. With her easy to access website, people from not only her town but all over can benefit from the miracle of gardening. She led her team in researching and creating the website, highlighting important seasons for specific plants and planting processes. She taught members of her community and shared her tips and tricks as well for people to continue gardening after the pandemic.

Amelia R. | Howell

Amelia’s Silver Award, “Gender Inequality of Women,” was created with the intent of educating youth of the harmful stereotypes of women in the media, as well as helping them in our community. Amelia and her team ran meetings for four troops teaching them what sexism and stereotypes were, what stereotypes affect women, and how they manifest, as well as issues that affect women today. They also created a bookshelf that showcases feminist books that could inspire young students to make a difference in Howell Township Middle School North as the sustainable portion of the project. Over the summer, the team donated to 180 Turning Lives Around to finish off the project by donating large boxes full of school supplies, socks and underwear, toiletries, and cleaning supplies, as well as a large bag with boxes of pads and tampons.

Jennevieve D. | Wall

Jennevieve’s Silver Award project “Getting to Know Geckos and Other Exotic Animals” was designed to educate her community about the care of leopard geckos and spread awareness about rescue organizations who support an “Adopt/Don’t Shop” mission for unwanted small exotic animals. Many of these exotic animals can make wonderful starter pets when acquired and cared for properly. For this project, Jennevieve researched and created her own habitat, prior to adopting a 3-year older leopard gecko from a local exotic animal rescue, and then used what she learned from this experience to create and publish an online tutorial that outlines proper habitat setup and care for leopard geckos. She then partnered with Wild Exotics Animal Rescue to help spread awareness at a community wide event and has created the framework for an “Exotic Pet” Girl Scout patch program. Jennevieve hopes that this program will continue to spread awareness to younger Girl Scouts, empowering them to learn and get more involved in this cause.

Vassi C., Katrina C. | Lanoka Harbor

For their Silver Award, Vassi and Katrina connected with someone locally who just started fostering five week old puppies. The girls assisted her with fostering the puppies by brushing fleas, giving them baths, helping vaccinate them, helping name them, playing with them, and meeting people who wanted to adopt them. Lindsey taught them about the importance of fostering and how she did it. The girls then made blankets, emergency leashes and dog toys for foster dogs and they gave them to the fostering organization. Then to inspire others about their project, they created a poster about the importance of fostering and shared this with their community as well as brochures that had the same information as the poster and handed them out to pet stores and vets, and Shoprite. Last, they organized stations for a younger troop so they could teach them about the importance of fostering and how to make dog toys and leashes.

Sofia K. | Point Pleasant

Sofia’s Silver Award aimed to bring awareness to native bees specifically to Mason bees as extraordinary pollinators. Mason bees are wild bees and are native to this area and so she wanted to educate the public about these bees and build habitats for them, as well as start a pollinator garden. Sofia attended the Green Fair in Brick Township with educational posters that showed differences between the honeybee and Mason bee, and the life cycle of Mason bee. She talked to about 75people about importance of Mason bees, handed out pollinator garden seeds for people to start their own pollinator gardens along with educational flyer about these bees that she created and with donation of 100 copies from local printing businesses. Her display had different types of bee hotels to show the public how they can build their own bee house and to help Mason bee population. She also held a presentation for the Garden Club of Brick on for 45 members of the club and left her educational flyer and list of native plants for them to plant around the town to help with Mason bee population. She also presented to her troop and a local Busy Beekeeping club about the importance of native bees and held the display of the bee hotels at Ocean County Fair as well. Last, she helped to plant pollinator gardens at Jakes Branch County Park and donated her biggest hotel to the pollinator garden that she helped to plant.

Juliette S. | Jackson

For Juliette’s project, she created a safe habitat for both birds and butterflies at the Sunrise Senior Living in Jackson for the residents to enjoy. She contacted local nurseries to get donations of plants that would attract birds and butterflies. She then worked with Sunrise to find a location that would be best for the birds and butterflies but that the residents would be able to enjoy also. She also researched and went back to the nursery to find plants that worked in the area she picked, based on the amount of sun it gets, that would be best for both larvae and adult butterflies. With her project advisor, she led a team of three people to do all the planting. She then researched the types of birdhouses that would be best for her project and led a team of students from her school play’s stage crew team to help build and paint all different types of birdhouses. Each of the birdhouses is designed to attract different kinds of birds. She researched the best type of feeders and birdbaths to help attract the birds. She created a 20-page laminated guidebook which the residents could use to identify the various birds and butterflies that her project would attract. Each page shows a photo of the type of bird and some important facts about that bird. Juliette did her project in the gardens that the residents could enjoy from their outdoor patio or through the windows of their dining room.

Isabel D. | Lakehurst

Isabel DiMeo2022 Girl Scouts of the Jersey Shore Silver Award Necessary Pantry BoxIsabel realized that within her community people couldn’t always get the items they needed. Whether they didn’t have time to go to the store due to long work hours, weren’t able to purchase personal hygienic items due to cost, or other reasons, Isabel led her team to build thepantry box for her Silver Award. The box is made of a mixture of wood and composite material, with the roof being covered with an asphalt shingle. The interior is made of wire for shelving and the exposed walls and trim is made of composite material. The outside is painted and stained. The box is filled with materials such as food, cleaning supplies, and hygiene products. Lakehurst Presbyterian Church and residents will help keep the pantry stocked.

Brooke R., Charlotte C. | Little Silver

Charlotte and Brooke beautified the garden bed in front of the Historic Parker Homestead in Little Silver New Jersey. They went through several phases of weeding, planting, and watering throughout the year to deal with the weather and deer. The girls planted perennials for every season, spring bulbs, as well as a dwarf Spruce Evergreen tree in the center of the garden bed. They added a rain barrel made to collect and use rainwater to water the plants for the future. To make the project sustainable, Charlotte and Brooke presented their project to a local girl scout troop and worked with the homestead to continue the work on the property. This project is very special to the townspeople by making the house prettier, which helps build pride in their town and hopefully will also encourage others to come and explore the homestead and learn about its history.

Casey R., Katie D. | Howell, Jackson

Katie and Casey created their Silver Award project titled, “Plant A Seed For Those In Need,” by reaching out to various food pantries in Jackson and Howell to find out what the needs were and discovered that fresh produce is scarce and much needed in food pantries. The girls each planted gardens with different types of tomatoes, eggplants, peppers, cucumbers, string beans, and snap peas. Their donations were over 40 lbs of fresh vegetables to three different food pantries. For the second part of their project, they created 160 Blessing Bags for the Blessing Bag Brigade in Freehold and included younger Girl Scouts to write inspirational messages. The third part of their project was speaking to younger troops about their project and hosting activities to educate the girls about world hunger, budgeting for a family, and gave each girl a seed to plant in their own garden and help those in need.

Angelina T. | Whiting

Angelina completed her Silver Award at her local elementary school. Working with the school, she led her team to create two sensory paths for the students to use. She made a path inside that would allow children to get their sensory needs out when they need a break or when they cannot go outside. The path outside would allow students to work in gross motor skills. The team also created giant game boards for children to work on social skills. This is an important project to Angelina because her mom is a special education teacher and she learned that children all learn differently and sometimes need more movement to allow them to be able to learn. Sensory paths can be used to support children with sensory processing issues or to help children to develop motor skills, balance, hand-eye coordination and spatial awareness. This can help both the students in the general education classes and the special education classes. Teachers can use the path as an inside and outdoor recess activity to get energy out or as a brain break. The Occupational and Physical therapist can also use the paths to work on motor skills. Angelina and her team trained the teachers in the school how to use the paths in their classrooms as well as the benefits of the paths.

Ariana M. | Middletown

Ariana’s Silver Award Take Action Project gathered students in grades 3-5 in “social circles” via Google Classroom. The social circles were a social time, facilitated by Ariana with a script/plan of activities to encourage kids to talk with one another, get to know each other and focus on a theme during each session. She planned and led 24 sessions on zoom that occurred 4 times each week for 1 hour with each group. She held sessions in the morning for homeschoolers and sessions in the afternoon for public schooled children and home-schooled children. Some themes discussed were as follows: listening, friendship, value, teamwork, identity, self-confidence, emotions, communication, setting goals, conflict, making decisions, and anger-management. This project made a difference in the community because everyone has been impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic and the social circles gave a way for kids to safely connect with each other focusing on mental and social-emotional health themes.

Hailey B., Giavana G., Mackenzi L. | Little Egg Harbor

Mackenzi, Hailey, and Giavana, made a big difference in their community with their Silver Award by putting out positive words to anyone and everyone. These little actions can make someone's whole day and the girls wanted to remind people that they are enough, and everything is going to be okay. Through their project, they painted positive quotes in the Cat Shack, a local pantry, and school bathrooms in both gender bathrooms. The girls designed the quotes and painted themselves on the walls and doors of the bathrooms, working with the school to share their message and spread positivity.

Maggie D., Isabella B. | Holmdel

Maggie and Bella saw a need for a greater access to books in the Keansburg area and wanted to give books to people in need. For their Silver Award, “St. Mark's Keansburg Free Little Library,” they built a free little library with a STEM theme. The girls filled their library with book donations from a local school library with books focused on STEAM, such as science, tech, engineering, math, and art. They also created a make and take STEAM activity for visitors to take home from the library. Their library will be sustained through ongoing donations from the visitors to church and community center of St. Marks.

Ella S., Mackenzie M., Sophia S., Ava C. | Freehold

Mackenzie, Ava, Ella, and Sophia created their Silver Award, “STOP Domestic Violence.” This award was conducted to spread more awareness of an ongoing problem in today's society, women's domestic violence. Just a few years ago in their hometown a young woman, Stephanie Parze was domestically abused and killed by her ex-boyfriend. This tragedy was an eye opener to the girls and encouraged them to showcase the severity of domestic violence. They wanted to make people more aware of domestic violence in their community. The girls found that if people were more aware of it and the signs of it, then they could help put it to a stop. In this case, the girls branched out to their community to host activities to teach young girls about domestic violence and the signs of domestic violence. They taught young girls what domestic violence is, how to prevent it, warning signs, how to reach for help, and how to maintain healthy relationships. They created scenarios for the young girls to give them an idea of how this could happen in real life. These girls also created a board saying “Stop domestic violence,” in honor of Stephanie Parze and to keep her story out to the public. The girls spent time volunteering with the Stephanie Nicole Parze Foundation with hopes they have educated and touched many girls and will continue to do so to prevent this from happening.

Julia B., Luella F., Grace F., Skyla W. | Ocean Township

For their Silver Award, Sky, Julia, Grace, and Luella worked with their town leaders and community to improve the safety of the route that kids take when biking or walking to school, specifically the four-way stop area at Bowne and Deal Roads. Their project consisted of three main aspects; make the 4-way stop safer, communicate road safety to adults, and communicate bike safety to kids. For their first goal, after connecting with town received approval to install a new crosswalk and to put up signs to communicate to drivers about road and bike safety. The girls reached out to the community via social media and lawn signs to inform adults about the children riding their bikes to school and to slow down and be more aware. They also taught the 3rd and 4th grade students at a local elementary school about bike safety and placed bike safety signs at the bike racks at school.

Maya J. | Toms River

Maya completed their Silver Award called “The Confetti Problem.” Most confetti can be considered a “micro-plastic, “meaning it is smaller than 5 millimeters. And because of its size, it can make its way into our ecosystems, food chains, and local wildlife. Confetti has the largest and most harmful impact on birds and fish. Unfortunately, most people don’t realize harmful confetti really is. To bring more awareness to the issue, Maya created a slideshow that discussed how Confetti makes its way into our ecosystems, how to prevent it from happening, and lists non harmful alternatives to synthetic confetti. To combat this issue, Maya worked alongside a teacher at Brookdale community college and had students create an online presentation about “The Confetti Problem” and how it correlated to their current lessons in the class. The assignments were posted online, creating a lasting impact and continuous spread of knowledge about this issue. And worked with a past teacher to give a presentation to the class virtually and answer questions at a local elementary school. Maya also created a poster display for the “Manasquan Reservoir Environmental Center.”

Paige C. | Aberdeen

As the daughter of two Holiday Express volunteers/ musicians, she realized her project idea would be a perfect match with the Holiday Express mission. For her Silver Award, Paige led her troop in writing greeting cards, wrapping candy bags, collecting coloring books and crayons for Holiday Express clients, organized and promoted a community collection of new, warm socks, and volunteered her time at the Holiday Express warehouse to help pack the gift bags that are distributed at every event. Going forward, Paige’s efforts are sure to continue, since she has mentored and brought other Girl Scouts onboard to volunteer with Holiday Express and she’s made plans to continue collection drives each year for gift bag items that are most needed. The National Junior Honor Society at her Middle School also plans to hold many drives in the near and far future. She would like to thank everyone who guided her through this journey and looks forward to working on her Girl Scout Gold Award.

Mia C. | Whiting

“The Groovy Little Library” Silver Award created by Mia gives the community of Whiting the ability to trade in their old books for new ones as well as giving used books a new life. This project was brought to life because Mia, a Girl Scout of eight years, has a strong passion for reading. She wanted to provide her community with an opportunity to take books at no cost. The Groovy Little Library was constructed, painted, and installed by Mia and her family. The library is made of hardy materials that will provide the community with a place to donate and receive books. Books of all genres, reading levels, and conditions are welcomed at the Groovy Little Library. With a diverse selection, residents are encouraged to keep the books as long as they would like. The project will be sustained by a local organization, frequently adding books and updating the community on Instagram and the Groovy Little Library website.

Alyssa F. | Howell

Alyssa worked on her Silver Award, “The Health Benefits of Herbs,” throughout her middle school years including during the pandemic. For her Silver Award, she grew and donated her herbs at a local farmers market. One of her goals was to reduce her carbon footprint and so she focused on sustainably planting her herbs in container gardens. She attended her local farmer’s market where she distributed brochures along with her herbs, spreading awareness of their health benefits. She also created a website where she posted videos of how to use the herbs and other helpful information about the specific benefits that come from them. Alyssa researched all of the different types of herbs and their health benefits and then inputted all of that information into the website. She also made and edited video’s on how to better use the herbs and how to plant them sustainably in container gardens.

Peyton K. | Jackson

The “Woodlawn Cemetery Veterans,” Silver Award Project, created and completed by Peyton Rhyan, addressed the many Veterans graves in the Woodlawn Cemetery in Lakewood, NJ that were unmarked, as well as the lack of awareness about the Veterans who served and laid down their lives and were interred there. The team’s goal was to beautify and honor the Veterans at the Woodlawn Cemetery and in the process, the Woodlawn Cemetery Team addressed this issue by working on landscaping, grave cleaning, and producing and planting two-hundred grave markers for unmarked Veterans graves at the Woodlawn Cemetery. This Silver Award project will be sustained beyond the team’s involvement by their community outreach, since the Woodlawn Cemetery Veterans Team made efforts to get this project out and into the minds of the community, including through a bake sale at the Jackson Memorial Day parade. Due to a presentation made for the Woodlawn Cemetery’s website, there is now a permanent tool for people to learn about the Veterans at the cemetery. The landscaping that was planted will be maintained by the Cemetery Volunteer Board Members, as well as other volunteers in the community.

Sophia W. | Wall

Sophia’s Silver Award, “Yearly Chip Check-Up!” was created to spread awareness about microchips in pets, most commonly dogs. Her project was mostly based on microchips that had migrated from the original spot on the neck. She created flyers with important information about microchips and she attended multiple dog adoption days through the ‘Heaven Sent Rescue’ handing out these flyers to the new pet owners. Additionally, she reached out to over 50 different animal shelters, hospitals, police departments, and veterinarian offices, spreading the information and asking them to display her flyer. The Long Branch Animal Control Supervisor reached back out to her and asked her to collaborate creating a short video demonstrating how to scan a whole animal for the chip, rather than just the neck. Furthermore, she went to local dog parks and posted her flyers whenever they had billboards, and asked friends and family to share the information. Ultimately, Sophia’s project revolved around spreading information in many ways to share the essential knowledge about traveling as well as normal microchips.

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