Girl Scouts of Minnesota and Wisconsin River Valleys

Girls Scouts received the grant to develop the Go Green Girl! toolkit for waste reduction and is available for use in hard copy, electronic format, and for check-out. The toolkit is paired with a Go Green Girl! patch or badge. They completed the Go Green Girl! toolkit and patch program for Girl Scout troops, which has been promoted through Connections (for volunteers and girls) and Currents (for all Girl Scout supporters) newsletters. A Go Green Girl! blog was launched and is updated monthly and includes a new challenge each month. Go Green Girl! – Camp patch program was developed and Go Green Girl! activities were implemented at resident camps and day camps.

As a second year grantee in 2007-08, the Girl Scouts GSCSCV partnered with the Recycling Association of Minnesota (RAM) and developed a waste reduction curriculum for families and troops to use to learn to adopt waste reduction practices through the Green Family Challenge. They kicked off their event with a Go Green Girl! low waste event hosting 275 girls using bandanas for a placemat and napkin. Over half of those in attendance took a waste reduction action such as creating reused art, making non-toxic cleaners, or composting their food scraps. They promoted 52 weekly Green Family Challenges to 83,500 members. They also created a waste reduction kit that was checked out by 26 troops to fulfill badge requirements. Their kits will be replicated and offered for check out at four other service centers.

In 2003-04, over 1400 girls attended Camp Lakamaga near Forest Lake and took part in a composting demonstration project: 600 day campers learned how to compost at meal time and through signs on the property, and 800 resident campers participated in an hour-long composting information session and art activity (making a “scraps” bucket to take home). As a result, over 200 families committed to begin backyard composting. Three mailings that contained information on the composting project were sent to over 21,500 households. Due to the popularity of this initiative, the Girl Scouts created a “compost check out kit” for troop leaders who can check out a kit full of all the program supplies they need to complete a project on composting into the future.