Activism:
This past Sunday the group had an event with the Girl Scouts. The event entailed making bags for Safe House. We had the girls help us decorate the bags with different designs. The big success of the event would be that we ended up being able to make a lot of bags. My main pitfall would be that I got lost getting to Judy's house, but ended up getting there to help finish decorating the bags and spending time with the Girl Scouts. My group also met on Tuesday to go over the plan for this Saturday which is are big event.
Reflection:
These girls showed that leadership skills are not just in the form of transactional leadership. This type of work for the community is just as important as doing volunteer work directly with a community organization. These bags give the women as Safe House a bag full of basic necessities which can be nice after what they have gone through. The bags also being decorated will hopefully help them in someway. Showing them that people do care and took their time to draw designs on every bag. These girls showed that leadership is not just one sided and that many different skills and actions demonstrate leadership skills. I would love to say that these girls all believe in themselves that they are leaders, but not knowing what each of their understanding is on leadership makes it hard to say that. Even knowing were each girl stands on their understanding of leadership would still not define how they see themselves. In the article "Change It Up! What Girls Say About Redefining Leadership" the study found that the biggest problem that girls face with leadership has to do with their "self-perception—a lack of self-confidence in their own skills and competencies" (Schoenberg, Salmond, and Fleshman 7).
Reciprocity:
It was nice to see the Girl Scouts working together to create these bags and when putting the items into the bags. We formed a line which had each girl putting the product around them into each bag that came by. I completely believe that girls are capable of working together, but it is amazing actually to see it in person. I think there is a great possibility that these girls will go onto help the community more in the future.
Word Count: 388
Work Cited:
Schoenberg, Judy, Kimberlee Salmond, and Paula Fleshman. "Change It Up! What Girls Say About Redefining Leadership". Girl Scouts of the United States of America. New York: Girl Scouts of the USA. 2008. Web. November 17,2011. <http://www.girlscouts.org/research/pdf/change_it_up_executive_summary_english.pdf>
