Trish Williams and Melissa Powers wanted to lead by example in community service, so they really became leaders… Girl Scout leaders, that is.
Williams is associate dean of students and director of residence life, and Powers is former assistant director of residence life. Their office requires that Union resident assistants become involved in community service, so forming a Girl Scout troop seemed a good way to get involved themselves.
To become leaders, Williams and Powers had to go through a training process, including camping, which they both describe as “interesting.”
For Powers, a Girl Scout since her elementary school days, most of the training was old hat and pretty easy. For
Williams never a Girl Scout-it was just the opposite. Since most leaders are former Girl Scouts, the trainers assumed that everyone was familiar with what they were teaching.
“Everything was new to me,” she says. “The paperwork was the easy part, but everything else I had to be taught.” But they helped each other through (“I do the administrative stuff, she (Powers) plays with the kids,” Williams says), and soon they had their own troop.
Since the troop began, Erica DeCarlo, a senior and longtime Girl Scout, has been helping, and last fall, Farah Lalani, a freshman who has also been a scout since early elementary school, got involved. DeCarlo and Lalani went through leader training together and are now official leaders. Powers and Williams hope to pass the troop into students' hands.
The troop has eight members who are in grades one through five at three nearby elementary schools. Meetings are held every other week in the Reamer Campus Center, which Williams and Powers say has been beneficial for both the troop and Union students-the girls like to be at college, and the
students provide good role models. Many students who see-and hear-the girls in the Campus Center have offered to help on various occasions.
Williams and Powers have taken the troop camping and have had picnics with the girls and their families. And, of course, they have been working toward their badges. One badge involved making art to wear. For this project, the students of Ludlow House, where DeCarlo is house manager, got involved. Each girl was paired with a student, and they painted each others' faces. “The girls really enjoyed having a buddy for the day,” Powers says.
Williams and Powers have enjoyed watching the troop grow over the past couple of years. “It's working out well,” Williams says. “It's good to see them working together and interacting. And they can even sit still for a minute now,” she says, laughing.