Girl Scouts Gold Awards Identify Cortlandt Needs

CORTLANDT, N.Y. – College-bound high school seniors do not usually come to mind when Girl Scouts are mentioned. Yet four high school seniors from around Cortlandt are set to earn the organization’s highest honor, the Gold Award.

“Van Cortlandt Manor and history has always been something near and dear to my heart,” said scout Claire Leyden, when describing her motivation to create children’s booklets to pass out to young visitors of Van Cortlandt Manor.

Girl Scouts aiming for the Gold Award create projects which address a need in their community, and must be sustainable beyond the young woman’s involvement.

Each project is unique and specifically tailored to needs identified by its female creator. Projects have a wide breadth, the troop of four girls in Cortlandt independently created an LGBT sensitivity curriculum for middle and high school, an “open mic,” and a version of “Are You Smarter than a Fourth Grader,” to help kids with fractions.

Troop leader Agnes Leyden says the program teaches leadership among girls from the beginning. “Let’s let the girls make decisions, if they want to go on an outing to the library or to a pie shop," she said. "From the very, very beginning it’s letting the girls make decisions. By the time the girls get to be seniors in high school, if they make it that long, then the girls are doing the leading.”

Claire Leyden believes in the adage, “throw a stone” among female leadership today, and you will find a Girl Scout. Celebrities from Lucille Ball to Katie Couric, Star Jones, Dakota Fanning and Hilary Clinton were all Girl Scouts.

Although the Cortlandt troop’s membership is now small, the effect is exponential. Kyra Smith created a curriculum for Blue Mountain Middle School and Hendrick Hudson High School to teach students about different sexual orientations.

“I love learning about different people. A lot of people think sexuality is a black or white thing, gay or straight, but there are so many different colors in there,” she said. Smith identifies at bisexual, and said her own struggles helped her identify the focus of her project. “As I’ve grown into myself, watching other people grow up, I know how they’re feeling. They’re just as scared and just as anxious as I was."

Smith’s curriculum is focused on conversations between peers, hoping to teach about the LGBT community, while students learn about each other. Two other in the troop, Shivanee Shah and Kaylie Pyrch, are also pursuing Gold Award projects.

The Girl Scouts Heart of the Hudson Gold Award ceremony will take place on March 31 at the County Center in White Plains, in conjunction with the GSHH celebration of girl scouting’s 100th anniversary. The Kings Ferry Girl Scout community, comprising all troops in the Hendrick Hudson School District, will have its own awards ceremony on Tuesday, May 29, at Hendrick Hudson High School.  Girls and adults who have earned other awards will be recognized at that time as well.

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