The primary goals of Girl Scouts
Girl Scouts, as a fraternity, was initiated in 1912 in Georgia by the founder Juliette Gordon Low (Girl Scouts, 2016). The organization was chartered by the United States Congress 38 years later. Since then, the organization has spread to over 92 countries and has grown to over 2.5 million members (Girl Scouts, 2016). The primary goal of the entity is to empower girls. The fraternity has a wide array of programs which are designed to facilitate the discovery of fun, friendship, and the power that girls yield.
Furthermore, the entity has well-organized programs to achieve the primary goal. By executing this priority, the girls can realize and fully exploit their potential (Girl Scouts, 2016). The other goal is to promote understanding, respect, and build values. The realization and attainment of individual potential are contingent on having a culture based on values. Girl Scouts seeks to promote the development of this culture to create an optimal environment for the attainment of the secondary goals. Besides, values are the foundation for rational decision-making, which is critical in the pursuit of personal ambitions.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Girl Scouts third goal is to promote courage, confidence, and good character. The objective is associated with the binding law to be fair, honest, considerate, and friendly (Girl Scouts, 2016s). All these core parameters are essential in the endeavor to encourage the participation of girls in STEM. Primarily, STEM focusses on the ability to solve global problems through science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. It is paramount that the girls have the fundamental qualities enshrined in the fraternity’s law to achieve this.
How Girls Scout addresses these goals
The initiative has a balanced and well-organized program. The program has elements that are tailored to fulfill each objective. The plan has four major sections; STEM, outdoors, life skills, and entrepreneurship (Girl Scouts, 2016). The rationale for having these four aspects is to ensure that the girls not only have the skills and a matching personal character but also have the ability to apply the skills and knowledge. The outdoor activities are meant to create good interpersonal relations among the members. The reason for these relations is because the girls should be able to fit into society and relate productively with its members. The activities allow the mentors to educate the members on interpersonal relations and how to interact with different people.
Besides, the initiative strives to spark a desperate quest for leadership, innovation, and adventure. The essence of the quest is to not only impart the knowledge and skills but also to enable the girls to strive for relevant opportunities globally. By going through this initiative, members can overcome the gender barriers and stereotypes in STEM. Through courage, positivity, and good social relations, the girls can prove their ability and competence in any field where their ambition lies and compete equally with the male counterparts.
Brotman & Moore’s themes addressed by Girl Scouts
Girl Scouts addresses four Brotman and Moore’s themes; equity and access, revolutionizing the nature and culture of science and focusing on identity (Brotman and Moore, 2008). The life skills and outdoor activities address the identity, STEM programs address equity and access, while entrepreneurship deals with equity and access.
How I would improve or adapt Girl Scouts to also address an additional theme mentioned by Brotman & More
The initiative’s programs fail to address the curriculum and pedagogy. The entity should orientate part of its programs towards enabling the girls to identify gaps in the current curriculum to cater for this. Once the girls acknowledge the existence of shortcomings in the existing curriculum, they can use other complementary tools such as civic engagement to enlighten the community on the need for a more dynamic curriculum.
References
Brotman, J., & Moore, F. (2008). Girls and science: A review of four themes in the science education literature. Journal of Research in Science Teaching , 45 (9), 971-1002.
Our Program - Girl Scouts. (2016). Retrieved from https://www.girlscouts.org/en/our-program/our-program.html
