Salon.com > Girl Scouts

Girl Scouts introduce game design and coding curriculum

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 13:07:00 +0000

A Los Angeles chapter of the Girl Scouts has introduced a merit award for game design in an effort to encourage its members to get involved in science and technology, and help close the gender gap in both fields.

The California-based chapter partnered with Women in Games International to design the requirements and curriculum for the patch. And while the new focus area isn't recognized organization-wide yet, they hope that will change, soon: "Fostering interest in technology and video game development in females of all ages ... is the main inspiration for working towards a national badge," Sheri Rubin, president and CEO of Design, Direct, Deliver and a member of WIGI's steering committee, told NBC News in an email.

"Our plan is to start by working with the Girl Scouts of Greater Los Angeles to introduce a local patch and once successful open it up to other councils where game developers are prevalent," she added. "We hope this can be accomplished over the next couple years."

In addition to designing their own games, scouts will also be learning to code them using a customized version of design program Gamestar Mechanic.

I was an atheist child, and the Girl Scouts didn’t want me

Sun, 10 Feb 2013 14:00:00 +0000

The news this week from Scoutland brings controversy over a proposed end to the ban on gay Americans. But here’s another dirty little secret. The Boy Scouts also officially discriminate against atheists and agnostics. For much of their history, the Girl Scouts did, too, but in 1993, the national organization had the sense to stop this unfair and distinctly un-American practice.

That was too late for me. I was a Brownie in 1978, and wanted to become a Girl Scout. It was not to be. I had a hard time fitting in as a kid. My Sunday school teacher’s eyes shot daggers at me when, after a lesson on the Virgin Mary, I asked, “Was Joseph a virgin, too?” I just didn’t take to the religion thing. Alongside my Bible, I read Bullfinch’s Mythology, and I much preferred the Greek gods. They fell in love and had adventures and didn’t seem to take themselves so seriously. There was laughter in heaven. Jesus was sort of okay – I liked some of his sermons. But the Bible seemed filled with harsh desert people (mostly men) morbidly obsessed with death and suffering. What had they to do with me?

When I was eight, I became a Brownie and took much pleasure in my crisp little uniform and close association with mint chocolate cookies. I vaguely recall winding yarn around popsicle sticks and doing things like that to prove my craftiness. Like most Brownies, I yearned to join the green ranks of the Girl Scouts, so I dutifully earned Brownie points in preparation for the big event when I would be pinned by a troop leader and accepted into the upper echelon of girldom.

But something unexpected happened during the Induction Ceremony. The ritual of transition from Brownie to Girl Scout was very sacred and solemn and involved, among other things, staring into a pool of water. It also required me to pledge an oath to God. (You can check out a video of some little tykes saying it here.)

On my honor, I will try:
To serve God and my country,
To help people at all times,
And to live by the Girl Scout Law.

This pledge didn't sit right with me, for the simple reason that as far as I could tell, God didn’t exist. To pledge an oath to him would be lying. I stood frozen when it was time to swear fealty to a non-existent being. Probably I could have gotten away with just mouthing the words, but a feeling in the pit of my stomach told me that was wrong. I sheepishly mumbled my dilemma to the troop leader and she looked at me with the exasperation adults get when confronting a pint-sized pain in the ass. “Well, that’s what it takes to be a Girl Scout.” Confused, ashamed, and a little defiant, I took off my sash and handed it to her.

That was that. I would never have those illustrious Girl Scout badges for basket weaving and whatnot proudly streaming across my chest. The green uniform would not be mine. Part of me was a little relieved, because I wasn’t the sportiest of children and joining the Scouts meant proving my fitness for things like orienteering and riflery. I still like the cookies, though.

Compared to the Boy Scouts, today’s Girl Scouts are known as the more progressive example of youth programming. According to the Atlantic, the Boy Scouts of America still “expressly prohibits membership (even as Cub Scouts) of atheists and agnostics.” The Girl Scouts, on the other hand, are now cool with atheism and have shown a fondness for New Agey tenets. They've even drawn the ire of Catholic bishops. I’ll give them points for that.

The Girl Scout haters’ biggest mistake

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 16:39:00 +0000

Last week Indiana State Rep. Bob Morris claimed, in an open letter magnificently disdainful of facts, that Girls Scouts of the USA financially supports Planned Parenthood and is a force of pro-sex, pro-abortion, pro-homo indoctrination, determined to reach our American daughters. Since his original refusal to sign an Indiana statehouse resolution honoring the 100th anniversary of the GSUSA, Morris has made a nonsensical apology, saying that he “should never have written the letter,” while holding to the counterfactual argument that the GSUSA is partnered with Planned Parenthood.

The right still hates the Girl Scouts

Fri, 24 Feb 2012 21:45:00 +0000

Like alligators in the sewers or aspirin between the knees, certain memes are too stupid to die. For example: the extreme right's continued depiction of green-clad girls as abortion-hungry, traditional values-subverting agents of Satan.

On Tuesday, Indiana State Rep. Bob Morris made headlines for pooh-poohing a resolution celebrating the organization Juliette Gordon Low founded 100 years ago, the one that teaches girls to "make the world a better place." Umbrage mightily taken, Morris declared the Girl Scouts were "quickly becoming a tactical arm of Planned Parenthood" and have been "subverted in the name of liberal progressive politics and the destruction of traditional American family values" by "liberal progressives" promoting "feminists, lesbians or Communists." He also, big surprise, worked in the words "indoctrinate" and "radically pro-abortion." Damn, when I was a Girl Scout, all we ever did was make yarn dolls and sing folk songs.

The right’s latest target: Girl Scout cookies

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 17:35:00 +0000

For many of us, this is the most wonderful time of the year. The holidays are over, but there's still plenty of time to get the taxes done. Snow remains a pleasant novelty. Best of all – the Girl Scouts are selling cookies. But there are always dark forces conspiring to stand between slavering devotees and their Do-Si-Dos. In years past, they took aim at the cookies for trans fats, so the Girl Scouts eliminated them. This year, the critics are after something bigger: the Girl Scouts' politics.

The conservative hand-wringing started back in the spring, when antiabortion forces rallied their troops against the organization for its incredibly casual association with Planned Parenthood. Now, just in time for Chalet Crème season, those alleged ties to Planned Parenthood have been enough to get a crackpot in St. Louis to call for a boycott, forcing the Scout's East Missouri CEO to meekly promise, "Our girls have nothing to do with this organization." Also, a Catholic church in Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C., ousted the Scouts from meeting on its property because of the Planned Parenthood "controversy." No cookies for you, Saint Timothy's!

Is reality TV good for girls?

Wed, 07 Dec 2011 17:00:00 +0000

We all know how to raise girls with healthy self-esteem. Encourage them to be physically active. Set a positive example by showing them you believe in yourself. And let them watch reality TV. Wait, what?

OK, it's not quite that simple. In surprising-to-no-one news this week, a new study from as reliable source as the Girl Scout Research Institute found plenty to confirm all your worst fears about girls who define themselves as "regular" reality watchers. After surveying 1,100 girls aged between 11 and 17 nationwide, the Girl Scouts found that compared with their non-reality TV watching peers, reality fans are likelier to agree that gossiping is a normal part of girls' relationships (78 percent vs. 54 percent), that girls are naturally "catty" with each other (68 percent vs. 50 percent) and that it's "hard to trust" girls (63 percent vs. 50 percent).

Regular reality-TV viewers also report spending a significantly larger amount of time on their appearance and are far likelier to agree with statements like "Being mean earns you more respect than being nice." Apparently, reality fans don't join the Girl Scouts to make friends; they join to win.