Nassau County got into Scouting way back in 1917 with the first Boy Scout council and first Girl Scout troop. At the time, the orienteering and outdoor skills Scouting promotes were still useful, even in Farmingdale.
Nearly 100 years later, our lives are much less rustic. Scouting has adapted. Now, troops are more likely to promote robotics studies and entrepreneurship than how to start a fire or build a lean-to. What endures through the decades of change are lessons of leadership and teamwork, as useful for survival on Main St. as wielding an axe is in a forest.
But there’s a hitch at present. (Or maybe a half-hitch.) As a loose network of small groups, Scouting relies on local adults—parents, grandparents, uncles, aunts and cousins—for leadership.
Right now, several hundred young girls in Nassau County are ready to form troops, but lack an adult to lead them. To empty its waitlist of 800 girls, Girl Scouts of Nassau County is calling for volunteer leaders.
If you can’t make a regular time commitment, there’s a range of shorter volunteer opportunities. But if you can, consider becoming a leader of young women. There are many eager to learn from your example.
