Girl Scout Leadership Experience
To learn more about The New Girl Scout Leadership Experience, visit the GSUSA Web site.
At a Glance
Girl Scouts understands that girls have unique needs that are best met in a program designed specifically for them and delivered in an all-girl setting. Research tells us that a girl’s leadership blooms when she’s among other girls, away from school pressures, social cliques, and boys. In a place where she can be herself and take on new challenges. Where activities are girl-led. Where each girl learns by doing, and the learning is cooperative, not competitive. Where adults mentor girls and model skills, behaviors, relationships, and careers that girls can emulate.
Girl Scouts has developed an exciting model that meets every one of these needs—it’s called the Girl Scout Leadership Experience. Everything girls do in Girl Scouting is infused with the Girl Scout Leadership Experience, which shows girls how to discover who they are and what they stand for, connect with vibrant and diverse peers in their own neighborhoods and around the globe, and together take action to make a difference in the world, inspiring and advocating for others along the way. The Girl Scout Leadership Experience identifies fifteen exciting outcomes/benefits for girls, all of which propel girls toward becoming the exceptional women they were born to be.
Why is Girl Scouts focusing on leadership?
Girl Scouts has always been about leadership, so this is not a new focus but a more deliberate one. Even at the youngest ages of Girl Scouting, girls can gain leadership skills they will carry with them throughout their lives. The Girl Scout focus on leadership shows girls that they are leaders right now in their everyday lives, and they will continue to be leaders as they get older. We believe that when women are leaders in our world, positive results are achieved—and our world needs more positive results.
How is leadership taught to girls?
In the new Girl Scout Leadership experience, activities are organized around three Leadership Keys—discover, connect, and take action—which translate into knowing yourself, reaching out to others, and taking action to contribute to society in sustainable ways, making a difference in the world. This means that in every Girl Scout program delivered to girls of each age group, there will be a Discover, Connect and Take Action component. These three Leadership Keys and the focus on leadership development will start to build a consistent experience for girls across the country.
