Az Brownie Troop Supports Max Cure Foundation

Author: Nicole Hopkins

As a new Brownie Troop leader (girls in grades 2 and 3) in the Southern Arizona Region (Troop 26), I wanted to really try and provide my girls with a “girl led” experience, and also introduce them to the idea of impacting a world beyond their immediate view. Additionally, I was interested in helping the girls get prepared for working on their Bronze, Silver and, eventually, their Gold awards; the highest awards that Girl Scouting offers. All of these awards have a component of community service involved.

The girls were all asked to think about the kinds of people they wanted to help, and why it was important to them. Thankfully, my group is small, so the ideas they had were narrowed down to the following:

• They wanted to help homeless people by giving them food or clothing,
• They wanted to help women and girls in third world countries,
• They wanted to help sick kids.

My job, as their leader, was to help guide them to find ways we could accomplish these types of service projects. In my investigation, I was fortunate enough to have found some information about an upcoming Dunk Your Kicks event in Phoenix via Facebook (I am an aspiring runner, so my “ad” feed picked this up). Upon investigating what this event was about, I realized that our girls could accomplish ALL of their goals by sponsoring a Dunk Your Kicks event in Tucson…and we had a potential venue!

Every year, our Girl Scout Council hosts a “Thin Mint Sprint”, which is a 5K event whose proceeds help fund the scholarships which help other girls become Girl Scouts, as well as many council sponsored events through the year. I proposed the idea of having a Dunk Your Kicks event with the team at the Girl Scout Council, and they were fully on board.

My girls are now VERY excited about this project, and plan to leverage the skills they have learned by participating in Girl Scouts to spread the word and raise awareness about the Max Cure foundation and the goals this group has. As a troop, we have identified different stores that might let us collect shoes prior to the Thin Mint Sprint, and the girls plan to “pitch their plan” to store managers. The girls are also excited to share their experience with other troops, and hopefully help engage other troops in participating in the Dunk Your Kicks campaign, not only in Arizona, but possibly coast to coast. They have set a goal of collecting 5,000 pairs of shoes, and plan to donate half of their cookie proceeds to directly sponsor a local family identified by Max Cure.

Not only is the Max Cure Foundation helping families who struggle financially with an unimaginable burden of watching their child suffer with pediatric cancer, they are also assisting my girls in learning about service, communication and organization skills and how to execute a project; skills that will help them become future leaders and individuals committed to making the world a better place.