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This is the time of year where we take a long hard look at what we do.   We are always interested in improving our services to you and the girls we have the privilege of working with.   The best way for us to make changes is to listen to your input about what we do well and what areas where we can provide better service.

We are at a crossroads.   We recently have received notice of significant funding cuts for the 2013-2014 year.   Part of the funding cuts are due to sequestration, and other cuts I will share more about next week, as we have more information, but it looks like we will be working faster, quicker, smarter next year just to be at the place we are today.

Change is welcome. We can all learn and grow for how to leverage more of what we have to offer to the community.   We are partners with you, so we need your assistance in learning how we can be more fiscally efficient and efficient with all our resources.

This summer, we will be inviting you to an evening of light dinner and conversation, just adults.   Please come and talk to us.   Come with good ideas on how we can be better and illustrate to the community you are in that Girl Scouts change the world, one girl at a time.   These events will be starting in June, so stay tuned for one near you.

And, at the end of a good year with the girls, thank you for all you do. 

What would we do without you?   Well, the answer to that is you are integral to all we do.   You change the world through your gifts, time, and talents.   You are how the Girl Scout program stays alive!

One of the bonuses of our work is to have daily interaction with individuals who possess a giving heart, talented hands, energy and enthusiasm.   I have met troop leaders and parents with endless patience, unbelievable creativity, and a care and concern for girls that is simply amazing.   When others sit back and watch, they see that you are the lifeblood that makes our world a better place.   There are no spectators in our group of caring, giving, and generous volunteers!

All GSSA Leaders are invited to take advantage of a 20% discount off any one item in the shop (excluding uniform items)* until the end of April.  Remember, GSSA Leaders who have completed their Leader License also get a free gift in April.

THANK YOU FOR ALL YOU DO!

*One discount per volunteer, ends April 30, and does not include uniforms, insignia/badges, and the GS Silver Dollar. If you are shopping online, enter your GSSA Troop # and request the 20% discount.  Your total would be reduced accordingly. 

At the end of a fun program, we all are ready to go home.  But there is one more important step.  We need to know: What did the girls learn?

For us to receive funding we have to prove that our programs actually meet outcomes metrics that we outline. Each of our many United Ways and United Funds want to know that the funds they invest in girls actually produce the outcomes we indicate we are working toward. The more we can prove that Girl Scouts is the premiere leadership organization for girls, the more likely we are to receive United Way funds and donors' funds. In today's world, there is accountability for investment dollars, so if you wonder what our COO and I do, we spend lots of time riding the United Way circuit addressing how GSSA fulfills the outcomes we indicate on our requests for funding.

Our program staff members work from a set of objectives for each program GSSA offers.   At the culmination of the program, or sometimes after the program, we ask you, the leader or parent, and the girls questions related to our outcomes.   Did the program actually achieve the program metrics desired?   Did the girls learn something?   What did the girls learn?   And most important, did the girls have fun?

When you are asked to complete a survey and discuss what the girls learned at the end of a program, please help us out.   This often translates into securing more funds for girls to be Girl Scouts and tomorrow's leaders.

Thanks for your help in this important effort.

Fund raising is taking on different forms than it once did, and social media provides all sorts of new opportunities for us to raise funds for our girls in southern Alabama.   Last week we rolled out a new opportunity to support GSSA through Socialvest, which is an online donation service.  The process is fairly simple -- you sign up online and then when you are shopping at one of its participating companies, the Socialvest icon actually shows up at the top of your browser to tell you what percentage of your purchase will be given back to GSSA.   This is a quick and easy way to raise more funds for girls and girl programs.

Girl Scouts, unlike the Boy Scouts, historically is not very effective raising funds.   Part of it is our reticence to ask.   Where more than 75 percent of our income comes from the cookie program, the Boy Scouts raise more than 75 percent of their income from fund raising.   Clearly, they can learn about how to sell products from us, and we can learn how to raise money from them.   One of the GSUSA fund development vice presidents notes that there is more money given to animals in this country than there is to girl leadership and development initiatives.   Don't get me wrong, I love my pets, but that is a staggering statistic to me and something we need to change.

You are able to raise funds for your troop by participating with those organizations that partner with non-profits, some of them are Ruby Tuesday, Yolo, Five Guys, Cheeburger Cheeburger, CiCi's Pizza, ChuckECheese and other family  friendly restaurants.  Occasionally, council-wide fundraising events with restaurants and other local businesses are scheduled, but if your troop is interested in a money-earning activity, consider taking advantage of this opportunity too.  Like other money-earning projects, simply submit a completed money-earning activity application at least two weeks in advance to fund development staff. 

For larger companies and organizations there are some limitations for sponsorship requests.  I used to work at a university and we found that when we coordinated our requests to companies more people benefitted.   Currently BASF is working on constructing a storage building at Camp Scoutshire Woods so we can get the storage out of the recreation hall and provide more room for girl usage.   We also have an agreement with Books-A-Million where a portion of all voucher sales on designated days will benefit GSSA.  This agreement applies to all stores in central and south Alabama.

All sponsors must be approved by fund development staff prior to signing an agreement or making a request.  Sometimes fund development staff needs to do research about whether GSSA has already made a request. 

At the recent GSUSA CEO work session, we discussed that we need to ask more of our alumni, but many women don't recognize that they are alumni.   If you were a Brownie or Daisy, you were a Girl Scout, too, and many women do not understand that.   We are working to find more ways to highlight being a Girl Scout and how it improved your life.   If you are having an event in your community and are involved with women who might have been Girl Scouts, let us know and we will send your troop the alumni information form so we can get them involved again

Thanks for all you do.   For questions concerning fund raising contact mstallworth@girlscoutssa.org if you are in the northern part of the council or vedington@girlscoutssa.org if you are in the southern part of the council.

My previous work was in higher education where one of my responsibilities was student discipline.   This taught me a lot about human nature.  After a number of years, I concluded that students just want what they want.   They don't care about the rules or the equity of a situation; they just want what they want.   Sometimes it is an impulse issue.   Other times it is what they perceived as an entitlement issue, I did this, so you owe me.  

As I grew older and handled more parents with these cases, I found that most people (not simply college kids) just want what they want.   Student discipline was an emotionally charged area, because the stakes were always high.   We kicked students out of college for continual infractions of rules, when sometimes the root issue was alcohol, or over indulgence by parents that continued into college with negative, socially unacceptable behaviors.

As I handled these cases, I was also stunned that students and their parents would shriek, threaten, insult, and defend in an effort to change the outcome.   Most of the time there was plenty of evidence, repeated infractions, lots of discussion with professional staff, yet the student continued with the problematic behavior.   More than once I asked a parent how insulting me would get them what they wanted?   The responses were interesting, since most of the time I was the final step in what had been a long process with many opportunities for change in behavior and attitude.

Some people believe that if they are well dressed and look nice, their behavior doesn't matter, even if they have good manners.   I don't believe that is the case.   Actions speak louder than words and clothes.   Manners are important, but so is doing the right thing.   Understanding that kids "do as I do, not as I say," is an important to grasp.   Kids understand hypocrisy, even if they can't say it.

I no longer have these weekly shrieking telephone calls from parents or irate students in my office screaming irrationally.   I do, however, sometimes find myself at the end of the telephone or in a conversation that is equally emotionally charged.   The stakes are certainly different, but I'm still surprised when the insults start to fly when someone wants something.   I might have missed this lesson in education, but I still operate in my grandmother's world that "you catch more flies with honey than vinegar."

Most days I have the opportunity to observe adults who teach girls good citizenship by being a role model.  I watch adults adeptly defuse disappointments, frustrations, and tough social interactions by their gently encouraging all the girls in their care.   It is a rare occasion when I see adults who volunteer their time to do this work make missteps with the girls.    But I do want to be sure all who do this work are taking the girls' best interest at heart and their actions speak to whom they are.   Because of the importance of what you do, we owe it to the girls to only have adults whose actions speak louder than words about who they are, and the role models they provide to the girls we have the privilege to work with.

Thanks for all you do.   I share the relief you surely feel to have the cookie program behind you and look forward to the fun we will have this spring and summer spending time with girls, shaping their values and attitudes of the world they live in.

 I find myself in all sorts of conversations about programs, awards, trips, and camp.   It is interesting to me, because too frequently I hear why this and that didn't or doesn't work and it all rolls back to the adult involved.   It doesn't have anything to do with the girls.   When GSUSA moved toward high capacity councils, one of the many facets of their new business plan was to focus more on the GIRLS and less on the adults assisting.   Don't get me wrong, the adults that are assisting are critical to the delivery of the mission.   But for us to be and remain relevant, we must be GIRL LED.

What does that mean if you are a troop leader with a group of Brownies?   I was talking to a really good leader awhile back.   She said she had tried very hard to get two things out of each meeting that took a lot of time.   They were talking when they all arrived and coloring.   She thought both took a lot of time and she had things she wanted to accomplish.   In her wisdom, she had decided that talking was important to the girls.   At any gathering affording the girls free time at the beginning to share what is going on, often shapes the interaction to follow.   One of the values of the Girl Scout experience that I hear from alumnae is the relationship with the other girls of their troop.   When I meet with alumnae group their focus through the years is with their fellow Girl Scouts.

The issue of the coloring book with this leader was an interesting one.   She didn't see the value of it, but she said the girls insist.   If they don't get to color, they aren't happy with their meeting, no matter what they did that day.   I suspect this is more of the same.   Coloring is a time when they can enjoy themselves, talk with their friends, and enjoy their own creativity.   It is what the girls want.   This leader decided she would simply have to plan her meetings in relation to what the girls' needs and preferences were, not hers.   If they didn't earn all the Try-Its, that was fine.   The girls simply want to have fun.

One of our board chairs always emphasized the fun of the program.   Early on, she was always chiding me to be sure whatever we were planning, the girls were learning while having fun.   And what I have seen is sometimes the adults get in the way of what the girls really want.   Do you ask?   I used to work in student affairs at a university.   For years and years we saved the yearbook.   The students wouldn't get it done; someone from the professional staff would "fix it."   Things went much better at our university when I allowed the students to fail at some things.   It was expensive, but it improved their learning.   The students were telling us something about the yearbook and we weren't listening.

There is a very fine line between encouragement and discouragement.   I find that I am not too old to learn from children.   Their world is different than mine and when I can see through their lens, I find some of my views change, for the better.   Are we deciding for the girls or asking?   Are we involving the girls or telling?   Do we need control or are we flexible enough to allow them to make decisions, even though we don't see the wisdom in the decision?   Are we coaching and nudging or pushing and demanding?   Were they given options or told what to do?   Trust them and be prepared to be surprised.