Gold Award Girl Scout Shares Passion for STEM, Owls with Fellow Girl Scouts
MAIZE, Kan. — Girl Scouts of Kansas Heartland congratulates Clara K. for becoming a Gold Award Girl Scout, a designation she earned by creating an educational program on owls for younger Girl Scouts as well as owl pellet dissection kits and owl boxes.
The Gold Award is the mark of the truly remarkable — earned by a high school Girl Scout who works to address an issue she’s passionate about in a way that produces meaningful and lasting change. Whether it’s on a local, national, or global level, Gold Award Girl Scouts provide innovative solutions to significant challenges.
“Gold Award Girl Scouts don’t just change the world for the better, they change it for good — and Clara embodies everything this achievement stands for," said Rolinda Sample, chief executive officer of Girl Scouts of Kansas Heartland. “Clara addressed an issue that’s important to her — getting youth excited about science and animals — for her Gold Award, and we congratulate her on this momentous accomplishment.”
Passionate about the outdoors, animals, and science, Clara’s Gold Award focused on helping one particular animal: owls. Clara’s aim was to educate younger Girl Scouts about predatory birds and how we can help the declining populations and help increase current population levels of Barn Owls.
Through her project, Clara started with an educational program where Girl Scouts can check-out owl pellet dissection kits and utilize them during their meetings. In the kits, girls will learn about Barn Owls and what an owl pellet is, how to dissect them and what bones and objects could be within the pellets. The kits also include information about owl eating habits and their digestive systems. The next step for her educational program was teaching the Girl Scouts how to create an owl box, which is used for shelters so other predatory animals cannot get to the owls. Girls then built an owl box at their troop meetings and found locations to place them for usage.
“It made me really excited that I could share this with other girls,” Clara said. “When I was a Brownie, I remember doing a meeting about owls and how much I loved learning about them so I’m excited that other girls will have the chance to learn about them and share in my excitement.”
