They're as good as gold

The ELLM Association of Girl Scouts, representing girls and adult volunteers in the East Rockaway, Lakeview, Lynbrook and Malverne communities held its Gold Award ceremony on May 20 at Lynbrook High School. This year’s honorees are Taylor Aloisio, Janine Baron, Emma Barrett, Nora Louq, Megan Ochtera and Serena Sundeberg.

The Gold Award is Girl Scouting’s highest honor. Before work is even begun on a Gold Award project, a girl must complete prerequisites which give her experience in advocating for causes that are important to her, working with others as a team and reaching out to her community to effect lasting changes. The skills that she gains in this process are crucial in helping her to investigate a Gold Award project, write a proposal for its acceptance by Girl Scouts of Nassau Council, carry out a Gold Award project requiring a minimum of 80 hours and which must include advocacy, community involvement and sustainable change, and complete a final report for acceptance by Council.

“For my project, I organized a group that would meet with Middle School and High School level special education students at my school,” said East Rockaway resident Taylor Alosio, of Troop 2072.

“My project was designed to help patrons of my local pantry have access to fresh produce,” said Janine Baron of troop 2458 from Lakeview.

“The community issue that I addressed is the lack of awareness people have on the benefits of swimming,” said Lynbrook resident Emma Barrett of Troop 2328.

“For my Gold Award I addressed the issue of preserving local history at the East Rockaway Grist Mill Museum,” said Nora Louw of troop 2072 from East Rockaway.

“My project helped expand the Rhame Avenue School garden for year-round farming while showing the students the importance of sustainability, engineering and building,” said Meagan Ochtera of troop 2072 from East Rockaway.

“I addressed the nationwide problem of childhood obesity,” said Serena Sundeberg of troop 2328 from Lynbrook.