Leader Meeting Minutes from January 5, 2006:

Troops in attendance: Daisy 2956, Brownie 222, 696, 2805, 2450, 2546 Junior 2245, 2597, 2676, Cadette 2079, Senior 1035

Tree Lighting
The Tree Lighting on December 11th went well. We had plenty of refreshments this year. 2 Junior troops and the Cadette troop all brought things. We didn't have a good turn-out of Brownies, though. Only 222 and 696 were there from what we saw. Please try to encourage participation in town events with your girls.

Home Show
We discussed the Home Show cookie sale (March 11-12). Saturday shifts will be covered by Brownie troop 2805 from as soon as they can get there in the afternoon (after cookie delivery) until 5:00PM. Junior troop 2245 will take the 5:00 - 8:00 PM shift.

On Sunday, we need 3 Brownie troops to split the shifts. They could be 9:45-12:00, 12:00-2:00 and 2:00-4:15. If we can't get 3 troops, the shifts could just be split into 2 shifts from 9:45-1:00 and 1:00-4:15. We would like all Brownie troops to contribute in some way to the sale so the girls will know they are contributing to the Camporee.

Financially, we need to make a minimum of $300 in profit to cover the cost of the Camporee, our Financial Assistance fund and have enough to purchase supplies for next year's Chester Fair Midway. We would need to sell a minimum of 45 cases of cookies. (which is half the number of cookies we usually sell). If a troop is unable to participate in this sale, we will have to discuss a way for them to contribute to the town fund. At this point, it would be difficult to assign a dollar amount or number of boxes per troop. We had thought of doing this only if we no longer sold cookies at the Home Show.

It's A Girl Thing
We discussed the "It's A Girl Thing" event that took place on Sunday, December 4th. This event was a success, with 7 new Girl Scouts and 2 new Leaders joining us. Daisy Troop 2956 got 2 new members, Brownie troop 222 got 1, Brownie troop 2450 got 1 and Brownie troop 696 got 3 new girls and 2 Assistant Leaders! The Cadette and Junior girls who helped out at the event did a fantastic job. Feedback from the girls who attended was good. They all said they had a good time. We would like to make this an annual event which would be held in late September or early October. It was suggested to advertise the event at the Chester Fair and take registrations there and have the event follow the Fair by 2 or 3 weeks. This would put next year's event on the weekend of Sept. 23-24 or Sept. 30-Oct. 1. We would need to form a planning committee for this event before the end of this school year.

Camporee
We discussed the upcoming Camporee. Sandy would like to have custom patches made that say "Chester Camporee 2006". The cost would be $1.25 per patch. She would need to order a minimum of 50 patches. If your troop is interested in purchasing these custom patches, please let Sandy know. She will bring in the design choices and the participating troops can decide on which patch to order.

Nancy handed out Farnsworth maps with the sites we have reserved marked. Each troop will be asked at our April leader meeting to let us know the approximate number of girls and adults they have attending, their top 3 site choices and which troop they'd like to share a site with. Troop 2450 and 2079 have too many members to be able to share a site unless many members choose not to attend. Troops 2805 and 2597 have the same leaders so they will need to be together. Troops 2956, 222 and 2676 are all led by Nancy so they need to be together or very close by.

We have 6 sites reserved and we believe we will need all of them. The sites are: Treehouses, Tall Timbers, Windigo, Lakeside, Nutcracker and Yolacan. All are comparable sites with adirondacks/cabins. Some items to note about some sites: Nutcracker does not have a pavilion as far as we can tell by the map, but their is a program house called "Money Sunk" that can be used. Lakeside does not have a Pavilion or program house. The troop assigned to that site should bring some type of tarp to cover their picnic tables in the event of rain. (Easy-Up canopy, for example) The troop who uses Yolacan cannot park a vehicle at the site. They will need to park at the Infirmary and walk a short distance to their site. The troop who uses Windigo also cannot park very close to their site. They need to park near Lakeside (which is not far from the Windigo Pavilion) and walk to their site. Troops assigned to Tall Timbers, Windigo or Lakeside access their sites by vehicle from Mud Pond Road instead of through the camp. You cannot drive to these sites from the main enterance.

We discussed a proposed schedule for the Camporee:

• Friday night will be set-up and troop time. Remember that the cabins don't have electricity, so arrive before dark so you can see to set-up.
  
  
• Saturday morning Cadette troop 2079 will open our event with a Flag ceremony at 9:30 AM.
  
  
• Following the ceremony, the Cadettes will lead our 2nd and 3rd year Juniors (approx. 16 girls) in an activity. The 10 1st year Juniors will lead the Daisy and Brownie girls in an activity. (There are 68 Daisy/Brownie girls who could possibly attend). Troop 2245 will decide on the "Brownie Do-It" that the Daisies and Brownies will be doing. All morning activities should be completed by noon.
  
  
  {This year we are doing a Brownie "Do-It" instead of a "Try-it" because we could not find 1 badge that all the Brownies could work on. Brownie leaders, please remember not to earn the 4 badges we have put aside for Camporee on your own. They are Earth and Sky, Ready-Set-Go Camping, Outdoor Adventurer and GirlSports. Next year we hope to be able to return to doing "Try-Its" at the Camporee.}
  
  
• 12:00-1:00 is our lunch break. (you may have longer, depending on when the morning activity ends. It won't necessarily take 2 hours).
  
  
• From 1:15 until 5:00 will be our afternoon activities. We will have groups of 25 girls swimming for 45 minutes each. Troops will be split into groups so each one does not exceed 25 girls. We discussed having a craft project (possible set up in the Keushk) that the girls could participate in when they were not swimming. Some suggestions for the craft projects were S.W.A.P.S. and a Father's Day gift. It was suggested that each troop bring the craft supplies they want to make a S.W.A.P.S. and then the girls are allowed to trade at the campfire. Further discussion on the afternoon craft will be needed. Possibly, the town could purchase the supplies to make the Father's Day Craft, then each troop could do their own S.W.A.P.S. at their site at some time during the day. We will revisit this issue at a later Leader meeting. If the town will be purchasing the supplies, we will need to make a higher profit from the cookie sale to cover these costs.
  
  
• 5:00 - 6:30 will be our Supper time. The Cadettes will again host the Daisy girls and their families.
  
  
• At 6:45 everyone will gather at the Flag Pole. Junior troop 2597 will do a Flag Ceremony to take the flag down for the night. We will then all go up to Corky's Fire Circle for our campfire. Cindy will do the Campfire Ashes Ceremony, we will hand out badges earned by the girls during our morning activity, each troop will do a "Campers Own" (song, skit, etc. - could be a good way to practice what you'll be doing at the Court of Awards on June 14th.) and then we'll close out the night singing camp songs. We are encouraging all troop to stay for the camp songs this year.
  
  
• Sunday we'll have a closing ceremony at 9:30 AM at the Flag Pole. Each troop is responsible for cleaning their site (sweep out cabins, pick up at the pavilion, etc.), their bathroom and bringing all their trash to the dumpster. Leave the site BETTER than you found it. You can leave camp when you are ready after the closing ceremony. Everyone must depart no later than 1:00 PM.

Some notes on Camporee... remember that Dads are welcome to attend, but they must have separate sleeping quarters. If your site will not have an extra "Dad cabin" they should be instructed to bring a tent. There was a supply of many mattresses stored on the Tovariche site last year so Dads can still be comfortable in their tents. Girl Scouts recommends that each cabin has 2 adults sleeping with the girls or no adults. Don't put an adult in the position of being alone with girls for safety reasons. Because most troops will have to share a site with another troop, you may have to limit the number of parents who attend. There are minimum adult requirements. For Daisy scouts it is recommended to have a one-on-one ratio, but the minimum is 2 adults per 5 Daisy Scouts. Brownie scouts need 2 adults for every 12 girls plus one adult for every 6 girls after that. (for example, 18 Brownies would require 3 adults.) It is encouraged that Junior and Older girls are allowed to be in cabins without adults. There is a minimum of 2 adults needed for every 16 Juniors and 20 Cadettes on the site. Remember that alcohol is not allowed on any Girl Scout property or to be present at any Girl Scout activity. Do not allow parents to bring any alcohol to the camporee. As the leader, you are held responsible for the parents on your site. Smoking is only allowed at the fire circles on each site and only when no girls are in close proximity.

Gym-Ken
We discussed the upcoming Gym-Ken sleep-over which will be on February 11th. Please have a final count of girls attending to Nancy no later then January 15th. The cost is $20 per girl. If you have sisters that are attending, the second sister will get a $5 discount. The sisters can be in 2 different troops. Each troop should bring a snack and drink for the evening. It was suggested that we do a buffet for breakfast and each participating troop is responsible for bringing something. For example, 1 troop buys the juice, 1 troop buys the donuts, etc. so we can all share. We can finalize these plans at our next leader meeting on Feb. 2nd.

Court of Awards
It was discussed at last month's leader meeting to set the date for the Court of Awards/Bridging ceremony to June 14th. Nancy checked with the Rec. department and they ok'd this date. The ceremony will be at 7:00 PM on Wednesday, June 14th. This was suppose to be the last day of school, but because of snow cancellations, it may not be. We wanted the COA to be after the Camporee and before school gets out.

Training Brownie Troops for Camporee
Sandy has volunteered to take over the training of new Brownie troops for camping starting next year. Cindy has been doing this for several years. If your troop needs to be trained this year, please contact Cindy so she can schedule the 2 or 3 meetings she needs to train your girls and help plan the menu. A 3rd meeting is needed if you wish to construct a box oven and learn to use it.

Gift of Caring Project
We were asked for a clarification on the "Gift of Caring" project.

You have several options when doing a Gift of Caring Service Project.

1. You sell these cookies while you're selling your regular cookies and at your booth sale. The girls just ask if people would like to purchase an additional box as a donation. Your troop decides on where they'd like to donate the cookies. It can be to servicemen overseas, to a local homeless shelter, food pantry, etc. You are then responsible for getting the cookies to the organization you chose. It is surprisingly inexpensive to ship to Iraq. I shipped 100 boxes of cookies in 2 large boxes for $11.30 last year. When ordering your cookies, make sure not to order chocolate covered cookies if you're shipping to Iraq, they'll melt too fast. By doing it this way, you choose who gets your cookies. Last year my co-leader's husband had a co-worker who was recently deployed. 2 years ago one of my Brownies uncles was in Iraq. It was nice to know who they were going to.
   
   
2. You can sell for Iraq and deliver the cookies to the Bedford Service Center between April 3 and April 14. You are not responsible for shipping this way, but you can't choose who gets your cookies. You sell them the same way, by having the girls ask if people would like to buy an extra box for the troops in Iraq.
   
   
3. The third option is to simply donate a portion of your profits, NOT boxes of cookies. The Council will buy the cookies with this money and send them to our troops. There is a form to do this in your green cookie booklet.
   
   

No matter which option you choose, the girls can still make cards to send to the soldiers. I've gotten some incredibly nice letters back from the servicemen that we've sent to and they always comment on how wonderful it is to get these cards from the girls. I have one girl who's last name is Bush. When she was in 2nd or 3rd grade she made a card for the troops and included after a signature a little note that told them that she was NO relation to President Bush. The soldier who wrote to us said their platoon laughed about that comment for a long time! That's an important thing to include with your gift.

And don't forget that Iraq is not your only option. Local agencies can also use the cookies to brighten the day of a little homeless kid or adult who probably doesn't see a lot of cookies!

Our next leader meeting is February 2nd.



Back to Minutes Archive