[00:00:00] Walter: The Hearts of Gold Podcast is brought to you by the Grow and Share Network, produced by off the Walter Media Productions.
[00:00:14] Sheryl: Hi, I’m Sheryl. After being inspired by Gold Award Girl Scouts over the years, I wanted to spread awareness of the Girl Scout Gold Award and showcase these amazing young. I couldn’t imagine when the podcast started back in 2018 that we would be here four and a half years later, celebrating 100 episodes.
[00:00:38] We received some updates from guests of the show to share with you today. Astronaut Caitlin from episode 26 is still sharing her adventures through social media, encouraging stem activities..
[00:00:51] Kaitlyn: Hello, my name is Kaitlyn Ludlam and I’m a Gold Award Girl Scout from 2020 and I’m so excited to be a part of the Hearts Gold 100th episode, which is a really great podcast to look into everything that Girl Scouts are doing and how they’re doing with their gold award projects.
[00:01:08] So I am currently at the University of Florida where I’m studying mechanical engineering, and I’ve been an intern at Boeing in Northrop Grumman, and I’m returning to Northrop Grumman this summer where I’m working on really great aerospace. So my Grow Scout Gold Award project, which is astronaut stem non-profit court.
[00:01:26] We focus on getting girls and non-binary students into STEM by showing them their opportunities, introducing them to role models and holding great events where they can meet role models and get some practice working on activities and looking to all their opportunities. So currently we held our introduced girl to Engineering day, where we had some great speakers and activities and uh, lots of those students got to really look into everything.
[00:01:53] And then recently we held, we held a live, a live stream with some really great speakers in stem fields, and it was for Dave the girl. And then coming up 2023, we’ll be holding and introduce the girl to engineering day in person. Our first in-person event. It’s so, so exciting where we can go into great activities, meet with role models, and just really look into stem.
[00:02:19] So thank you so much for, for reaching out, and I’m really excited to learn about other Girl Scout Gold War projects and to continue working on my project and learning so much more about STEM and outreach, and I can’t wait for the future. Right. Thank you.
[00:02:36] Sheryl: Julia. K from Massachusetts was one of our first guests way back in episode five.
[00:02:43] Julia: Since my time on Hearts of Gold, I graduated high school and I’m now a junior at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. I’m studying mechanical engineering and I’m minoring in sustainability engineering to not only bring amazing mechanical engineering solutions to the world, but hopeful. Sustainable environmental solutions.
[00:03:02] My gold award has impacted me so much. I’ve always been like a really passionate person and my passion for the environment has just grown. I’m gonna continue doing activist work for the planet in my community, and. Hopefully make some real change when I’m out in the working world.
[00:03:17] Sheryl: Angelica aas connected her love of art to her Gold Award project in episode 58.
[00:03:24] Angelica: Hi, Sheryl, hi Hearts of Gold podcast. Since last I spoke with you, I am now enrolled at Meris College. I’m a freshman. I’m studying fashion merchandising with the business concentration, and I’m also doing a paralegal certificate. My plan is to continue studying. Going into law school and then hopefully working within intellectual property in the fashion industry.
[00:03:49] My Gold Award has certainly helped me throughout this entire process of getting into college. I was able to earn a presidential scholarship at my school because of my gold award. Additionally, just life skills, meeting people interpersonal skills, interview skills, all of those things as well.
[00:04:08] Making sure to continue to giving, give back to the community and service. I’m very grateful to have been interviewed by you. It was definitely an exciting time. My gold award is still. Going on in my high school. It’s now being run by a new group of kids, which is very exciting. It’s a new chapter of my gold award and I’m just very grateful and I’m very proud of everything that’s come out of it and where I am now.
[00:04:38] Congratulations on 100 episodes. That’s so amazing, and I hope you keep interviewing and keep giving these gold award. Girl Scouts an opportunity to share their stories and their projects. It’s a wonderful thing. Thank you so much, and congratulations on a hundred episodes.
[00:04:56] Sheryl: Kelsey Chico shared her experience in episode four, working with a cruise ship line to deliver and install a playground in Haiti.
[00:05:04] Kelsey: Before I get started, I would really like to thank Miss Sheryl for inviting me back to the platform and to celebrate hearts of gold hundredth celebration. It’s really a, a really great opportunity for me to come back to the platform and to expand upon, you know, the events and sort of my life kind of after the The interview that I did with Hearts of Gold on my Girl Scout Gold Award back in 2016.
[00:05:27] My Girl Scout Gold Award consisted of gathering donations from various different organizations and effort. And relief efforts for Hurricane Matthew for victims in from Haiti and the surrounding islands. Specifically, I wanted to help a particular neighborhood in Haiti and really particular neighborhood that I was able to get access to.
[00:05:47] Working with the Haitian Consulate in Orlando here, I was able to communicate with her in order to coordinate those donations to be. Transported over to that neighborhood in Haiti Girl Scouts has really affected my life in many positive ways throughout my life during 2016 and even now, even in my college years.
[00:06:06] It’s, it’s helped me in tremendous ways, honestly. I’m class of 2020 and having to transfer everything online and having everything go remote has been very challenging, but also very beneficial in many, many, many ways. It’s been a journey. It’s been a very long journey, but it’s, it’s been a. As a graduated Girl Scout ambassador, becoming a lifetime member and alumni of Girl Scouts my Girl Scout Gold Award has.
[00:06:30] It truly impacted my life. Every now and then, I think about the entire process. The project from packing the donations to having them shipped via boat across international Seaboards in order for it to be transferred over to Haiti, one of a cruise line force of call. It’s helped me in so many aspects for.
[00:06:51] My communication. I recall I loved public speaking in the ninth grade and I continued to love public speaking, but it’s really enhanced how I communicate with others, not only from a local but international level at the time when it came to communicating with officials and important decisions that required specific access and authority.
[00:07:16] Figures that really did help shape the way that I speak with people and how I communicate with others. Another thing would be leadership would be leading others, leading other Girl Scouts. How my influence has inspired others and really how it’s helped another Girl Scout potentially find an idea or inspire her to do a project of her own, something outside the box.
[00:07:39] Maybe she might not want to travel internationally like I did. , maybe just think outside of her comfort zone and to think, what else could I do? I like what she did. How? How could I do even more? Or rather, what more could I do to help? What more could I do? What challenges could I overcome? What other opportunities are out there for me to help someone else, not just in my local community?
[00:08:02] Being a college student during the pandemic has been very, Very challenging to say the least. And I think along my Girl Scout years and all of the work that I did with my troop, my mom was a Girl Scout leader, and ever since about the sixth grade, since I was a junior and I became a part of my T troop, I’ve had so many great opportunities and so many wonderful memories that I’ve thought about from Micro Scout, bronze, silver, and Gold Award.
[00:08:32] My project has influenced. In a professional way. It’s sort of guided me into this mindset of, of motivation, you know, thinking never to give up, never just focus on, on what’s just around you. Are there other avenues, other opportunities, other ways for you to. Expand your circle of, of impact that you might want to do.
[00:09:00] And that’s helped me through my academics, that’s helped me through my, my job that’s helped me through various opportunities that I’ve had the last two years being in college, an online student. And it’s been very nice. It’s been very nice. So my Girls Scout Gold Award has tremendously impacted my life.
[00:09:18] And those people down in Haiti, they’re extremely, extremely happy. They have a playground that the kids and families can enjoy. They have lots of food, clothing, hygiene products. Every single donation that we have most likely has impacted those families, women, kids, men, anybody there. And it wouldn’t be without really my parents, because my parents did help me a lot during the process, and they motivated me to me to keep going, to never give up and to.
[00:09:50] Recognize how big of an issue this was and the efforts that we all went through, and my initiative to help those people. And it’s really inspired me to do a lot more throughout my life and it’s gonna continue inspiring me to inspire others because once a Girl Scout, always a Girl Scout. Speaking of which, I had the wonderful opportunity to be a camp counselor at Pine Castle this summer for the Girl Scout summer camp, and it was such a wonderful opportunity for those four weeks to spend with my co counselors to get to explore the different curriculums and.
[00:10:28] Get to teach different activities for the kids and to make sure they’re having a good time. So I was able to implement my Girl Scout youth into my adulthood through my job, and it was such a wonderful opportunity for me. And I’ll never forget that summer, this past summer really, and it was quite, quite amazing.
[00:10:46] And it was so memorable, and I’m looking forward to possibly going to Camp Macau next year. So I can’t wait. My name is Kelsey, and I’m a Girl Scout alumni.
[00:10:57] Sheryl: Anna Sheena Haro encouraged people to use hydroponic gardening in order to grow their own healthy food in episode 41.
[00:11:04] Anna: Hello, my name is Anna Shahara and I am a gold award Girl Scout.
[00:11:09] I did my project called Go Grow Healthy at local elementary Schools to educate and inspire children to eat healthier. The Gold Award helped me to gain confidence in myself as well as learn how to better connect and communicate with. I have taken these skills with me ever since I completed the project in high school.
[00:11:26] Currently I am a junior at the University of Michigan, majoring in psychology with a minor in music. I’m on the pre-med track and work as a nurse aid, and I’m hoping to become a doctor in the future. The Gold Award has helped me to develop valuable connections with peers as well as mentors that I hope to continue to take with me into the future. Bye bye.
[00:11:47] Sheryl: Gikita Gorthi, shared rocketry in episode 69 and has an event next summer. Check out her website for more details.
[00:11:54] Gitika: Hello everyone. My name is Gikita Gorthi and I’m a freshman at Columbia University in the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences as a c Prescott Davis Scholar. Aspiring to be an aerospace physician, medical researcher, and astron.
[00:12:11] I’m also the founder and CEO of Ignited Thinkers, a nonprofit organization I founded in the eighth grade to spread space education to all students. I am a Girl Scout alumni as a part of the Girl Scout nations capital.
[00:12:26] I am one of the former two teen board of directors for Girl Scout Nations Capital and one of the former girls Advisory board members for Girl Scouts of the usa A Girl Scout since first grade, and it completely transformed my life.
[00:12:41] Girl Scouts have they equipped me, the tools to take change, to be the change I want to see, to take action and to be bold with all of my. Girl Scouts has empowered me to think of an idea and to make it a reality. When I founded Ignited Thinkers in the eighth grade, the purpose behind it was to spread my love for space education to all students and to show that space is for all.
[00:13:06] Whether you’re interested in science, math, engineering, arts, journalism, media, there is a space for you in the space. With Ignite Thinkers. We have free workshops, webinars. We have a YouTube channel where we highlight diverse space champions and their stories and have space contests that are organizing across the world.
[00:13:29] Our first competition will be taking place next summer in Zimbabwe, in collaboration with the Zimbabwe Space Agency, and we are really, really excited to continuously reaching out to thousands and. Students across the world and showing that faith is for everyone and investing in space is investing in earth and humanity.
[00:13:50] Sheryl: Back in episode eight, Noel shared her crocheting skills and critters she creates for those in the hospital.
[00:13:57] Noelle: I’m Noel Buice and I earned my Girl Scout Gold Award my senior year of high school. I’m now sitting in my long room at the University of Virginia as a fourth year. I’m set to graduate in the spring with a distinguished major in religious studies..
[00:14:08] A double major in music and a minor in psychology. My childhood best friend who inspired my Gold Award project is doing well and set to graduate from Virginia Tech in the spring as well. Since earning my Girl Scout Gold Award, I’ve kept up with my knitting. And as you can see, I’m currently working on Christmas presents as the president of one of UVA’s oldest acapella groups.
[00:14:29] I’m working on hats for our new members. I’ve also kept up with my official 5 0 1 C three nonprofit cancer kicking critters that I created for my gold award project at the University of Virginia. I’ve taught Learn to Kni classes and critter kit assembly. With various organizations on grounds. Since my Gold Award project, I’ve delivered over 3000 nitten crochets stuffed animals and
[00:14:54] critter kits across the country to various hospitals in the United States, Canada, and Athro Bajian.
[00:15:00] Sheryl: Shelby O’Neill’s no straw November and Ocean Guardians from episode 46 are still going strong.
[00:15:08] Shelby: Hi Hi Hearts of Gold podcast. My name is Shelby O’Neal. I’m the founder of a nonprofit called Junior Ocean Guardians and the creative a challenge called Noah November. Since being on Harle podcasts, Noah November has celebrated its sixth year spreading awareness about plastic pollution. This year we focus on climate change.
[00:15:25] We’ve had several Girl Scouts involved and every year we’ve existed and I’m very proud to have started with Girl Scouts at my Gold Award. Yeah, girl Scouts in Gold War has changed my life and I’m so grateful for it. And happy 100th episode. Mwa!
[00:15:38] Sheryl: With a hundred episodes available and more to come, there’s a topic of interest for everyone.
[00:15:44] Please share the show and listen to any episodes you may not have heard yet. Let’s all spread the word and bring awareness to the Girl Scout Gold Award. Let’s all power our passion. And conquer our challenges.
[00:16:02] Walter: The Hearts of Gold Podcast is brought to you by the Grow and Share Network, produced by off the Walter Media production.
[00:16:09] Thank you for listening and spreading the word on what we do. If you want to share your story of how you earned your goal award, reach out and send an email to grow and share outlook.com. Be sure to listen to the newest episodes on your favorite podcast app, as well as view the full video episodes on youtube.com/SherylM Robinson.
[00:16:30] That’s youtube.com/Sheryl, the letter m, Robinson. Take care and we’ll see you next time.