Newfield Girl Scout Troop 41350 spreads holiday cheer for families in need

 

After working hard to earn the funds to purchase gifts for families in need, a group of Newfield Girl Scouts delivered smiles this holiday season.

While many people associate Girl Scouts with cookie sales, these successful scouts were busy from October to mid-November with Treats, Reads & More. The program allows the scouts to sell candy, nuts, magazines and other items, with the proceeds benefiting local residents.

“Our troop for many years now has always allocated most of our earnings to going towards helping people in need,” said Amanda De Olden, leader of Girl Scout Troop 41350. “We used to make gift bags for a women’s shelter in Ithaca, but recently we wanted to keep it more local to Newfield.”

The troop, which has 10 scouts, first donated to Giving Tree, a donation program run by Newfield’s student council, to acquire gloves, hats, socks, and books for those in need.

“Last year the girls bought toys to place in the two donation boxes in Newfield: the blue box on Douglas/Millard Hill and the one at the Newfield Baptist Church,” De Olden said.

This year, the Girl Scout troop was able to get even more gifts and worked with the Newfield Food Pantry to place the items on a table during pick-up.

Troop 41350’s leader likes to share the scouts’ successes on social media to spread the word about the impact of Girl Scouts on the local community.

“I like to let our community know about our donations so they can see how Girl Scouts is a positive program that helps girls learn things outside of school, but also how we help the community,” she said. “They are always very appreciative, with lots of positive feedback.”

Locals who are interested in supporting Newfield Girl Scouts can do so by purchasing cookies, candy, nuts and magazines, or by simply offering their unique skills to help with projects.

“They can also volunteer their time and expertise when we try to get our girls to earn a new badge that we know little or nothing about, like archery, woodworking, etc.,” said De Olden.

The Girl Scouts are pleased with the success of their fundraising, which she said is the best part for the girls.

“Council gives them small gifts they can earn at different selling points, but their main goal is to get these gifts for kids so they can have a great holiday,” she said. “It brings smiles to their faces when I tell them about the community’s feedback. And they just love shopping.”

A future project for the scouts will be the construction of a free library similar to the one in Mill Park.

“The girls are in the process of picking a design. We luckily have a father who does construction who will help the girls build it,” De Olden said. “They are still in the process of deciding where it should go and getting permission to have it there. We’ll then ask the community to donate books.”

Troop 41350 will be earning their Archery badges soon, cooking their way through the New Cuisines badge in February, and learning how to rock climb in the spring.

Newfield Notes appears every week in Tompkins Weekly. Send story ideas to editorial@vizellamedia.com.