Girl Scouts make electric car to educate community
Two Girl Scouts from North Fort Myers wanted to tell their community the importance of keeping the environment clean, and wanted to create something to teach it that lesson.
So they converted a gas-powered car to an electric car and created a presentation for elementary children.
Alice and Christina of North Fort Myers, members of Troop 735 in North Fort Myers, learned about air pollution while working on a project to earn their Girl Scout Silver Star award.
This project was a way to teach people about making the air quality better while using sustainable resources.
“Pollution is a worldwide problem. We need air to breathe and we need to breathe to live. It is important for us to find a way to clean up our air,” Alice said in a statement release by Girl Scouts of Gulfcoast Florida.
Troop 735 leader Jackie Webster said it all morphed from a science project they were doing.
“We were working on one of their journeys with air and water and how to use resources wisely. So they took the school project and turned it into a Girl Scout project,” Webster said. “I’m so proud. I put it out there every year for all the scouts and it’s the first time in years we’ve had someone do anything.”
The Girl Scout Silver Award is the highest award for Girl Scout Cadettes (who are in the sixth through eighth grade). Girls can work as an individual or as a small team.
“The girls find something they want to fix in their community or identify a cause or issue and come up with an action project,” said Julie Krueger, manager of communications and marketing for the Girl Scouts of Gulfcoast Florida.
This take action project is usually on a topic the girls are passionate about that takes no less than 50 hours per girl. This award gives girls the chance to show that they are leaders who are dedicated to improving their community, Kreuger said.
“The girls put together the plan, the organization of it, and identify the needs and execute the project,” Kreuger said. “They then have to fill out a form of all the requirements and it is then decided if they won the award.”
The girls not only made the electric car, but also created a presentation to the community about electric cars and made a project around that, which Krueger said was especially great.
For more information about the Girl Scouts of Gulfcoast Florida, visit www.gsgcf.org.
(Editor’s note: Girl Scouts does not release the last names of scouts without specific parental permission.)