The Girl Scout Leadership Experience is based on three keys—discover, connect, and take action—but it’s not just for your troop! As a Girl Scout leader, you’ll embark on your own leadership journey as you help girls develop the vital leadership skills they’ll use to make the world a better place. Here are a few basic concepts that outline what leadership means in Girl Scouting.
Leadership is teaching girls:
- That they can do and be anything!
- That they are decision makers and should own their decisions.
- How to live the Girl Scout Law by modeling it for them.
As a leader, see yourself as a coach who:
- Advises, discusses, and cheers on your troop, not as a teacher with a planned lesson or activity.
- Ensures each member understands and can carry out their responsibilities within the troop.
- Encourages Girl Scouts to build their skills and their ethics.
- Gives more responsibilities to the girls as they grow and develop.
It’s important to remember that:
- You cannot know everything that your Girl Scouts might ever want to learn.
- You’ll explore and learn alongside your girls and grow your confidence in the process.
- You’re not expected to know everything about Girl Scouting, but you should know where to go for information—and to ask for help when you need it.
Your responsibilities as a Girl Scout volunteer include:
- Accepting the Girl Scout Promise and Law.
- Understanding and coaching the three keys to leadership that are the basis of the Girl Scout Leadership Experience: discover, connect, and take action.
- Sharing your knowledge, experience, and skills with a positive and flexible approach.
- Working in a partnership with Girl Scouts so that their activities are girl-led and that they learn by doing, individually and a group. You’ll also partner with other volunteers and council staff for support and guidance.
- Organizing fun, interactive, girl-led activities that address relevant issues and match girls’ interests and needs.
- Providing guidance and information regarding Girl Scout group meetings with girls’ families on a regular and ongoing basis through a variety of tools, including email, phone calls, newsletters, blogs, other forms of social media, and any other method you choose.
- Processing and completing registration forms and other paperwork, such as permission slips.
- Communicating effectively and delivering clear, organized, and vibrant presentations or information to an individual or the group.
- Overseeing with honesty, integrity, and careful record-keeping the funds that girls raise.
- Maintaining a close connection to your volunteer support team as well as your council.
- Facilitating a safe experience for every Girl Scout.
Girl Scouts of Citrus (GSC) may release a volunteer for any reason, from any and all roles held, at its sole discretion, including but not limited to:
- Restructuring of volunteer roles
- Elimination of the volunteer role in which a person serves
- Inability or failure of the volunteer to complete the requirements for the role
- Failure to complete training required for the volunteer role
- Misappropriation of funds
- Failure to cooperate in any type of financial review of a troop or service community account
- Failure to pay product sales amount owed
- Failure to adhere to GSC’s product program guidelines
- Inability or failure to perform to GSC’s satisfaction
- Failure to comply with GSC or GSUSA policies
- Failure to support the mission and values of the organization and GSC’s goals
- Improper use of prescription drugs, over the counter drugs, illegal drugs or alcohol directly before or during Girl Scout activities.
- Disclosure, or dissemination, of copy written and trademarked assets owned by Girl Scouts now or heretofore used in carrying out Girl Scout program; this includes but is not limited to service marks, emblems, badges, titles, fonts, descriptive or designating marks, artwork and program curriculum
- Disclosure or misuse of membership data and personal girl and/or adult member contact information not related to official Girl Scout business.
- Listed in the sex offender registry of any state or conviction of a sexual or related offense
- Providing false, incomplete, or misleading information on the volunteer application
- Inappropriate behavior including, but not limited to, physical violence, abuse, unauthorized carrying of firearms, stalking, threatening, menacing, lying, harassment, sexual harassment, or falsification of documents
- An unacceptable criminal background check or failure to report arrest or conviction
- Entering into a contract or agreement with any agency, on behalf of GSC, without approval from the CEO or CEO designee
- Hostile acts, malicious gossip, harassment or derogatory attacks concerning anyone associated with the GSC; including girls, registered volunteers, parents of members and/or employed staff.
- The use of Girl Scouts as a basis for initiating or perpetuating personal disagreements.