Westlake Girl Scouts earn Silver Award

Cadette Troop 71345 with one of two Little Free Libraries they built for Stonebrook Montessori. Pictured left to right are Olivia Clarke, Samantha Chang, Abigail Dumm, Maya Daw, Christie Murphy, Rebecca Monahan and Madeline Boyer, all of Westlake.

Cadette Troop 71345 from Westlake earned the Silver Award by helping children keep reading at a new public charter school in inner-city Cleveland, Stonebrook Montessori. The Silver Award is the second-highest award in Girl Scouting and is open to Cadette Girls Scouts in sixth to eighth grades. Madeline Boyer, Samantha Chang, Olivia Clarke, Maya Daw, Abigail Dumm, Rebecca Monahan, and Christie Murphy, all of Westlake, earned this prestigious award.

The girls are avid readers and wanted to pass on this passion to other children. They located an inner-city school that just opened in Cleveland and does not yet have a library. The girls researched about the importance of early childhood literacy and the effects poverty can have on a small child. Then they discovered Little Free Libraries. A Little Free Library is a small box that holds books. Children are invited to "take a book and leave a book."

They built two Little Free Libraries – one for the primary classes and one for the elementary classes at the school. Their libraries are registered on the Little Free Library website. They also collected books to fill these libraries. The Girl Scouts placed boxes at the Westlake Rec Center, at the Service Center and the Police Station to accept donated gently used books. They also sought donations from Half Price Books in North Olmsted among other business and individual donations.

The Girl Scouts, who are seventh-graders in Westlake and at the Hershey Farm School, presented these libraries to the students on March 24. The children were thrilled to each receive a book as well as a snack of lemonade and Girl Scout cookies while the girls explained the Little Free Library process.

Maria Boyer

Maria Boyer 

Girl Scout Cadette Troop 71345 Leader

Read More on Local News
Volume 8, Issue 7, Posted 10:10 AM, 04.05.2016