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No. 15 Vol. 6
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Local Girl Scouts Shower The Less Fortunate With Kindness
By J.L. Shively pril showers brought more than just May flowers to the homeless and less fortunate in Morris County thanks to the Girl Scouts of Troop 80037. For their Silver Award
project the four members of the Randolph troop decided to join together with one big project which they aptly named, Showers of Kindness. The Showers of Kindness Project was a collection of toiletries and per-
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June 2017
sonal hygiene items which were then donated across Morris County to families and individuals in need. The girls of Troop 80037, Katherine Gardner, Nicole Finati, Karina Olsakowski and Alyssa Savage, had been inspired for their project from past volunteer experience with the community. All graduating eighth graders from Randolph Middle School, these Cadet Girl Scouts had during the past two years volunteered at a Faith Kitchen in Dover. Lead by leader Lisa Savage and co-leader Karen Gardner, the girls had cooked and served at the kitchen their first year and returned last summer to cook again. The girls “were inspired by meeting the people they served,” states Gardner explaining the girls’ decision to create a project that would benefit people they had already met and branching out from there. Gardner also relates that, as eighth grade middle school students, each of the girls had been required for their Capstone Project to select a goal and actively “do something to make it happen; [and] to do something to inspire others,” Gardner states. Katherine had selected sanitation as her Capstone
goal and Alyssa had chosen to focus on poverty. With the essence of their goals in mind they became the foundation for the heart of their Silver Award project. “[The girls realized] this is a way we could help people,” Gardner says. In order to complete the project the four girl scouts reached out to different places in the community where they could set up collection boxes for donations. In staying with the theme of their project, the girls designed the boxes to look like little showers, complete with tub, shower curtain and even rubber ducks. Each box stated what toiletries were need-
ed.
Boxes were set up at the Randolph Library, local YMCA, the Resurrection Parish, Randolph Middle School and the Redeemer Lutheran Church. To help promote the project the library featured the collection on their webpage and on Facebook and the town included it in their newsletter, explains Gardner. The collection began on March 1 when the first boxes were set up and then was concluded on May 20. In that time more than 5,500 items were collected. This collection included toiletries such as shampoo, conditioner, deodorant, toothbrushes, toothpaste,
lotion, floss, razors and socks. Socks being the most needed item for donation. As originally intended the girls went to Dover and distributed the items in bags of eight items each to the needy. Each bag had an estimated value of $10 each and the girls handed out 60 bags on May 20. With such a successful donation the girls were able to donate above and beyond what they had originally anticipated. The girls also donated to Family Promise of Morris County and Trinity Lutheran Food Pantry and Faith Kitchen in Dover on May 26. The girls also intend continued on page 2