The Girl Guides Association of Jamaica rebuilds with ‘Project VIBE’

The Girl Guides Association of Jamaica is about volunteerism and redirection for young women, and the organisation wants Jamaica to know that it is still in service. Girl Guides has impacted thousands of lives over the decades, and it is all thanks to the legions of uniformed and non-uniformed guides who volunteer.

Like many other organisations, the pandemic halted much of the association’s activities, including camps, hikes and administrative functions at the headquarters. However, according to Karen Francis, chief commissioner, some of the Guiders were innovative and hosted meetings online. Furthermore, some of the programmes were tweaked, which included allowing the girls to create and submit videos of their badge work.

“We also adjusted how we did our promise ceremonies, and had to make amendments to [the] hosting [of] our annual general meeting. It was difficult, as guiding requires interaction as we work in patrols,” Francis told GoodHeart.

Now, the association has welcomed the return of face-to-face interactions in schools and churches, and is offering its services with renewed energy.

“We have noted a heightened interest in creation of units in schools and churches, and we are focusing on developing leadership to meet this challenge. Our leaders are all volunteers, so we try to provide a variety of support for them as they are trained to deliver our unique programme,” Francis said.

The association, however, has kept many of their online meetings for leadership and the executive, affording some of their commissioners the opportunity to work from home.

“We have seen [more] growth in the number of Brownies enrolled, as many school leaders have seen the value of uniformed groups and they all want to have a uniformed group in their schools. We are grateful for the increased interest in the Girl Guides Association,” she added.

The association also started a Young Leaders Group with Dr Karen Thaxter Nesbeth, with the objective of providing assistance to the headquarters and to bolster leadership in tertiary students.

PROJECT VIBE

In the summer of 2022, as the association prepared to rebuild after lockdowns, the group faced severe financial crises.

“We had depleted operating funds just to maintain our beloved headquarters in the absence of our shop and cookie income streams for two years. Our beloved treasurer shared with the management team that C.B. Facey Foundation had an annual call for project proposals and the immediate past Vice-president, Dr Karen Thaxter Nesbeth volunteered and prepared a proposal for Project VIBE: ‘Visibility Innovation for Better Educational Programming’ on behalf of the Girl Guides Association of Jamaica,” Francis said.

Project VIBE was created on the premise that, for over 100 years, the Girl Guides Association has been giving service, engendering discipline and strong leadership and citizenship skills in girls and young women, but they had not recently been visible to the public.

“The first C.B. Facey Foundation grant provided a seed for sustainably enabling the Girl Guides Shop to have girls and young women at work and play in uniforms, at both formal and informal occasions,” Nesbeth shared, continuing, “The funds received from C. B. Facey Foundation has also assisted in the provision of leadership opportunities and enabled dissemination of these skills. One young leader received funds to attend the World Conference of the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts, held in Cyprus last July. Upon her return, she conducted sessions at the National Senior Section Training Forum, in which she shared her new perspectives and enabled local young women to think like world citizens.”

According to Anna Ward, executive director of the C.B. Facey Foundation, it was necessary to add capacity building that would positively impact these young leaders.

“Through our grant programme, we have ensured that the Girl Guides Association continues to operate sustainably. The plan is to ensure that they get to the level that they can operate efficiently. At C. B. Facey Foundation, we stay with our projects for at least two to three years, so that they can receive the necessary support they need to rebuild.”

The most recent grant from the foundation funded a combined event hosted by the Kingston and St Andrew Division called ‘Think and Create’. “This was a dual celebration of World Thinking Day (Founders Day) and an opportunity for girls to create art and craft pieces as they earned Interest badges, which they can now proudly wear on their uniforms,” Francis said.

“The event was enriched by hands-on facilitation of art and craft projects by students of the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts, and the Dean of the School of Visual Arts, Miriam Hinds Smith. We had close to 300 Brownies and Guides in attendance, and some 15 badge projects facilitated by funding from the C. B. Facey Foundation,” Nesbeth said.

The Girl Guides Association now looks forward to the next phase of this year’s grant, in which a ‘100-girls’ project will be created by the Young Leader who has been chosen to attend the Juliette Lowe International Leadership Seminar, to be held in Mexico in September.

keisha.hill@gleanerjm.com