The Things We Do
I read somewhere on the internet that Guiders were awarded "funny money" for doing extra special things. At the end of the year, during the closing banquet, the funny money was used to buy small items being auctioned. I realize that the Pathfinders don't need to be paid for doing service work, but it would be nice for them to see at the end of the year how much they contributed to our community if they earned a coupon every time they did something special. So the Pathfinders agreed to try the "funny money" idea.
On Saturday, October 17th, we were asked by the Canadian Cancer Society to help with the planting of daffodil bulbs at Sullivan's Pond in downtown Dartmouth. The pathfinders helped to serve food, blow up balloons for children, and took part in planting daffodils. Only five Pathfinders from our unit of thirteen attended, and I wondered how we could get more participation.
It was a windy, cold and wet Remembrance Day morning, but we had eleven Pathfinders attend the service. I was really proud of them; it would be so easy to stay at home and sleep in.
We were asked by the Salvation Army to make name tags for the Angel Trees in the shopping malls. The tags have children's names and their ages written on them. People will take a name from the Angel Tree and buy a gift for a needy child for Christmas. The Pathfinders always like working on service projects, and they agreed to help out with this one. On November 12th, we wrote names, ages and clothing sizes on hundreds of name tags.
The girls worked in the shopping malls during the two Saturday's before Christmas. They sat at tables while people took name tags from the Christmas tree or brought in gifts that they had purchased. The Pathfinders enjoyed this project. They told me stories about how one lady took three or four names from the tree and bought beautiful clothing for the children. Some of the girls put their money together and shopped for presents for the children. I thought that was extremely generous in light of the fact that they had already worked so hard on this service project.
After Christmas, we received a beautiful letter from the Salvation Army and a certificate of appreciation for each person who worked on the Christmas Angel Tree project. The Pathfinders plan to attach the documents to their resumes when they start to look for part-time jobs.
On Saturday, November 21st, the Pathfinders were scheduled to work at the Dartmouth Lakes Fair. Sometimes they don't read notices very well. I asked them to bring their baked goods to the fair, and some parents called my house in a tizzy wondering what they were supposed to do with the the things they made for the fair. Our Junior Leader suggested that rather than giving out notices to the Pathfinders, the girls should write the messages in their binders at the meeting. That's what they do at school. So starting next week, if there are messages to go home, I think I'll try that tactic.
The fair was a huge success, and we had eight Pathfinders who volunteered to work on the raffle and bake tables. More funny money will be given out at our next meeting.
On January 30 and 31, 1999, the Pathfinders volunteered to work at the Winter Special Olympics at Shearwater, Nova Scotia. We had two teams of Pathfinders - one team worked on Saturday, and the other team was called in on Sunday.
We helped to set up mats around the boards of the rink. Then we met with the volunteer coordinator who explained all the jobs that needed to be done for the speed skating competitions. Two girls were asked to judge the athletes as they crossed the finish line. Others ran scores from the judges to the recorder's desk (where a Guider was asked to help record the race results), and then they ran information from the recorder's desk to the bullpen. Some girls posted results on the bulletin board. Two Pathfinders carried buckets of water to the ice so that the skating lanes were kept smooth. When the competitions were over, three Pathfinders were asked to carry the gold, silver and bronze medals for presentation to the athletes.
The Pathfinders asked for a "hands on" service project, and this certainly filled the bill. We felt really needed, and it was a wonderful experience to be a part of the Special Olympics.
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