Fall - Winter 2018-2019 Volunteer 411 Girl Scouts are known for their infectious, go-getter attitudes. In 2019, we are celebrating their spirit and all the ways they are daring, creative and innovative, and how they find their own type of bold in the Girl Scout cookie sale. When a girl sells Girl Scout cookies, she is participating in the largest business run by girls the world. And she learns goal setting, decision making, money management, people skills. and business ethics - aspects essential to leadership and success. Little Brownie Bakers Before the Girl Scout Cookie Sale: A Troop leader recruits a troop cookie manager and works with them provides resources to facilitate the cookie sale for the girls in the troop. Troop to help girls and cookie managers and leaders should work together in deciding whether or not to hold a booth sale and the dates and times for troops have the best booth sales. After December 10, all troop leaders have access and most successful to ebudde, the online troop cookie ordering system. After the sale, troop leaders should make sure that the troop cookie sale cookie sale ever! manager has deposited all the earned cookie sale proceeds into the troop bank account. Girl Scout Built By Me Cookie Troop Gift of Caring: Troops choose Planner: With a local organization to whom to donate cookies. options to fit all Girls ask customers to purchase 1-2 packages to interests and donate to this local organization. Girls receive the schedules, this cookies and donate them. online tool helps you easily guide girls in planning a customized troop plan for an incredible cookie Encourage your girls and parents to experience from start to finish. It’s create a Digital Cookie webpage! Parents as simple as taking a short quiz! will find it easier than ever to create a Digital Cookie webpage with their Girl Scouts daughters thanks to help sections and Cookie Rookie: step-by-step instructions. Parents will Working with receive a Digital Cookie registration email link in early December. girls who are new to the Girl Girls who used Digital Cookie in 2018 had a 175 per girl selling Scout cookie program? Help make average compared to the Council average of 148 for girls who their first steps delightful ones! use only traditional sales methods. Digital sales doubled last Start their cookie journey with a year, and girl participation and customers’ orders also increased fun, 10 minute video that explains dramatically. Customers purchased an average of 7.2 packages the basics to younger girls, along per customer compared to traditional sales of 4.9 packages. with a leader’s guide. Customers pay with credit card when placing their order. There These resources (and more!) can are no additional credit card processing fees to customers, be found online at: unless they choose to have cookies shipped to them, rather than littlebrowniebakers.com personally delivered. Cookie Sale Important Dates • December 2018: Girls may take orders from family members and close family friends over the holiday (personal Facebook sites 2019 Cookie Booth Sale Weekends February 16 - March 31 included.) No door-to-door or in-person sales or order cards to work until Thursday January 10. • January 4: Girls can use Digital Cookie to send emails to potential customers to solicit sales. Troops selling a minimum of 120 packages at • January 10 - Girls begin door-to-door sales. their booths earn one night free building rental for a troop getaway at Camp Evelyn or Camp Manitou, or a pool party at Camp Evelyn in the 2019 Cookie Pro summer. Troops who sell 240 packages will be credited two nights of free building rental, Contest except during the peak rental months of June, 24 top cookie entrepreneurs - July and August, when a two night credit is four per grade level - will win required for one night of a camp building a trip to sunny California for a rental. Cookie Entrepreneur Experience that includes meet-and-greet April 2 - Troops may return up to 10% of opportunities with prominent their initial cookie booth order rounded up business leaders, a special recognition event, and a VIP to a full case. Specialty cookies S’mores and tour of Warner Bros. Studios with a behind-the-scenes Toffee-tastic cannot be returned, so please be look at the DC Super Hero Girls. mindful of this when ordering these varieties for booth sales. There will be a limited amount Beginning January 2, Girl Scouts may head over to of specialty cookies available at council www.girlscouts.org/cookiepro to register and submit cupboards. their Cookie Pro contest entry. Once girls submit their Cookie Pro contest entry they will receive an email confirming their submission and providing instructions 2019 Troop Reward: for unlocking their limited edition Cookie Pro 2019 Kalahari or patch. Girls may then purchase the patch online (and pay shipping and handling charges) or order from the Blue harbor or council Petals to Patches shop for $1.50. milwaukee zoo! Troops who sell an average of 170 per registered girl will receive tickets to Kalahari Water and Theme Park in Wisconsin Dells, or Blue Harbor Waterpark in Sheboygan, or the Milwaukee County Zoo. (Girls must sell a minimum of 25 packages to receive tickets.) Volunteer Toolkit Tips & Tricks By now you have likely heard about the Volunteer Toolkit. It’s an online tool to help you plan and manage your Girl Scout year with meeting plans, administration tools and new content for all program levels. Log into your member community (via MyGs at gsmanitou.org) and take a look around, especially while reading these tips!

Tip 1: Click. Play. Learn. You can select a year plan, change your mind, and go back and select another. If you want to dive deeper than the preview screen, select a year plan to view the full meeting plans. Go to the “Explore” tab and simply select a new plan.

Tip 2: Sync your calendars. Can the VTK calendar sync with my personal calendar? Yes it can! On the year plan tab, click the dowload button (arrow pointing down) and it will sync to the default calendar program on your device.

Tip 3: One Toolkit per troop, please. Regardless of how many leaders you have assigned to your troop, there is only one Volunteer Toolkit - it is a shared site among all leaders in your troop. You still use your own login to MyGS to access the Volunteer Toolkit, but any changes you make will be seen by other leaders in your group. Work together or designate a primary Volunteer Toolkit guru to make updates to your troop’s year plans and schedule. In the event that someone makes a change that’s incorrect, remember tip number one - you can always edit, delete, and change meetings and year plans.

Tip 4: It’s a date! Assigning dates to meetings can feel a little tricky. The tricky part is that you have to initially set all the dates at the same time (ex. biweekly at 4 p.m.). Once you set your initial dates, you can change indiviudal meeting dates by selecting each one and picking a new date and time. You can also combine meetings if you plan to meet longer and accomplish two activity plans in one day. Assigning dates is completely optional, and not a required step.

Tip 5: Send meeting reminders. If you do assign dates to your meetings and activities, you have the ability to send meeting reminders directly through the Volunteer Toolkit. Click on the meeting, and select “Edit/Send Meeting Reminder Email”. The meeting will pre-populate the email subject and content, but you can make changes or add other notes if you like. Keep in mind that the Volunteer Toolkit pulls the family’s email address on file at Girl Scouts when sending your message (check the My Troop tab to see which email the family has on file). Also helpful to know is that the email will show up from [email protected], but if a family replies to your message, it will send back to your email!

We hope you find the Volunteer Toolkit an invaluable addition to the resources available to you as a troop leader. There is no right or wrong way to use the Volunteer Toolkit, so use the way that’s best for you. Destinations NEW! Girls will be able to apply and submit reference forms for Destinations online. Questions? Contact Amy at [email protected]. First deadline is December 1st! “Girl Scouts and my destination helped me realize that I am capable of more than I ever imagined, allowed me to experience a completely different culture and way of life, and resulted in friendships that will never be lost,” said Katie Bollini of Valders. Be a Girl Scout Champion: 10 Facts to Share about Girl Scouts 1. Say it loud, “I’m Proud to be a Girl Scout!” you are part of an in- credible movement that instills confidence in girls. Our program is girl tested, girl approved since 1912. 2. We’re proud of the “Girl” in Girl Scouts. Girls will not find the opportunities offered by Girl Scouts in any other organization; only in an organization designed specifically for girls, by girls. 3. Girl Scouts are girl experts. Girl’s self-esteem levels drop drastically as they enter adolescence, except when girls participate Share Your in Girl Scouts; Girl Scouts’ self-esteem rises. Our safe, supportive, girl-led environment is where girls take risks, make choices, solve Girl Scout Story problems and lead. If you follow us on social media 4. Troop Leaders are role models. Girls are surrounded by caring or visit our website frequently, female role models cheering them on every step of the way. you might have noticed troops Volunteers help girls discover their passion. Girls learn how to work being featured. How can you as teams and make decisions preparing them for a lifetime of get your Girl Scout or troop leadership. featured? Any time your troop 5. Girl Scouts get outdoors. Outdoors fosters adventure, friendship goes on a trip, has an activity, and perseverance. With two beautiful Girl Scout camps, Girl Scouts completes an award or project, can spend time in nature. They learn to overcome their fears, thrive hosts an event, participates in physically and gain important skills as they earn badges. something, send a picture (or a 6. Girl Scouts are STEM ready. We capture girls’ natural curiosity and few) to [email protected]. expose them to science, technology, engineering and math. Our Include your Troop # and a short hands-on program and badges teach skills in robotics, engineering, description! Please be patient, space science, cybersecurity and more. When it comes to STEM, we if we continue to receive more have a badge for that! and more submissions, you may 7. Girl Scouts builds entrepreneurs. Our Cookie program is the not see your G.I.R.L.s featured largest girl-led business in the world. Girls learn important business immediately. P.S.: you never skills, how to set goals to finance their dreams, ethical leadership, know where else the photos you online marketing, and how to deliver great customer service. send in might end up! 8. Girl Scouts builds leaders. Every year spent in Girl Scout girls’ leadership skills and confidence grows. The Girl Scout Gold Award Additionally, we want YOU to is the pinnacle of a Girl Scout’s leadership journey. Gold Award showcase the pride you have in Girl Scouts demonstrate a commitment to solving community your troop and Girl Scouts. Share problems, with determination, confidence and drive to earn the your own stories and photos on highest award: Gold Award. social media using the hashtag 9. Help spread the Word. Invite friends over for Girl Scout cookies #girlscoutsofmanitoucouncil and & milk and share the benefits of being a Girl Scout member. tag us in them! Ecourage your Hold a reception at your house of worship or school to inform girls’ parents to do the same! your community of the value and importance of Girl Scouts. We check regularly, and these Post a Girl Scout yard sign in your yard. Join us on social media photos can be featured as well. and share your Girl Scout experiences using the hashtag #girlscoutsofmanitoucouncil. Like or follow us on: 10. Be a Myth Buster. There are some myths about Girl Scouts - like Girl Scouts don’t camp or offer challenging adventures. We know these are wrong and simply reinforce gender stereotypes. You are the best representative to counter the myths and share the amazing opportunities girls get through Girl Scouting.