Girl Scout Ambassador Riley of Troop 293 earned the Girl Scout Gold Award by completing a service project she titled, “Ending Period Poverty.” To accomplish her goal of supporting women in need, Riley worked with the Virginia Beach chapter of Days for Girls, an organization which serves to advance menstrual equity, health, dignity and opportunity for women around the world by providing healthcare, feminine products, and education. She also created a Girl Scout patch program, called “Period Power,” for Girl Scout Juniors in her service unit to learn about reproductive health. She also provided access to service ideas for other Girl Scouts to help end period poverty locally.
“I addressed period poverty through two Days for Girls workshops as well as an Amazon wish list supply drive where I collected new underwear and period products. During the workshops, we sewed 138 transport bags and put 61 Days for Girls kits to send to Ukrainian refugees. The first workshop took initiative to sew the transport bags. The second workshop assembled the kits using the transport bags we made, products donated, as well as an inventory of reusable liners and shields from that Days of Girls Virginia Beach Chapter.”