No. 1 Kingstown Girl Guide Company welcomes new members

The No.1 Kingstown Girl Guide Company last Friday, January 21, hosted its annual Enrolment and Awards Ceremony at the decommissioned E.T Joshua Airport Tarmac at Arnos Vale where it welcomed and enrolled 25 new members.

Tamira Browne, who heads that Company told SEARCHLIGHT that there are five Guiders assisting the No.1 Kingstown Company, which has 80 girls who take part in activities on a regular basis, but due to the Covid pandemic, “today we just had 67.”

Friday’s ceremony saw the 25 new members being enrolled into the Company but “one or two could not make it due to the pandemic,”Browne explained.

Starfish patrol received the largest number of new members, 5; Dragon Fly received 4; Bumble Bee, Daffodils, Parrot, and Rose Patrols each received three; while two each were assigned to Butterfly Patrol and Daisy patrol.

Browne said the No.1 Kingstown Girl Guide Company is strict in observing the COVID-19 protocols.

“We have our girls doing their regular testing and if any are positive they are not allowed to mingle with anyone,”
Browne explained.

A number of girls received awards for attaining good scores which Browne said was to test the girls who were “serious about wanting to become a Girl Guide, and they all attained a score of over 70-percent.

“We have been telling them that they need to continue striving for their best, and that their best today may not be their best tomorrow, to up their game and work towards a standard of excellence.”

There is an ongoing programme of holistic development which exposes the Guides to many areas of training in survival and life skills. Many of these activities would be held outdoors due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We really just want girls to ensure that there is that meaningful engagement in St. Vincent and the Grenadines and we are trying to bring that back,” Browne added.

The enrolment and awards exercise, which was chaired by Jonique Haynes, witnessed 10 of the new members receiving top-5 scores in the Pre-promise awards. Two girls had a perfect score of 100%; one earned a score of 98%; three had a score of 96%; one girl scored 94% and three scored 90%.

Year Level Awards, which is an accumulation of points over the year, were presented to several other members.

The three year 1 guides who were recipients of the Year Level Awards were led by Jennaya Bonadie who accumulated a total of 32,650 points. Jaida Jackson, with an accumulation of 33,100 points led the three Year 2 members who received Year Level Awards.

And Kyarra Sandy, with an accumulation of 32,800 points, led the three year 3 Guides who received Year Level Awards.

Some 14 year three guides and nine from year four were presented with WAGGGS (World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts) Certificates and Bumble bee received the honour of being named the Most Outstanding Patrol.

The Number 1 Kingstown Girl Guide Company has been in existence since1914, and has been at the Girls High School since 1927.