COLUMBUS, Ohio — Girl Scouts of Ohio’s Heartland recently recognized six Delaware County girls with the Girl Scout Gold Award — the highest award a Girl Scout can earn. The Gold Award is the top distinction under the Girl Scouts Highest Awards program, a national program signifying a Girl Scout’s commitment to improving her community leadership, creativity and dedication.

Gold Award recipients include:

Aryadevi Cox

A 2023 graduate of Big Walnut High School, Cox is currently attending Vassar College. Her project was “Reading Representation Book Club.”

Cox was discouraged to see how many books were being banned by school districts like hers. She created a book club at Big Walnut High School to expose students to important books and hold conversations around them. She also created a web-based resource and pamphlet to share with others who hope to explore diverse titles in literature, despite book banning practices.

Jayadevi Cox

A 2023 graduate of Big Walnut High School, Jayadevi Cox is currently attending Vassar College. Her project was “Inclusivity Matters: A Representative Literacy Curriculum.”

Jayadevi Cox worked to tackle the issue of representation in youth literature after noticing a lack of diversity in characters in children’s books. She aimed to equip teachers working with the littlest learners to share stories and perspectives of diverse voices. She created a preschool curriculum for six daycare centers that features stories that include characters from diverse backgrounds and a reading list that she printed on a bookmark that she then distributed to more than 14 sites in the community. She also partnered with a local bookstore to promote her project and share these tools.

Ella Hazelrigg

A junior at Buckeye Valley High School, her project was “Stepping into Freshman Year.”

As a former private school student, Hazelrigg found that the transition to a public high school could be difficult. From admissions to paperwork and clubs and activities, Hazelrigg wanted eighth graders entering public high schools to feel better prepared. For her project, she created a resource kit and mentorship program, which she shared with local private schools. The program connects eighth graders with the tools and fellow student mentors they need to be successful on their high school journey at Buckeye Valley High School in Delaware.

Allison Jenkins

A senior at Olentangy Liberty High School, her project was “Monarch Mania!”

For her project, Jenkins wanted to help preserve monarch butterfly habitats at High Banks Metropark in Powell, so she worked with the park to help strengthen and spread these habitats further throughout the park. Her primary focus was a workshop for families at the park to educate them about monarch habitats and how to support monarch butterflies in their own backyards. She also created educational materials along with milkweed seed packets that park naturalists could use in public programs to educate people about the issue of declining monarch populations.

Grace Metz

A 2023 graduate of Rutherford B. Hayes High School, her project was “LOUD Delaware: Furthering Scholastic Representation.”

Metz became passionate about diverse perspectives in literature offered to high school and middle school students after seeing books and topics banned from public school curriculums. For her project, she started a creative writing workshop in which students are exposed to diverse perspectives from contemporary writers. They were then given a chance to express themselves freely in a judgment-free zone while learning new expression and communication skills from writing mentors and facilitators. Following the workshop, Metz edited and printed an anthology of the group’s writing for distribution in the Delaware community.

Julia Waltz

A senior at Rutherford B. Hayes High School, her project was “Poetry Jam Camp.”

For her project, Waltz was inspired by her own experiences with theater and drama. She set out to help provide younger students in the Delaware City Schools District with an opportunity to develop public speaking skills, confidence, artistic expression, and emotional regulation through participation in a poetry jam workshop and culminating event. Her camp program is officially being offered each year by the high school’s Thespian Troupe so that students can experience poetry and performance as a vehicle for public speaking skills, confidence building, and emotional expression.

Girl Scouts take action

The Girl Scout Gold Award honors girls in grades nine through 12 who demonstrate extraordinary leadership through sustainable and measurable “Take Action” projects. The Gold Award is the highest distinction falling under the Girl Scouts Highest Awards program. Girls dedicate a minimum of 80 hours to complete the steps to earn the Girl Scout Gold Award.

“Gold Award Girl Scouts exemplify the values of Girl Scouts by addressing important issues in their communities and effecting lasting change,” said Tammy Wharton, president and chief executive officer for Girl Scouts of Ohio’s Heartland. “These projects embody the leadership skills and commitment to service that are hallmarks of the Gold Award. I applaud our 2024 Gold Award Girl Scouts for being innovators, big thinkers and role models.”

In 2024, 16 girls in the Girl Scouts of Ohio’s Heartland 30-county region received the Gold Award. The Gold Award is awarded to fewer than 6% of Girl Scouts annually, and each Gold Award Girl Scout spends one to two years on her project. Approximately one million Girl Scouts have earned the Gold Award or its equivalent since 1916.

The recipients received their awards during the Highest Awards Ceremony on Sunday, June 9, at the Idea Foundry in Columbus. Kate Siefert, ABC 6 and Fox 28 reporter, served as keynote speaker for the event.

Submitted by Girl Scouts of Ohio’s Heartland.