Women Worldwide Interest Patch

Interest badges are supplementary insignia that are worn on the back of girls' uniforms who have participated in Girl Scout activities in various ways. Through hands-on online activities, Women Worldwide introduces Girl Scouts to a variety of international women's issues in order to earn a patch to affix to their uniform. Girls seeking to earn this patch must complete at least 7 activities, including 2 skill builders (including "Be a Girl Grantmaker"), one technology, one service project, one career exploration, and 2 activities from any category of the girl's choosing.

Girls carry out these activities on the Women Worldwide website. These activities are designed to raise girls' awareness about women's rights, as well as to offer girls tangible ways in which they can take action to help. For instance, they can take an Equality Rules Quiz to find out about laws that affect women's and girls' rights. Another option is reading about the work of human rights activists and then presenting what they learned to their troop. Stories in the "Girls in Action" section of the site feature the words of Girl Scouts reflecting on women's rights issues. In another activity, a troop can role-play being grantmakers and decide how to allocate limited funds to a diverse group of women's rights projects in different countries. The girls can start their own service project, raising money or giving support to women's groups worldwide. Another activity allows a troop to be "big sisters" to a younger troop and help them to complete a similar project.

Girls, Women, Rights.

Organisers cite the following figures: more than 700 million women in the world live on less than US$1 a day. Women make up 70% of people this economically poor. Of the more than 1 billion people in the world who cannot read or write, two-thirds are women. 73 million school-aged girls around the globe do not have an opportunity for basic schooling. Every year, about 515,000 women die from pregnancy-related causes. Women farmers produce half of the world's food, but own only 1% of the world's farmland.

Organisers pilot-tested the programme during the 2002-03 school year. A number of troops in Santa Clara earned the patch. They plan to expand the audience for Women Worldwide to Girl Scouts elsewhere in California and across the US.