Its always interesting planning for a new guiding year, especially when you are new to the unit. You do not have knowledge of what the girls have already done the previous years and trying to get all of the guiders input is very complicated. Last year, I worked with a Guide and Brownie Unit that worked mainly on the Guide program and planned meetings week by week. This does not always work. At the end of the year, it was hard to give the girls badges because we did not plan to finish anything. Planning was off the cuff and based on the money the unit had.
This year I am moving to a brand new unit. This allows me and my co-leader to plan everything from scratch. We can work on the parts of the program that we want to and make sure we finish program sections. The only issue we have is that we do not have a lot of money, cookies to sell or camping equipment. It is also hard to get the two of us together to plan.
A big issue with a new unit is that we may not be able to sell fall cookies as they have to be ordered in the spring. We also only start with $200, plus registration fees of $24 a girl. We will also need to collect dues for the first few years, purchase or borrow camping equipment and start a collection of art supplies. This will limit what we can do as a unit. We also will not necessarily be able to camp in the fall. Having limited funds will direct what we are able to do.
Another issue with a new unit is that most of the girls will be new, even if they are second and third years, which means that the unit will have to spend more time on enrolment prep. This also benefits the unit because there is less of a chance of repeating something the girls have already done. We can be as creative or inventive as we want to be.
In the back of my mind is also the fact that the program will be changing soon which means that all of the planning I do this year will not help for the next year as the old program may not translate to the new program and we do not have enough girls who will be grandfathered into the program. This is not something to focus on now however.
This year I want to use a different style of planning. I will look at the milestones and anything time bound. This includes enrolment, bound to the fall, advancement, bound to the spring and Thinking Day, bound to Feb 22. The next thing is to add in optional milestones like Fall and Spring Camp, overnights, cookie selling and field trips. The final step is to fit programming into the rest of the weeks. However, something that I learned from last year is that schedules are unpredictable and there is no way to guarantee that a schedule can be followed. I would also plan to finish 6 or so interest badges in case the girls want to finish the program but not work at home.
Things happen and you have to be flexible. To do this, I will pick the 30 challenge badges that I would like to accomplish, (not including the mandatory stuff like Promise and Law) and spread them out over the year. This will allow us to have an idea of what we want to do each month but we will not plan particulars until we know how much money we will have and when we can do something.
Milestones:
First Meeting: September 18 2017
Enrolment: October 23 or 30 2008
Holiday Party/Last Meeting of 2017: December 18 2008
First Meeting of 2018: January 8 2018
Thinking Day: February 22 2018
Advancement: June 2018
Optional Milestones:
Fall Camp: October/November 2017
Spring Camp: April/May 2018
Sleepover: January/February 2018
Mint Cookie Selling: October 2017
Spring Cookie Selling: April 2018
Field Trips: November 2017, January 2018, March 2018, April 2018, possibly May 2018
Badge Test Nights: Once a month
Programming Ideas:
Spa Night, Sports Night, Science Night, Camp Prep Nights, Craft Night, Drama Night, Sewing Night, Culture Night, Career Night, First Aid Night, Healthy Eating and Kitchen Creation Night(s)
Guided by Phoenix 