5 BP Awards for Ballarat

Award Certificate Presentation

On Saturday, November 9, five Ballarat Girl Guides were amongst those invited to attend the annual Guides Victoria Celebrate! Award Certificate Presentation. This is special event to acknowledge the 2019 recipients of the Baden-Powell Award and Queens Guide Award.

11th Ballarat Guides

Prior to the state ceremony, the five girls from the 11th Ballarat Guides were presented with badges and certificates at a local ceremony on October 30th:

• Alicia Pollock
• Amy Chester
• Gracie Sherman
• Kaitlyn Pollock
• Maggie Browning

The evening was attended by parents, friends and invited guests. The awards were presented by Central Highlands Region Manager, Ms Louisa Watts

Unit youth members provided supper, formed the colour party and participated in the ceremony. The BP awardees all renewed the Guide Promise,   presented supporter badges to their parents or grandparents and cut their special cakes.

Silver Endeavour Award

Emily Shearer-Cox was presented with the Silver Endeavour Award, signifying that she has completed the first 9 challenges of the BP Award. Her badge was presented by Cherie Brown, Emily’s leader when she was a Junior Guide. The same badge was presented by Rosemary Garth and Trish LaTrobe to Alicia, Amy, Gracie, Kaitlyn and Maggie.

BP Award

The BP Award is one of Guiding’s peak achievement awards and is named after the founder, Robert Baden-Powell. The Guides work on the syllabus over a period of several years, completing challenges from each of the 7 fundamentals on the Australian Guide Program.

• Promise and Law
• Guiding traditions
• Service
• Patrol system
• Outdoors
• Leadership

Some of the challenges undertaken by the girls include:

• completing the Service Flash 3 badge, Safety 1, Safety 2, Emergency 1 and Emergency 2, Boating 1 and Boating 2 badges
• completing a first aid course
• devising and practicing evacuation plans
• providing service to the RSL by sellinng ANZAC day badges and poppies
• sorting and bagging toys for the Ballarat Toy Library, made fruit cakes and biscuits for Blaze Aid
• worked with the Soup Bus
• attending the opening of the Ballarat Mosque and compared the beliefs and practices of various religions
• hosting an afternoon tea for former Guides and Leaders
• researching the lives of Agnes and Olave Baden-Powell and their influence on Guiding
• constructing outdoor devices with ropes and poles
• abseiling on the tower at Pax Hill
• cooking a 3 course meals outdoors over an open fire
• fishing, canoeing, yachting, sail boarding
• planning a night of activities to teach other Guides about the 5 World Centres and Guiding in the Arab Region