Local Girl Scout takes action with ‘Books for Belize’ project

CLARKS SUMMIT—Abington Heights junior and Girl Scout Ambassador of Troop 50797 Grace Bennett plans to help the underprivileged San Jose Succotz R.C. School in Belize by sending educational games for her Girl Scout Take Action Project. She contacted and pitched this idea to Brandi Dugal, CEO and founder of The Fidget Game, which makes education fun and effective for all learning abilities. Brandi willingly donated a couple of copies and variations of this game.

Grace is also the president of her school’s International Club. She has been making global connections to support schools that lack quality education. For the same elementary school in Belize, she was able to collect 1,000 pounds of children’s books and retired curriculum. The community donated them, especially Christopher Hall, a 4th-grade teacher at Clarks Summit Elementary School. He donated books from his personal collection.

In need of monetary donations to ship both the games and the books over to Belize, Grace started a GoFundMe page called Books for Belize. She needs to raise over $1,000 to make the deliveries happen. She also contacted former Olympic skater Michelle Kwan, currently the US Ambassador to Belize, asking her to provide insight on expediting this project’s logistics.

Grace decided to take on these endeavors after visiting the San Jose Succotz R.C. School with the Girl Scouts when she visited Belize last year. She and her fellow Girl Scouts interacted with the students. She saw the school’s learning environment and compared it to the schools in Pennsylvania.

“I noticed that they (students) really need help,” she said. “And it will benefit their future with careers and everything because they need a good education to find a good future for themselves. I think doing this would definitely help.”

Grace’s Girl Scout Take Action project is a stepping stone to her Gold Award project, in which she plans to build a butterfly/garden to promote pollination and a book nook at Hillside Park. The project will be called Grace’s Garden Grandeur, located behind her sister Faith Bennett’s labyrinth in the park.