Taylie Smith characterizes herself as an animal lover, so when time came for her to choose a project to earn the highest achievement in Girls Scouts, helping out a local animal shelter was a no-brainer.
The 18-year-old, a senior at Wilsonville High School, has been involved in Girls Scouts for more than a decade and had one more goal to achieve before cutting back on her involvement as she heads off to college.
“A Gold Award is the highest achievement a scout can achieve in Girl Scouts,” she said in an email. “It is the equivalent to the Eagle Scout achievement (in Boy Scouts).”
To earn the award, Smith committed to erect lean-tos at the Newberg animal shelter.
“I came up with a plan and timeline, worked with others on a design and then fundraised,” she said. “After fundraising for funds and donated goods, I got any materials that I hadn’t already received as in-kind donations and assembled the roofs — with volunteers. As soon as the roofing was done myself and volunteers finished assembling the lean-tos.”
The work was welcomed by the Sandoz Road shelter, which is primarily operated by volunteers and via donations.
“Last August, Taylie … approached the Newberg Animal Shelter offering to complete a project for us to earn her Gold Award,” Kathy Carver, a board member at the shelter, said in an email. “The project that we chose was to build semi-permanent rain/sun shelters for three of our dog runs, replacing ones that don’t hold up well over time. Taylie completed the project and the three shelters were delivered and installed (April 28). The shelters are great and will help our dogs.”
Although it wasn’t Smith’s first philanthropic project, it proved to be challenging.
“Yes, though nothing quite as extensive,” she said of past efforts. “For my Silver Award I did a blanket drive for children in the hospital.”
Raising the funds was a big part of the process of getting the job done.
“Through the GoFundMe we raised my target of $1,500 (before fees),” Smith said. “We used all of those monetary donations to pay for materials such as metal, powder-coating and wood. If there had been extra monetary donations then they would be given to the animal shelter.”
Now that the project is completed, Smith can concentrate on graduating high school in a few weeks and then heading off to college, where she will pursue a major concentrating on, you guessed it, animals.
“After high school I plan to get my transfer degree at Clackamas Community College before I attend Eastern Oregon University, where I’ll major in rangeland science and minor in fish and wildlife management,” Smith said. “After college graduation I’ll get a job with the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, where I can put my love for nature, conservation and animals to use.”
Although she won’t be as involved in scouting as in years past, “I look forward to volunteering at a yearly day camp I’ve attended since the beginning of my time in Girls Scouts,” she said.
And the future will undoubtedly include pets of her own (she has one dog now, a miniature Schnauzer named Ratchett).
“When I’m older and can take care of a dog on my own I will get a dog from a shelter,” she said. “Probably a large breed of dog."
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