At my girl scout camp, the staff carry clipboards containing schedules and other important documents. Once you are a Counselor in Training, (CIT), you get to paint your own, now that you have your own schedule to carry. As a CIT, once we arrive at camp, the first thing we do is paint our clipboards. Generally, you put your name somewhere on it, and often something that relates to your name. This helps kids remember your name, and also functions as a name tag. This is something of a status symbol, because you get to feel important and responsible now that you are a part of something bigger. When I was painting it, I spilled paint on it, and I thought I had ruined the painting. However, my friend had the idea of painting soot sprites -a creature from studio ghibli movies- over the mistakes. These were pointed out by many of the children that I worked with, leading to multiple conversations with the young girl scouts about how mistakes are opportunities to make something beautiful. These kinds of lessons are the ones that I wish to always be able to teach the children whom I work with, and inspire me to do what I do. My sister was a girl scout camp counselor, my mom was a girl scout, as was her mother before her, meaning I am the third generation of girl scouts in my family. These lessons for children help me carry on my family legacy.

– EK

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