Girl Guides Australia

Girl Guides Australia
Country	Australia
Founded	1910
Membership	30,811
Chief Commissioner	Helen Geard
Affiliation	World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts
Website girlguides.org.au

Girl Guides Australia is the national Guiding organisation in Australia. It provides a girls only space and its mission is to enable girls and young women to grow into confident, self-respecting members of the community. Membership is open to all girls and young women from all cultures, faiths and traditions. Founded in 1910, the girls-only organization became a full member of the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts in 1928. It has 30,000 members (as of 2010) including 18,000 youth members, aged 5 to 17. Over a million Australian women are or have been Guides.^[1]

Program and ideals

Since 1996, all youth members from 5-17 have been known as Guides. Guide Units are made up of Patrols based on age. Called Developmental Stages, the Patrols include Girls aged 5 –7, 7 - 9, 9 - 12, 12 - 14 and 14 - 17. There is also a program for women aged 18 to 30, known as the Olave Program. Guide Leaders are adult volunteers aged 18 or over.

The Girl Guide emblem incorporates the Commonwealth Star.

Guide Promise

For many years, the Guide Promise closely resembled that of Girlguiding UK:

I promise that I will do my best:
To do my duty to God,
to serve the Queen and my country,
To help other people, and
To keep the Guide Law.

The Girl Guides Australia Board in May 2010, passed a recommendation that Members may opt to use an alternative to the current Promise:^[2]

I promise that I will do my best:
to do my duty to God and my country;
to help other people; and
to keep the Guide Law.

Other alternatives were also agreed for members of other nationalities.^[2]

In July 2012, the Guide Promise was updated, along with the Guide Law (as below), to better reflect modern society and the perspective of current day Guides. Notable changes include the removal of explicit reference to God, instead replaced by "my beliefs", and removing reference to the Queen. This updated promise was ratified by the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts on July 3, 2012^[3] and now stands as below:

I promise that I will do my best
To be true to myself and develop my beliefs
To serve my community and Australia
And live by the Guide Law.

Guide Law

The original and long-standing Guide Law, as established in 1910 was:

A Guide is loyal and can be trusted.
A Guide is helpful.
A Guide is polite and considerate.
A Guide is friendly and a sister to all Guides.
A Guide is kind to animals and respects all living things.
A Guide is obedient.
A Guide has courage and is cheerful in all difficulties.
A Guide makes good use of her time.
A Guide takes care of her own possessions and those of other people.
A Guide is self-controlled in all she thinks, says and does.

The Guide Law was updated in July 2012 after some surveying of Guides and Leaders, with emphasis on those principles they felt best reflected the goal of modern Guiding. The updated Guide Law was ratified by the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts on July 3, 2012^[3] and now stands as below:

As a Guide I will strive to:
Respect myself and others
Be considerate, honest and trustworthy
Be friendly to others
Make choices for a better world
Use my time and abilities wisely
Be thoughtful and optimistic
Live with courage and strength.

Guide biscuits

Guides sell manufactured biscuits to raise money for the organisation. Girl guide biscuits come in three varieties with the guide logo on the biscuit

• Traditional
• Chocolate coated
• Mini Chocolate coated

The money raised is spent at a local and national level. The Guide biscuit campaign starts in May each year.^[4]

Centenary

In 2010, Girl Guides Australia celebrated 100 years of Guiding across Australia. The centenary ran from September 2009 to February 2011.^[5]

See also

• Eleanor Manning
• Joyce Price
• Scouts Australia

References