Troop Spotlight
Troops at St. Edward’s Catholic School
warm the hearts of others

by Donna Ellison

Brownie Girl Scout Troop #1226 from St. Edward’s Catholic School in Spring participated in the One Warm Coat service project with four other troops. Girls collected coats, jackets, and sweaters from students at Goodman Elementary in the Aldine ISD. The troop, their friends and families donated 62 items. Many more were donated by their sister troops in time for Christmas.

Rachel, Katherine, Becky, and Sara team up to bring boxes of coats to the sorting table.

The troop decided not to stop there. The leaders organized a school and church-wide coat drive and got all nine Girl Scout troops at the school to pitch in. Each troop picked an organization they would send their donations to. One week in January, the Girl Scouts encouraged students and staff to clear out their closets and bring clean, used coats to school. The classes had a contest to see who could bring in the most donations. By the end of the week, 373 coats, jackets, and sweaters were collected along with 173 other clothing items.

Emily helps sort the coats.

Troops #11226, #13005, and #11322 are pictured just before helping to sort, count, label, and bag donations.

The next Sunday the Girl Scouts greeted parishioners, held doors, and received donations. They then sorted, counted, labeled and bagged the items. The project was a great success, at last count 962 items were collected from the church and the school.
Junior Girl Scout Troop #11542 led by Karen DuPont picked Casa Juan Diego as their organization to receive donations. They spent their day off on Martin Luther King Jr. Day to drop off the donations at Casa Juan Diego. The girls were invited to tour the organization and speak to some of the volunteers.

Many girls and adults have benefited from this service opportunity. Junior Girl Scout Emilysaid, “Instead of doing something for myself, I enjoyed helping others. I am glad children my age are able to stay warm for the winter.”

Bob Schmanski supervises Grace, Gabriella, Maggie, and Carson in counting and bagging items.

The nine Girl Scout troops that participated were: Troops #11551, #11419, #11322, #11542, #11577, #13005, #11226, #13040, and #13022. The troops donated the 962 items to Casa Juan Diego, Boys and Girls Country, United Way of Montgomery County-Student Support Services, Covenant House, Holy Name Catholic Church and School, Catholic Charities-Refugee Services, Our Lady of Guadelupe Social Services-Women’s Shelter, Casa de Esperanza, and Star of Hope Mission.

One Warm Coat is a national non-profit organization that helps local organizations provide free coats to people in need within their communities. They help provide tools and resources to organizations to set up their own One Warm Coat drive. The organization’s mission is to ensure that anyone who needs a coat has one.