The Girl Scouts of Troop 626 at St. James Holy Redeemer received their Silver Award at a Girl Scout ceremony on Wednesday, May 16 at St. Luke’s in Temple City. The five were among 200 girls who earned the award.

Emme Yekikian, Christina Aguilera, Emily Haug, Katie Taix and Sydney Flynn have been together in scouting since first grade and receiving the Silver Award, the second highest award a Girl Scout can receive, was a significant accomplishment for them. They worked hard for two years to earn this award. The girls received badges that went along with their project and took this journey together. As a troop, they decided that their silver project would be the renovation of the school’s library.

This was a huge undertaking that lasted over two years. The library seemed stalled in the 1950s and needed a lot of dedication to bring it into the 21st century. The girls began by working in the summer, cleaning, going through all the books and donating over 30 boxes of out-of-date titles to Goodwill.

The girls then painted the library themselves, re-stocked the shelves into genres, bought beanbag chairs, added some decor and purchased new books from proceeds of their cookie sales.

The girls created a new check-out system for the classes and teachers to use. Finally, they presented the library with a plaque and had Fr. Ed Dover, the school’s priest, bless the renovated and updated facility.

As the girls of Troop 626 are getting ready to graduate and move on to high school, they feel they have left their mark on their school, something they all wanted to achieve.