Not Your Grandma's Girl Scouts

"There's still that sense of girl power, teaching them to be leaders. Empowering the girls. Teaching them the 'I-can-do,' " says Petteway. "Just believing in themselves is very important. You take girls and you try to show them different things, things they would never experience otherwise. And you see the growth."

Few high school students would be confident enough to approach a shelter for abused women, ask what its needs were and embark upon a reading program. Fewer still would have the determination to stay the course, to carry it off successfully. Rachelle Anderson had the will and the skill. Her experience in Girl Scouts not only made it a necessity if she was to achieve a Gold Award, but gave her the tools to do the job.

Arthur Hermiz

Rachelle Anderson read stories to children for weeks on end.

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• Rachelle Anderson
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If the Girl Scouts were smarter, and they seem to be getting smarter, they'd order up a recruiting poster and put Rachelle Anderson all over it.

E-mail Margaret Downing at margaret.downing@houstonpress.com.