We wanted to recognize the remarkable recent achievement of Marissa Marques. The Phillipston teenager earned the Girl Scouts’ highest distinction, the Gold Award, although that wasn’t the real achievement.
Marques has been involved with the Girl Scouts since she was a Brownie, around age 7, and she was determined to use her skills she learned from the organization to help her brother, who has Down syndrome, after she realized he didn’t like to attend school dances because of the bright lights and loud sounds.
Marques saw an opportunity to both help her brother and at the same time to work toward the Gold Award, which requires Scouts to identify a problem in their community, find a solution and take action to resolve it.
Marques started to plan and research her options to host a sensory-friendly dance for the seventh- and eighth-graders at Narragansett Pier School.
“I decided to do this dance so all those kids who usually sit on the side could feel included — this dance was all for them,” she told the Athol Daily News.
She spoke with her troop leader, Jennie Chase, about the idea, submitted her work to the Girl Scout Council and then was invited to Worcester to meet with regional Scout leaders to detail what she wanted to do and how she was hoping to make an impact in her community. Once she had the green light from the organization, she reached out to school administrators. She said she got an outpouring of support from the school and the broader community.
“It was a lot of getting out of my comfort zone and just talking to people and a lot of what we got was so unexpected,” said Marques.
Residents volunteered their time to chaperone the dance held in March and offered donations.
“The whole community was very supportive and I am grateful for that,” said Marques.
She said more students attended the dance than she expected and found everyone to be joining in the fun by the end. Students were able to play games and pick their own music.
Her assessment of the event was quite thoughtful.
“Mostly we focus on school being about grades — you go to school, you get your classwork and you go home — but I feel like in middle school, you are still trying to figure out who you are, and part of who you are should be going out and having fun, so why not go to a dance where everyone feels included?” she explained.
Marques said she has been speaking with Girl Scouts within her own community, as well as other girls in surrounding towns, about implementing a similar dance at their schools.
“I hope by me doing this it will sustain itself in our community, but (in) others as well,” she said.
Two months after the dance, Marques found out she would be receiving the Gold Award.
According to the Girl Scouts’ website, the Gold Award is given to fewer than 6 percent of all Girl Scouts annually. Special Events and Projects Manager of the Girl Scouts of Central and Western Massachusetts Tammy Breen said the girls do not win the award, but earn it through their hard work.
So, Marques has been rewarded for her hard work with Girl Scouting’s highest honor. And we suspect Marques’ family and friends have seen her grow as a result of the community project as well. But the real payoff was the dance itself and the difference it made for her brother and others.
How can we top that?