MCFARLAND — On April 7, at the Girl Scouts of Wisconsin Badgerland Award Ceremony in Prairie Du Sac, Tori Budnar-Chapman was one of 11 Girl Scouts receiving her Gold Award.
The Gold Award is the highest award a Girl Scout can earn. Once achieved, according to the chapter’s website, “It shows colleges, employers, and your community that you’re out there changing the world.”
MADISON — The Diocese of Madison Catholic Committee of Scouting (DMCCS) is hosting a Catholic celebration for their fellow Scouts on Sunday, April 3, at Edgewood High School, 2219 Monroe St, Madison.
All Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, and Girl Scouts interested in starting or completing the Religious Emblems Program are invited to attend this event.
Registration begins at 1 p.m. at the school. A Scout Mass will be held at 4 p.m. and dinner will be provided following the service.
MADISON — Each year, Catholic committees on scouting, including those on the diocesan level, take time to honor and recognize adult leaders and committee members who give large amounts of time, effort, and faith to promote scouting for boys and girls.
On November 9, two leaders in the Diocese of Madison were given special recognition for their work with Boy Scouts in the diocese.
Richard Ley, member of St. Dennis Parish in Madison, and Gregory Bergenske, member of St. Patrick Parish in Janesville, were honored at the annual Diocese of Madison Catholic Committee on Scouting (DMCCS) 2014 Annual Adult Recognition Dinner at St. Dennis Church in Madison.
WINTER — The Sinsinawa Dominican Sisters of Wisconsin were seeking a place for girls to discover, explore, and experience God’s great outdoors.
So, in 1923, they created what would become the only full-season Catholic girls overnight camp in the nation — WeHaKee Camp for Girls located in northern Wisconsin.
MADISON — St. Maria Goretti School (SMG) in Madison has received a $2,500 grant from American Girl as a runner-up winner of the national American Girl Elevate the Arts School Grant Contest.
According to the American Girl website, “American Girl, in partnership with Americans for the Arts, invited elementary school art teachers to submit student projects and an essay about how their schools value art, as well as how a grant would be used to further art in their schools. With hundreds of entries from schools across the country, determining the winners was challenging. Using criteria of artistic merit, effort, and effective expression of the theme, our judging committee rewarded 13 schools with grants totaling $45,000.”
Last month, an advisory committee of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta recommended that nine- to 12-year-old boys be vaccinated against the human papillomavirus (HPV), a virus transmitted through sexual contact. The goal of the recommendations was to prevent cancers caused by HPV, such as certain cancers of the digestive tract.
The same committee had already recommended, back in March of 2007, that girls and young women between the ages of nine and 26 be vaccinated against HPV, to help prevent various cancers of the reproductive tract, such as cervical cancer.
While the motivation to prevent cancer and diseases is clearly good, a universal recommendation of this type raises ethical concerns. Because the recommendations of the committee relate to important aspects of human behavior and sexuality at formative ages for children and adolescents, parents need to look at the psychological and social messages they might be conveying by choosing to vaccinate their children against HPV.
