Hi! I'm Amanda Fulton, and I am a senior at Souhegan High School in Amherst, NH. I have been a Girl Scout for almost 12 years and have achieved my Bronze and Silver Award. I started working on my Gold Award early in summer 2021 and was awarded it in November!
I always knew I wanted my Gold Award to be animal-related because I enjoy being around animals and the environment. I also knew I wanted it to be about bats because I've always liked bats and noticed less and less of them flying around every summer. I was curious about their slow disappearance, and I'd also heard about White-Nose Syndrome, so I decided to do some research and use this opportunity to learn more about bats as well as practicing my community-outreach skills and leadership.
My plan included components of trying to support a physical bat habitat in New Boston, because I have connections with the Forestry Commission there. I have created 6 bat boxes with help from 4 peers, with 3 to hang up and 3 to give to the New Boston Forestry Commission to make my project sustainable.
I presented to the Daland Memorial Library in Mont Vernon on July 29th at 6:30 PM and the Whipple Free Library in New Boston on July 26th at 1 PM about my bat research, including environmental impacts of bats, the types of bats in NH, and the threats that bats face, as well as how you can help bats and specifics on bat boxes. I also presented to several groups of younger Girl Scouts at Camp Kettleford and helped them build 3 bat boxes to use in New Boston as well.
I reached my goals for community outreach. I aspired to reach over 100 people virtually and physically in my community, and I have accomplished this task. At my presentation at the Whipple Free Library (New Boston, NH), 25 people attended from various age groups. At my Daland Memorial Library presentation (Mont Vernon, NH), 11 people attended. During my 3 Camp Kettleford presentations, I closely interacted with and educated 26 girls and 3 counselors. I also distributed my 68 brochures (compilations of my research as well as containing links to my website infographic) to my three local libraries (Amherst, New Boston, Mont Vernon) who graciously agreed to hold onto them and distribute them to the community. Online, I reached at least 35 people, if not more. This may not sound like many but I was very proud of what I did as I had never done anything like this before. My survey responses (also linked on the website) gained only 17 responses, but I was still glad to have them. I reached my goals by advertising online (through my Instagram account and school Discord) and also by doing physical outreach in my community. Overall (assuming overlap on the online aspects) I reached over 150 people physically and virtually.
My Gold Award is sustainable beyond my involvement by my physical construction of bat habitat, online resources, brochures, plaques, and the education my community now has. I hung 3 bat boxes in New Boston (after doing extensive research into how to best place them for bats) and gave the New Boston Forestry Commission 3 identical boxes to replace them with/hang up whenever they wish to. If these 3 boxes ever fall down or become damaged the Commission has replacements on hand. I also gave them replacement plaques and supplies to hang the boxes. I hung my boxes with hooks and bungee cords as this does not harm the tree. New Boston has some of these bungees and hooks for their boxes. The replacements and supplies are safe in Town Hall. Additionally, my plaques hung near the boxes on trailheads are laminated to avoid weathering. These plaques offer information on the boxes as well as URL codes to my website and infographic for further information. My website itself will always be accessible with a link or URL code on the plaques and brochures. This website and infographic are compilations of my information. I intended them to be resources that are forever available through my plaques with all of my extensive research in them. My Gold Award will live on virtually through these two resources. (At least as long as the Internet exists). My project is also sustained through the information accessible on this websites such as bat box plans, which many people have accessed there. My brochures are also being kept at my local libraries for people to access, and they also contain my website and infographic linked. At every presentation, I also guided people to access bat box plans, so I do know that the community I outreached to has the skills to do that if they are ever able to build boxes. Also, my Gold Award exists in the minds of my community members. You cannot ever unlearn something. The community I reached knows of the threats bats face and how they can help from now on.
I wanted to inform people about why bats are important and why we need to actively be protecting bats. I know that my project was a good way to reach out and help educate people about bats. Thanks so much for checking out my work.
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