How do you change the world if you are just 11 years old and you have to study for MCAS while preparing for your end of the year dance recital in between walking the dogs and emptying the dishwasher?

Maybe it’s impossible, but I work with a group of 15 Girl Scouts who refuse to believe that and now they have the blog to prove it.

At the beginning of this year, we set out to find a project that would make a difference in our community. There was a long list of groups they’d like to help including soldiers overseas, children in the hospital, orphans in other countries, people in need of food and the homeless living on Boston Common. These girls have big hearts.

It wasn’t easy to convince them that while they could do something for someone, they couldn’t do everything for everyone and choices would have to be made if we were to be able to do any good at all.

They settled on the animals. Specifically, the ones who need homes. The dogs and cats, the puppies and the kittens who have been lost or abandoned and really deserve more.

In all seriousness, they wanted to adopt one as a troop. If we didn’t meet in a building that doesn’t allow pets, if I didn’t already have two dogs, if I thought for an instant that the parents wouldn’t torch my phone, I still would have rejected the idea because really dogs can’t live on Girl Scout cookies!

They liked the idea of collecting items for the animal shelter, but the reality of it proved to be more complex than they expected and they didn’t get as many items as we’d hoped.  They did at least make toys and got to see for themselves  how much they were appreciated during a tour of the Northeast Animal Shelter. But that turned out not to be enough.

That tour had a big impact. It convinced the girls even more that something should be done. They nearly cried as they heard for themselves the awful stories about what happens to dogs and cats without homes. They thought of their own pets at home and they wished their homes were bigger.

While they wait to grow up and have big homes of their own, they decided that for now they can let people know what they know and urge them to do what they can to stop the problem. They picked out three things that they think will help:
-Spay and Neuter so there won’t be unwanted puppies and kittens
-Make sure pets have an ID so they can be sent home if they get lost
-Vaccinate to keep pets healthy

But how do you let people know that it’s important? You have to tell them. They can’t tell the whole world at once, but they figured they could tell three people who could tell three people who could tell three people etc..

“Do3, Tell 3”

Armed with this idea and needing a way to get the word out to a broader audience, they launched a blog: www.do3tell3.wordpress.com.

In between studying and practicing and taking care of chores, they plan to post pictures of their favorite pets and write about why they think it’s important to not just take care of their own animals but all the animals. If you agree, you can take their pledge to “do 3, tell 3.”

And that is how an 11 year old can change the world.