Rebekah achieves top Guiding award
Rebekah Murphy from Ballance, Pahiatua, has completed her Aoraki Award — the highest award achieved in Girl Guides — and was recently presented this at a special shared meal.
Rebekah has been in the Guiding movement since a 6-year-old when she was a Pippin and then from 7-9 a Brownie, both here in Pahiatua. However, she joined Hokowhitu, Palmerston North Guides as a 10-year-old, but last year due to school, travel and other sports activities clashing, Rebekah moved to Aotearoa Guides which is basically Guides done through correspondence. Her leader was on Great Barrier Island and the rest of the girls were from throughout the North Island (there is a South Island Aotearoa Guide Unit). They keep in contact via phone and emails.
“Having completed this award at 121⁄2, Rebekah has decided to go on to Rangers and is now a member of the Aotearoa Ranger unit with her leader this time in Masterton and girls scattered throughout New Zealand,” said Rebekah’s mother, Sharryn Murphy. “She finds it a challenge continuing to work on her own but just sets goals and works towards it. Rebekah has found school activities and involvement at Palmerston North Intermediate Normal helpful in achieving goals — she does road patrol, peer mentoring and is a school librarian and they all helped towards service. Sometimes she has to adjust the clauses as she can’t always be in groups to achieve results but her leader helps and she finds a way around the problem.”
It was the same at Guides. “To complete each step you had to do clauses from four sections — Outdoors, My Community, My World and Global Exploration — these were done with The Unit, The Patrol And Individual,” said Rebekah. “Then to achieve my Aoraki Award I had to do a several more challenges — Leadership activities, a Community Challenge and hold an overnight camp with at least three other girls. It was a lot of work but fun — I had planned the camp in March last year but before attending I had to cancel the date as we had two cyclones and the camp sites were all flooded. That was interesting but at least we weren’t at camp when it happened.
“I also attended a Guide Jamboree in Christchurch and tried sailing which I’d never done before, I meet a lot of Guides from other areas in NZ and also overseas. I got to do rock climbing, high rope obstacle course, archery and lots of other fun activities,” she said.
Rebekah follows a family strong in Guiding and Scouting connections. Her great-grandmother was one of the first Guide leaders in Wellington before moving to Palmerston North and leading a Brownie group there. Her grandmother went through Brownies, Guides and Rangers in Palmerston North before moving to Taihape and become a Brownie leader, Guide leader, camp trainer in Taihape and the surrounding Manawatu¯ areas for many years. Rebekah’s mother was also a Brownie, Guide and Ranger, completing her Queen’s Guide. Rebekah’s brother David is in Scouting and has completed his Chief Scout Award and is in Venturers.
Rebekah is looking forward to lots of fun experiences with Rangers and has been very busy completing many certificates already — Safety, Leadership, Outdoors as well as a large range of service and advocacy projects.