The Girl Scouts of Newtown held their Gold Award Centennial Ceremony on Sunday, June 12, in the Cyrenius H. Booth Library's Meeting Room.

Cat Fedorchek, who is the Girl Scouts of Connecticut/Newtown Service Unit Manager and a Gold Award mentor, welcomed everyone attending the ceremony.

"Today we have two exceptionally intelligent young ladies who have just earned their Gold Award last week at our state ceremony," said Ms Fedorchek.

The Newtown recipients of the 2016 Gold Award were Anika Dholakia and Grace Herrick.

Gold Award mentor Hilary Micalizzi made opening remarks about the history of the Gold Award and the work it entails.

Girl Scout Seniors and Ambassadors can earn the pin by doing a Gold Award Project that tackles a community problem and seeks ways to improve people's lives. It is considered the highest and most prestigious Girl Scout award to be earned.

Ms Micalizzi said, "It is given in recognition of girls who take action to make our world a better place."

The ceremony started by paying homage to the American flag with the Pledge of Allegiance, and was then followed by the Girl Scout Promise and Law.

For Anika's Gold Award Project, she taught senior citizens at Maplewood in Newtown how to use personal technology devices like smartphones, computers and tablets. She also created training materials, like pamphlets, as reference guides. In her classes she had students ranging in age from 75 to 93 years old.

For her Gold Award Project, Grace created an early education program for children in Nakaseke, Uganda, with the help of ACCESS (African Community Center for Cultural Sustainability). Her preschool program runs once a week, on Saturdays, in one of the nursing school classrooms at ACCESS. It currently has a waiting list to get in because the community has such a need for it.

Ms Fedorchek explained in an e-mail prior to the event that "Every year, eight Gold Award recipients are chosen across the nation go to [Washington] DC to participate in the National Celebration. This is the first time someone from Connecticut was chosen, and it just happens to be during our Centennial year."

Gold Award recipient Grace was chosen to attend the National Celebration.

When talking about Grace's upcoming trip to DC, her mother, Anna Cristina Herrick, said, "It's exciting. I'm very proud of her."

During the ceremony, the Newtown recipients were officially given the Gold Award pin by their mentor, which had Ms Micalizzi pinning Anika and Ms Fedorchek pinning Grace.

Afterwards, each girl pinned her mother as a way to thank them for their support.

"It is to commend her mother for her service in helping her achieve her goals," said Ms Fedorchek.

The ceremony closed with the playing of Taps, which invited all Girl Scouts attending the event - past and present - to go up to the front of the room.

Guests were then welcome to stay for refreshments and talk to the Gold Award recipients about their project exhibitions.