TRI-CITIES, Tenn. (WJHL) — Two girls from the Tri-Cities earned a Girl Scouts Gold Award for their efforts to improve their local communities. Taylor Trammell and Evelyn Yang were both awarded after they planned and implemented significant projects that addressed an issue in their area.

Trammell developed Sunday school and Wednesday night programming for youth at two local churches. Yang worked with Sleep in a Heavenly Place to fill almost all of its orders for kids in need to have beds, with the help of local schools and clubs.

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“The Gold Award is the highest honor a Girl Scout can receive,” said Lynne Fugate, CEO of the Girl Scout Council of the Southern Appalachians (GSCSA). “These young women have worked hard and demonstrated extraordinary leadership. They have shown empathy and problem-solving skills to enact positive change in our community. We’re so proud of their dedication.”

A release from Girl Scouts said Trammell saw a need for more youth activities and programs at her local church, noting that Black churches and religious communities sometimes did not offer child-focused church programming.

She set out to develop a full year of Sunday school and Wednesday night church activities for kids’ classes and then implemented them in two different congregations.

As a way to secure the longevity of her work, Trammell compiled her church youth programming into a binder and posted it online for the public, for free.

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Evelyn Yang worked with Sleep in Heavenly Peace, a non-profit that supplies beds and bedding materials to area kids in need, to organize “build days”.

Yang and others, including the Dobyns-Bennett High School Beta Club, Eastman Professional Development Club and First Baptist Church of Kingsport, worked to build beds for the non-profit to distribute.

Girl Scouts said Yang was able to triple her goal and build enough beds to help the non-profit fill almost all of their active orders, with more build days planned for the future.

Yang discovered through research that between 1.5 and 2 million children in the country lack adequate sleeping arrangements, with many using a couch or the floor. She told Girl Scouts leaders that this research inspired her to ensure local children had a comfortable place to sleep.

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