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Girl Scouts to award badge for video game development

The youth organization is getting with the times by creating a new skill badge for girls who build their own video games.

Dara Kerr Former senior reporter
Dara Kerr was a senior reporter for CNET covering the on-demand economy and tech culture. She grew up in Colorado, went to school in New York City and can never remember how to pronounce gif.
Dara Kerr
Some of the badges available to Girl Scouts. The Girl Scouts of the United States

While camping, gardening, and public speaking are important to being a stand-up scout, the Girl Scouts of Greater Los Angeles has decided that video game development should also be included as a prestigious badge.

The Girl Scouts has teamed up with Women in Games International to create the new badge, according to GirlGamer. The aim is to get the scouts interested in engineering and software development. The badge will be part of the Girl Scout's STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) curriculum.

"Our ultimate goal is to create a STEM-aligned video game badge for the Girl Scouts of the United States of America," WIGI vice president Amy Allison told GirlGamer. "Creating this badge will get young girls excited in technology and science and let them know that they, too, can have a career in the video game industry."

To earn the gaming badge the girl scouts will use Gamestar Mechanic, which is a program that helps people learn game design and development, according to GirlGamer.

The Boy Scouts already have a gaming badge; they also have one for robot building and other tech-geared badges. On the 100th anniversary of the Girl Scouts in 2012, Adafruit Industries, an open-source hardware and maker products emporium, also started pushing the Boy and Girl Scouts to offer more tech-based skill badges, including working on Android or Linux and computer engineering.