Girl Scouts in the Heart of Pennsylvania Service Unit 416 (State College Girl Scouts) comprises more than 40 Girl Scout troops serving around 400 girls, covering mostly the State College Area School District.
The Service Unit is run by an amazing team of volunteer leaders.
Girl Scouts in the Heart of Pennsylvania
Girl Scouts in the Heart of Pennsylvania (GSHPA), the premier leadership development organization for girls 5-17 in central and northeastern PA, helps today’s girls become tomorrow’s leaders. GSHPA serves 30 counties in central and northeastern Pennsylvania. State College is part of the West Region, which covers Centre, Clinton, Huntingdon, Juniata, and Mifflin Counties.
Regions are subdivided into Service Units (sometimes called Communities). Most of Centre County now encompasses two Service Units: 414 (Bellefonte, Bald Eagle, Penns Valley) and 416 (State College Area).
For more information about Girl Scouts in the Heart of Pennsylvania or to join, please visit www.gshpa.org.
GSHPA Service Unit 416
When you become a Girl Scout, you join a network of over 2 million girls and adult leaders living out the Girl Scout Law to Make the World a Better Place. State College Girl Scouts helps connect 400 area girls and their adult leaders.
At the service unit level, we support area troops by bringing girls together for community wide events such as Camporees and World Thinking Day. Cookie rallies, bridging ceremonies, and parades may also be organized at the community level. Many of these events can draw over 100 scouts and their chaperones.
Join Girl Scouts
If you are looking for a troop to join, you can browse our Troop Directory or contact GSHPA for placement assistance.
Keep in mind that our Troop Directory will not match the official GSHPA opportunity catalog for a variety of reasons. For example, troop leaders may close their troop to automatic placement (even if they are accepting new members) if the troop has an odd schedule or travels a lot. We encourage all new members to reach out to prospective troops in order to learn more about the kind of activities the troop participates in and what kind of schedule it follows.
Volunteer
If you are an adult looking to help with Girl Scouts in the State College Area, please Contact Us! We cannot deliver a life changing youth program without your help. We need volunteers to work directly with the girls at the troop level, but also to help organize community wide activities like our Camporees, World Thinking Day, Bridging Ceremonies, communications, training adult leaders, etc.
We cannot go camping without first aid certified volunteers. We cannot go canoeing without lifeguards. We cannot let the girls do archery without archery instructors.
Perhaps you just want to organize a badge workshop, help the girls with a service project, or teach the girls a skill? Our troop leaders are not experts in every field their girls want to explore and will appreciate the help.