World Thinking Day: 22 February 2017

Celebrated annually since 1926, every 22 February is World Thinking Day. World Thinking Day is a day of international friendship, speaking out on issues that affect girls and young women, and fund raising for 10 million girl guides and girl scouts around the world.

In 2017, the girl guides and girl scouts would like to grow the World Thinking Day celebrations, and invite more girls and young women around the world to experience what it means to be part of the Girl Guiding and Girl Scouting Movement.

In 1926, Girl Guide and Girl Scout delegates from around the globe met in America for the 4th World Conference. Among other decisions, they agreed that there should be a special annual day when Girl Guides and Girl Scouts around the world think of each other and express their thanks and appreciation for the international Movement. This was called Thinking Day. The delegates chose 22 February as the date for Thinking Day because it was the birthday of both Lord Baden-Powell, the British founder of the Boy Scout Movement, and Olave Baden-Powell, who was World Chief Guide.

Six years later in 1932, at the 7th World Conference in Bucze, Poland, a Belgian delegate said that a birthday usually involves gifts. Olave Baden-Powell wrote a letter to all Girl Guides and Girl Scouts later that year to tell them about this idea and to ask them to spare a penny to help support Girl Guiding and Girl Scouting around the world.

In 1999, at the 30th World Conference in Dublin, Ireland, delegates from around the world decided to change the name of the day from Thinking Day to World Thinking Day. Today the fundraising aspect of World Thinking Day that began in 1932 is still an important funding mechanism for the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts (WAGGGS), and it helps to keep the Movement going.

An Activity Pack can be downloaded from the WAGGGS website. The pack, built on the theme of ‘Connect’, invites people to explore and celebrate the meaningful connections that make our lives better.

https://www.wagggs.org/en/what-we-do/world-thinking-day/history/

MARTINA NICOLLS is an international aid and development consultant, and the author of:- The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).

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