MCHS Community Corps AmeriCorps members serving with Girl Scouts of the Northwestern Great Lakes lead a group of scouts on an overseas adventure

September 2, 2024

When Marshfield Clinic Health System (MCHS) - Community Corps AmeriCorps members Sigourney Vandeveer, Miranda Schomberg, and Lauren David started their service last year at the Girl Scouts of the Northwestern Great Lakes, they had little idea it would lead them to an overseas adventure this summer to chaperone a group of girls to Italy, Austria, and Germany in addition to all of their planned service activities.

MCHS Community Corps AmeriCorps member Lauren David explained that “I knew it was an option to chaperone a trip when I interviewed for Girl Scouts last summer. What I didn’t know is that it would be an international trip.” Reflecting on the opportunity, Lauren described that “I had always wanted to go to Europe, but it wasn’t feasible to take a trip there myself…I was so excited to be a part of this trip and to take in the cultures as much as I could.”

Over the course of nine days, they helped lead the participating girls through their travel and helped open their eyes to the world during their exploration of Rome, Pisa, Florence, Innsbruck, Munich, and the Dachau concentration camp. “I loved getting to know the people in my chaperone group and in the overall tour group. Watching them open up to new experiences was amazing,” said Lauren. “It was definitely one of the highlights of my service term and I will always be grateful to AmeriCorps and Girl Scouts for allowing me the chance of a lifetime.”

This sentiment was echoed by her fellow AmeriCorps members, with Sigourney Vandeveer beginning her detailed reflection on each element of the trip by stating that “it is appropriate that I begin by thanking with every fiber of my being the following: Girl Scouts of the Northwestern Great Lakes, Marshfield Clinic Health Systems, AmeriCorps, Community Corps, EF Tours, and all the friends, family, and community members who helped me prepare for my first journey across the Atlantic. It was nine days to remember, though it peeled past, or maybe through me like lightning.” The trip provided her with the opportunity to visit many of the sites she had previously studied as a humanities major. Thinking back on her overall journey following their visit to Dachau on the final day before returning home, Sigourney explained how she “silently thanked my teachers, professors, mentors, and all the others in my life who’d taught me well and given me an appetite for learning and seeing the world as its true, beautiful, ugly, heartbreaking self.”

For more about Sigourney's service this year before the trip, check out the episode of The S-Files podcast featuring her service: Finding Joy Providing Opportunities through the Girl Scouts while serving with MCHS Community Corps