1 and 3 year volunteering badges and certificates

We want to celebrate any time that a volunteer spends in Girlguiding. We have the first 15 badge as the first recognition and we think 1 & 3 years feel like a great way to celebrate the next steps in their journey.

These badges are awarded as you journey towards Girlguiding’s long service awards, the first being 5 years.

We’ll be telling members about these badges during volunteers’ week in June and the badges and certificates will be available in time for the new term.

All volunteer roles age 16+ are eligible, as all roles contribute to ensuring our young members have a fantastic experience.

No, as we already have badges to celebrate young members time in their sections, including the new young leader badges.

Yes, it does! We’re celebrating you achieving your first and third year in Girlguiding whilst you are volunteering in Scotland.

Yes, these badges can be presented for any volunteer roles (age 16+).

You can check your own membership record on GO to see how long you’ve been volunteering.  

Speak to your unit leader or local commissioner in the first instance. You may need to show them information about these awards as they are new. 

In person at our shop in Edinburgh, through your local depot or via our online shop.  

Badges will cost £1.50 and certificates 50p. 

The badges are pin badges, similar in design to the Girlguiding 5 year service award. 

Yes, we would encourage this as it’s the best way to ensure no one misses out on an award.

Anyone can buy these badges. You might want to check whether there are any specific arrangements within your district, division or county in case someone is coordinating giving them out.  

These badges can be bought and given out at any level. Individual districts, divisions and counties may want to put their own arrangements in place. 

Of course, there are no restrictions on who can buy these badges.  

Money spent in our shops goes back into guiding in Scotland and helps to keep subscriptions as low as possible.

The badges feature our Scottish thistle design and are intended to help those volunteering in Scotland celebrate their time as part of Girlguiding Scotland. Some members may have volunteered in more than one country or region so if you’ve volunteered in Scotland previously and want to mark this with one of these badges, then that’s fine too! It won’t be possible to add them to the GO record of those living outside Scotland though.  

The badges can be presented in any way, a lot of volunteers like being presented at their unit meeting, or perhaps for a non–unit role a district meeting or event may suit better.   

We’re working with Girlguiding to ensure districts, divisions or counties can add these awards onto individual’s GO records if you would like to. We’ve been advised that this should be possible by the end of 2024 and we’ll give an update to confirm once the necessary GO updates have happened. If there is a district, division or county-wide approach to buying and presenting badges, you should also factor in updating GO records as part of your process.  

Commissioners and others with district, division or county-level access will be able to add these badges to GO.  

Districts, divisions or counties could appoint someone specifically to add these badges to GO. It would be a good role for someone taking a step back from unit guiding or someone new who wants to be involved behind the scenes and gain some admin experience.    

It’s up to each area to decide how they want to approach presenting these badges. It might be something commissioners do as part of a unit-visit or district/division meeting. Or girls may want to take the lead in arranging a presentation as part of a unit meeting.