Girl Scouts in Chinle build rockets, confidence at Navajo Nation camp

More than 60 Girl Scouts from across the Navajo Nation spent three days in Chinle learning to build rockets, run together and picture technical careers without leaving home. The free camp at Chinle High School was built as much around access as activity, mixing science with outdoor lessons and female mentorship for girls in Apache County and other Navajo communities.

The camp ran May 5-7 and included a morning run with Miss Navajo Nation Camille Uentillie, a Jeep tour through Canyon de Chelly, stargazing with Navajo constellations, archery, bike riding and rocket-building and launching. For a child who had just turned 7, Bahazhooni Craig, the appeal was personal: she wanted a Girl Scouts birthday experience, a reminder that the camp reached some of its youngest participants as something special, not just educational.

Navajo Transitional Energy Company and the Girl Scouts-Arizona Cactus-Pine Council sponsored the camp for the eighth year, tying it to a longer effort to widen the STEM pipeline for Navajo girls. NTEC says its Girl Scouts STEM Camp is held annually in June and has included Navajo rug weaving, basket making, rocket building, archery and speakers such as Miss Navajo Nation and female STEM professionals. That mix of cultural learning and hands-on science is aimed at keeping girls engaged in their own communities while introducing them to fields that often feel far away.

The council’s footprint shows why the effort matters in rural and tribal areas. Girl Scouts-Arizona Cactus-Pine Council says it serves more than 12,000 girls and more than 7,500 adult volunteers across about 75,000 square miles in Arizona, including 19 of the 22 tribal communities in its jurisdiction. On the Navajo Nation and Hopi Lands, the council says it has more than a dozen troops, with over 190 Girl Scouts and 60 adult volunteers, and its work with tribal communities dates back to the 1930s.

The Chinle camp also fits a pattern that started years ago. The first Navajo Nation Girl Scouts STEM camp, held in Tsaile in June 2018, drew 84 girls ages 5 to 17 from about 20 communities. At that time, NTEC said many Navajo Nation girls could not reach STEM activities in surrounding cities, so it brought the programming to them. The Chinle camp carried that same message forward: if Apache County is going to build a local STEM talent base, it will start with girls who can see science, leadership and possibility right here at home.