Upper St. Clair Scout joins ranks of female Eagles

Girls can be Eagles, too.

Molly Walsh, 16, joined the growing number of females earning the highest rank attainable in Scouts BSA, previously known as Boy Scouts.

“She knows what she likes. She pursues it,” her father, Bethel Park School District Superintendent James Walsh, said. “And we just sort of follow along and make it happen with her.”

Family members joined friends and fellow Scouts to assist in make her Eagle community service project happen. To fulfill a requirement for the rank, Molly built a tree bench and installed play equipment at Horses With Hope, formerly in Bethel Park and now at Gilfillan Farm in Upper St. Clair.

She began contributing time to the nonprofit therapeutic riding center when she was 14.

“A year after I started volunteering there is when I started my Eagle project. And since I already was volunteering there, it made sense,” she said. “I like the people there and what they’re doing. It’s always fun to be with the kids and help them.”

Molly is a member of Brookline-based Girls Troop 9006, which was admitted into Scouts BSA on Feb. 28, 2019, the first year of eligibility for females.

“My brother was in Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts when I was growing up, so I did some of the activities with him,” Molly said about sibling John, now 18, who went on to earn his own Eagle. “I tried Girl Scouts, and it just wasn’t for me because I grew up with the activities that were more outdoorsy, and you learn more doing it.”

Troop 9006 was active for just over a year when covid-19 interrupted normal proceedings.

“During the pandemic, Molly was a troop leader, and so she had to try to conduct meetings via Zoom, which for Scouting is really not super-conducive to their activities,” her father said. “But she really did a great job.”

Molly, daughter of James and Ann, is the second female Scout in the Eagle Valley District of the Laurel Highlands Council to earn the loftiest BSA rank. A Court of Honor ceremony celebrating her achievement took place in June at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Mt. Lebanon.

“She was waiting to hold her Court of Honor, hoping that more girls from the troop could join her,” James Walsh said. “She didn’t want to be the only one. Unfortunately, a year went by and nobody else was ready.”

Molly launched her Eagle project by enlisting helpers, including a friend of her brother who is a carpenter, and asking for donations. Among the Bethel Park businesses that gave were Evey True Value Hardware and Rental, Lowe’s, and Home Depot

Requesting contributions turned out to be a beneficial life experience.

“It was definitely nerve-wracking at first,” Molly said. “But I think what did help is I know people who have gotten their Eagle before me, and they kind of told me how to do it. So it was less scary, because I knew what to expect.”

Going into her junior year at Upper St. Clair High School, Molly expects to choose eventually between a pair of potential career paths. One is forensic science, inspired by her older brother, Michael, a recent graduate of Point Park University with a degree in intelligence and national security.

“Hearing him talk about it was really cool,” she said, plus she helped him with his forensic science homework. And during the summer, she is interning with her township’s police department to learn about criminal justice.

Another field of study could be athletic training.

“I’m our football team’s manager,” Molly said about her services on behalf of the Upper St. Clair Panthers. “So I’ve had a lot of exposure doing that.”

During her Court of Honor, numerous letters of recognition from national, state and local dignitaries were read on Molly’s behalf. Among the guests was Russ Spicuzza, Scouting representative with the South Hills Elks Lodge 2213 in Bethel Park, who presented Molly with two framed certificates of merit, a personal-sized American flag and a small gold lapel pin representing 80-plus years of the relationship between the Elks and Scouting.

Nearly 1,000 young women nationally became the first female Eagle Scouts on Feb. 8, 2021, the 111th anniversary of Boy Scouts of America’s founding. Katy Appleman of Fox Chapel was the first from the Laurel Highlands Council, which includes 13 districts serving nearly 17,000 youths in Western Pennsylvania and parts of West Virginia and Maryland, earning the honor in September 2021.