As a former Personal Progress Leader, I know how
difficult it can be to know which girls have completed
experiences and which have not. Part of the
difficulty for me was getting to know all the girls
and making time to talk with them about their
progress. As much as I hate telephones they soon
became my best friend as I took the time to help each
girl complete her goals.

Personal Progress needs to have a good foundation and
leader support for girls to want to complete it.
Ideally part of the New Beginnings program should
focus on Personal Progress to help the new girls, as
well as the current ones, become excited about the
program and feel motivated.

As the leader it will be your job to ensure the girls
work on Personal Progress as often as possible and can
come to you for help whenever it is needed. I
recommend getting a 3-ring binder and filling it with
experience and project ideas grouped by value and
leaving it in the Young Women’s room for the girls to
look through when they need some fresh ideas. Then if
for some reason you are unavailable to help the girls
they will still have a resource to turn to.

If you are feeling adventurous and the Young Women
President approves it, you can make your own Personal
Progress tracking sheet on poster board, based on the
tracking sheet produced by the church, and post it on
the wall in the YW room so everyone can see at a
glance where they are. However, if you are in a ward
where the girls have a tendency to compete or tease
those who fall behind this may not be a good idea.

You should keep handy the tracking sheet from the
church as well. This will be an enormous help in
planning Personal Progress night each month as you can
see at a glance which values each girl still needs to
accomplish. Most of the value experiences require some
sort of journal writing which can easily get
overlooked. Try to reserve 15-20 minutes of time
either at the beginning or end of PP night for journal
writing to help the girls keep up.

Most importantly, as a Personal Progress Leader, take
the time to carefully and plan and organize your
activities. With proper preparation anything can
become more enjoyable and uplifting. Seek blessings
if you hit road blocks along the way and if you have
never had a chance to earn your Personal Progress
Medallion work along with the girls to earn yours as
well.

For more ideas and help on incorporating value
experiences into lessons and help with laurel projects
please check out the Young Women’s
Connection web site.

This week's article has been written by Amy Daniels.