Cincinnati-Kharkiv project wins award (10/27/96)

Cincinnati-Kharkiv project wins award

CINCINNATI - The Cincinnati-Kharkiv Sister City Project has won a national award for its work to establish Girl Scouting in Kharkiv.

The award is the Youth Leadership Development Award, one of a few national awards given annually by Sister Cities International to recognize sister city organizations for "exemplary success in developing ongoing relations and programs with their foreign counterparts."

The Cincinnati-Kharkiv Sister City Project's (CKSCP) award recognizes a five-year effort to introduce Girl Scouting to Cincinnati's sister city. Information about scouting did not exist there during communism. Now, Kharkiv provides scouting for more than 1,000 children.

The CKSCP and Cincinnati scouts have been visiting and corresponding with Kharkiv adults and youngsters setting up Scout troops.

The effort was spearheaded in 1991 by Jan Sherbin, a member of the CKSCP board of trustees. She connected her Kharkiv contacts with Cincinnati Girl Scout troops, as well as with the London-based World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts, which has provided leader training. For this work, Ms. Sherbin also recently received a Gem award, as a "Global Advocate for Young Women," from Women in Communications.

The Cincinnati-Kharkiv Sister City Project has won a national Sister Cities International award in six of its seven years of existence.