Natalie Monteleone, a 12th grader at Kenmore East High School, earned her Girl Scout Gold Award, the highest honor among Girl Scouts with only 6% earning the award nationally every year.

Gold Award Girl Scouts are defined as helping fix a problem in their community or making a lasting change in their world. Natalie created a project titled, “Let’s Have Fun Together” where she created, advertised, and hosted a puzzle drive. She wound up collecting over 1,500 games to benefit the Cradle Beach community.

“Games and puzzles help challenge and develop skills for those of us with a developmental disability,” Natalie wrote. “My goal was to get the word out that the Developmental Disabled community can benefit from games and puzzles to expand their abilities, to be included in team work and team building and expand our social skills.”

"We are so proud of Natalie and all of her hard work," her mother Jeannine said. "Kenmore East was instrumental to her project and let her put the collection box at the front office. She also set up an Amazon QR code and many donations were shipped directly to Cradle Beach."

Natalie has been in Troop 30875 for eight years. As for school activities, she was a member of the Kenmore East Unified Bowling team and performed in Dance Club for the first half of the school year. She is also involved in Best Buddies and the Kenmore Special Olympics Track and Field team.

Natalie is the 2nd Ken-Ton student in the last two years to earn their Girl Scout Gold Award. Kenmore West student Gaia Godinho was honored in the spring of 2023.