By Lacey Storer
Contributing Writer
Nina Baran, a senior at Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy, made history this year. Last month she became one of the first females in the country to achieve the rank of Eagle Scout in Scouts BSA (formerly Boys Scouts of America). Not only that, she reached this achievement – which some Scouts work towards throughout their grade school and high school years – in just 18 months.
Baran, the daughter of Andrea and Robert Baran, was a Girl Scout in kindergarten and first grade, but it wasn’t really for her. Years later, her young brother Isaac joined Scouts when he was in fourth grade. She watched him learn how to build fires and go on camping trips and knew that was the kind of scouting she wanted to do. Unfortunately, at the time, the Scouts didn’t allow girls to join its troops.
“I complained for years and years about not being able to do it,” she said. “When I saw that I could join Scouts, I thought, ‘Perfect, that’s what I want to do.’”
The Scouts announced in the fall of 2018 that they were opening up its program to include girl’s troops (in Scouts, for ages 11 to 17, troops are gender specific, although they can plan joint activities). Seeing her immediate interest, Baran’s mother contacted the leaders of Troop 61 to try to start a girl’s troop at Beth Shalom. Starting a new troop requires a minimum of five scouts, and at the time they couldn’t find five Jewish girls who were interested and able to commit.
At that same time, the Church of the Resurrection was putting together its own girl’s troop and needed more members, so Andrea Baran decided to work with the COR leaders to create a girl’s troop “with intentional Jewish connections.” In February 2019, seven girls and a small group of leaders founded Troop 792. Three of those girls, including Baran, were Jewish and had brothers in Troop 61.
Baran started to work toward Eagle Scout right away. Scouts typically have to earn the rank before they turn 18. When the Scouts decided to allow girls to join, they said they would allow people who joined at that time to apply for an exception if they needed more time. Still, it was Baran’s personal goal to get it done before she was 18 (her birthday was Dec. 2).
“She’s always been very focused and very driven,” Andrea Baran said.
Baran had to move through multiple ranks to achieve Eagle Scout. The focus of the first few ranks is learning and demonstrating skills: knot tying, fire building, plant and animal identifying, etc., then the focus moves to demonstrating leadership. Scouts also need to do a service project and complete community service hours to move through each rank.
Once a Scout reaches the Life rank, they start serving as a leader in their troop and can begin working on an Eagle project. While working through the ranks, a Scout must earn a total of 21 badges, some of which are Eagle required.
Baran reached Life Scout in April and began planning her Eagle project. Eagle projects must meet several requirements, including having a lasting benefit and benefitting the community or a religious organization.
It took a bit of time for Baran to figure out what she wanted to do for her project; she had ideas but wasn’t sure they’d get approved. She finally came up with assembling first-aid kits because they learned about first aid in Scouts, and it was the beginning of the pandemic, so health and safety were at the forefront of everyone’s minds.
Baran started out by asking her neighbors to donate items, figuring she’d get a few products and would need to raise money so she could buy the rest. Instead, she got about half the stuff she needed for the kits just by going door-to-door down four or five streets in her neighborhood.
“My neighbors really stepped up in a way that I did not expect,” she said.
Another project requirement is that the Scout must lead others in the project. Baran recruited other Scouts and Scout parents to help. Baran and her team ended up making 30 kits. The kits included Band-Aids, gauze, medical tape, gloves, Neosporin, tweezers, Benadryl, Ibuprofen, alcohol swabs and anti-itch cream.
After weighing the options, she decided to donate them to Jewish Vocational Service to be distributed to refugees.
“Someone not familiar with the American system might not know how to access healthcare or know what American healthcare items are,” she said.
On her official Eagle Scout paperwork, Baran estimated that she spent 80 hours on her project (although her mother thinks it’s likely more than that). Her project was finished and her Eagle paperwork was turned in by Oct. 1, and she had her Eagle board of review on Oct. 22. On Nov. 8, she had her Court of Honor ceremony and got her Eagle pin at Shawnee Mission Park, becoming one of the nation’s first female Eagle Scouts.
“It was really cool,” Baran said of achieving Eagle Scout. “I didn’t really think it was going to happen. I always had in the back of my mind that something was going to go wrong, so I was just thrilled that it had happened.”
Baran completed a lot of her Scout rank advancement during her junior year, already a busy year between AP classes and everything students need to do to make sure they’re ready to apply for college. Nina’s mother said she was busy all the time between school and scouting, and this summer was no different. Instead of taking a break, Baran decided to become a Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA).
She had been working towards her CNA as part of a program offered by Shawnee Mission South, but due to scheduling issues, she wasn’t going to be able to participate this school year.
It was difficult to find another program. Many of them had closed during the summer because of the pandemic. She finally found one through Mid-American Nursing & Allied Health Institute.
“Nina’s one of those people that when she gets focused and she wants something to happen, she’s just going to push and push and push to make it happen,” her mother said.
The program included 90 hours of class time in just three weeks. Baran was required to do five hours of classroom instruction, 25 hours of clinical time with patients, and 25 hours of lab time practicing on mannequins.
Then 17 years old, Baran was in the program with people in their 40s and 50s and was one of the youngest students her instructor had ever had.
“It was definitely nerve-wracking a little bit,” Baran said of her experience, “but I loved it. I loved interacting with the patients and getting to know them.”
She finished her CNA in August and is now looking for a part-time position that fits her school schedule so she can get in as much clinical time as she can before she heads off to college. Her first choice for school is Smith College in Massachusetts. She plans to study medicine, possibly pursuing a career in obstetrics or reproductive health.
She knows that finishing up her senior year of high school, working as a CNA and fitting in other extracurriculars – like leading HBHA’s Rainbow Rams LGBTQ group – will be a challenge, but she feels up to the task.
“I imagine it will be a learning curve for sure, figuring out when I can to do my homework, when I can do (other activities),” she said. “But I know medical school won’t be any easier.”
