Lilyanna Potts ’26 Earns Prestigious Girl Scouts Gold Award

The Academy of the Holy Angels proudly congratulates senior Lilyanna Potts ’26 on earning the Girl Scouts Gold Award, the highest distinction a Girl Scout can achieve. This prestigious honor recognizes exceptional leadership, dedication to service, and a lasting commitment to improving the community, qualities Lilyanna has demonstrated throughout her years at Holy Angels.

For her Gold Award project, titled “Seniors… You Gotta Love ’Em!”, Lilyanna designed and led a comprehensive intergenerational initiative to strengthen relationships between children and senior citizens while raising awareness of elder neglect. Her vision centered on helping young people recognize the dignity, wisdom, and value of older generations, while also bringing companionship and joy to seniors.

Lilyanna developed and facilitated interactive programming, including trivia games, creative workshops, and story-sharing sessions, to foster meaningful connections between students and seniors. She also created classroom-ready educational materials and lesson plans for teachers, parents, and guidance counselors to use with younger students to promote respect and empathy for elders. To assess the program’s impact, Lilyanna designed surveys and reflection tools for both students and seniors, which revealed heartfelt moments of connection, learning, and mutual understanding.

To ensure her work would have a lasting reach beyond the initial program, Lilyanna compiled all of her resources, presentations, and activities into a sustainable digital toolkit that schools and community organizations can continue to use. At Summer Hill of Wayne, a Christian health community where she implemented part of her project, Lilyanna also created a digital Jeopardy game for residents, organized a crossword and word-search book drive, and coordinated donated prizes for participants. Her final program event was met with overwhelming enthusiasm and gratitude from residents and staff alike.

Lilyanna’s mother, Carla Propersi Potts ’97, shared her appreciation for Holy Angels’ role in her daughter’s life: “We are so grateful to AHA for encouraging her leadership and service, which helped her achieve this milestone”. Lilyanna’s Gold Award exemplifies how Holy Angels students are empowered to identify real-world needs, develop innovative solutions, and create measurable, lasting impact.

In addition to this remarkable accomplishment, Lilyanna recently signed to continue her academic and athletic career at Moravian University. Her success in the classroom, in service, and on the soccer field is a testament to the well-rounded education and leadership formation that defines the Holy Angels experience. Lilyanna Potts represents the very best of what it means to be an Angel, driven, compassionate, innovative, and prepared to lead. We celebrate her extraordinary achievements and look forward to watching her continue to thrive at Moravian University and beyond.