This past week, the Trefoil Society luncheon was held at the Waterhouse Pavillion to honor Dr. Rebecca Ashford, the President of Chattanooga State Community College.
The Trefoil Society luncheons are held each fall in the various Girl Scout Council regions to honor a woman who exemplifies the spirit of Girl Scouting.
The event was hosted by the Girls Scouts of the Southern Appalachians Council.
Chief Executive Officer of the Girls Scouts of the Southern Appalachians, Lynne Fugate said the Girls Scouts Council of the Southern Appalachians covers 46 counties from southwest Virginia all the way through east Tennessee and down into northwest Georgia. The Council provides a variety of programs designed to help girls thrive.
“We are creating our future leaders,” Fugate said.
Board Member Emily Mack introduced Dr. Ashford, highlighting her astounding achievements and career.
Dr. Ashford was hired as the President of Chattanooga State Community College in 2017. She is a member of the Chattanooga Area Chamber Board of Directors and the Executive Committee. She serves on several other boards including Enterprise Center, the McNabb Center Board of Directors and Executive Committee, the River City Company, Chattanooga Tourism Co., the Southeast Tennessee Development District, the Blood Assurance Board of Directors, the Austin Hatcher Foundation, and the Rotary Club of Chattanooga. In 2022, she was named a Greater Chattanooga Woman of Distinction. She is a graduate of Leadership Tennessee Class VII and completed the Aspen New President’s Fellowship in 2022.
“I can not tell you what an honor this is,” Dr. Ashford said. “I mean I’m truly humbled to be here and be recognized by the Girl Scouts. The Girl Scouts have had a positive impact on millions of women since 1912. I can only hope to live my life in such a way that I might have a positive impact on others.”
Dr. Ashford said courage, confidence and character are the three C’s of the Girl Scouts.
“Today I’d like to focus on one of the C’s – courage,” she said. “In contemplating the three C’s of the girl scouts I argue that courage is the most important. Without courage can we have confidence or character? Having confidence often implies courage and having character requires that we have the courage to do the right thing even when the right thing is not popular. In my own life when I made courageous decisions and that is when I feel more aligned with my true self. Courage is one of my strongly held values.”
She said, in hindsight, several of the moves she and her family made, leaving her home state of Florida and moving to New York, then Knoxville and finally here to Chattanooga, took a lot of courage.
She praised her eldest daughter who finished high school a semester early so she could enroll in the nursing program at Chattanooga State Community College.
“So, while her friends were getting ready for prom and all the last semester’s senior activities, she was learning anatomy and physiology and microbiology and is now in the honor student program and will graduate in May,” she said.
She also praised her youngest daughter who will be attending boot camp in July with the U.S. Marine Corps.
Dr. Ashford also shared the stories of two students at Chattanooga State Community College who had to overcome many obstacles and adversities to complete their degrees. She became emotional as she spoke about a third student who fought cancer while attending college only to die weeks shy of graduation.
“At Chattanooga State we witness the courage our students demonstrate on a daily basis,” she said. “Many of our students are the first in their family to attend college. For many of our students just contacting us, applying for admissions, and visiting the campus takes remarkable courage in overcoming great fear and self-doubt.”
Dr. Ashford encouraged the audience and the Girl Scouts to challenge their level of comfort and find the courage to make things happen to better their lives and achieve goals.
“Face your fears as if your life depends on it,” she said quoting a phrase from author Jeanette Coron. “Because living in fear keeps you from living.”
