Nobody would question that women have occupied a changed role in society in the past century. And it's certain that girls would benefit from guidance and mentoring that steer them toward the skills they need to excel in the 21st century.

So it's exciting to see that the Girl Scouts of the USA, an organization on the brink of its 95th anniversary, has taken up the challenge of modernizing without sacrificing its traditional approaches to enriching the lives of our youth.

The Girl Scout Council of Hawai'i has been in the thick of this search for ways to revitalize the organization and ensure its relevance to today's girls and young women. Through a national grassroots brainstorming process of sorts, the organization has finely honed its mission statement to an inspirational directive: "Girl Scouting builds girls of courage, confidence and character, who make the world a better place."

How successfully the Scouts deliver on that pledge will hinge on whether the network of girls and adult mentors is reconfigured in a way that fits today's society, in which most women work outside the home and most girls have competing demands on their time.

Nationally, Scouting councils are consolidating to improve efficiency; Hawai'i's Scouts, which years ago reorganized into a single statewide council, is ahead of the game on that score.

Now they can focus on finding ways to offer activities and learning opportunities to girls, reaching out to keiki whose parents may not have the resources or free time to join the Scouting corps of troop leaders. This may mean transitioning from small independent troops to cooperative networks that make more efficient use of staff and volunteers.

It's encouraging to see this effort and attention being marshalled to give girls what they need to change the world. We're all the beneficiaries of that.