Acton Girlguide Leader Receives British Empire Medal
Jennifer Dudley has given four decades of service to young people
Jennifer Dudley
June 25, 2026
A long-serving Girlguiding volunteer from Acton has been recognised in the King’s Birthday Honours for more than four decades of service to young people across London and the South East.
Jennifer Dudley, who leads Brownie, Guide and Ranger units in Ealing and serves as lead safeguarding volunteer for Girlguiding’s London and South East England region, has been awarded the British Empire Medal. Her honour marks 46 years of continuous volunteering since she first became a leader in 1979.
Jennifer’s connection to Girlguiding began much earlier, when she joined the 4th Acton Brownies at the age of seven. Since then she has supported generations of girls and young women, offering weekly activities, trips and skills-based challenges through the organisation’s programme. Alongside her unit leadership, she has served as a county commissioner, and is also a trainer and mentor for other volunteers.
Her contribution has been recognised locally as well as nationally. Earlier this year she received the inaugural Mayor of Ealing’s community service award, and she has previously been honoured with a Jack Petchey Foundation Special Leader’s Award.
Jennifer said she was proud to receive the BEM and described her years in Girlguiding as deeply rewarding. She said the most memorable moments were seeing girls gain confidence as they tried new activities or mastered new skills for the first time.
Jennifer (right) with a local girlguide group
One of her Rangers, 16-year-old Dilys, said Dudley had shaped her entire guiding journey from Rainbows through to Rangers. She described unit meetings as enjoyable and supportive, adding that Dudley’s leadership had helped her and others grow in confidence.
Amanda Teasel, chief commissioner for the London and South East England region, said the award recognised Dudley’s consistent commitment to Girlguiding at both local and regional level.
Girlguiding, which has almost 80,000 volunteers across the UK, offers a wide range of roles for adults and young people, from helping at weekly meetings to taking on leadership, mentoring or behind-the-scenes responsibilities. Opportunities for young volunteers begin at age ten, including roles such as young leaders and peer educators.
More information about volunteering with Girlguiding is available at www.girlguiding.org.uk.
Like Reading Articles Like This? Help Us Produce More This site remains committed to providing local community news and public interest journalism. Articles such as the one above are integral to what we do. We aim to feature as much as possible on local societies, charities based in the area, fundraising efforts by residents, community-based initiatives and even helping people find missing pets. We’ve always done that and won’t be changing, in fact we’d like to do more. However, the readership that these stories generates is often below that needed to cover the cost of producing them. Our financial resources are limited and the local media environment is intensely competitive so there is a constraint on what we can do. We are therefore asking our readers to consider offering financial support to these efforts. Any money given will help support community and public interest news and the expansion of our coverage in this area. A suggested monthly payment is £8 but we would be grateful for any amount for instance if you think this site offers the equivalent value of a subscription to a daily printed newspaper you may wish to consider £20 per month. If neither of these amounts is suitable for you then contact info@neighbournet.com and we can set up an alternative. All payments are made through a secure web site. One-off donations are also appreciated. Choose The Amount You Wish To Contribute. If you do support us in this way we’d be interested to hear what kind of articles you would like to see more of on the site – send your suggestions to the editor. For businesses we offer the chance to be a corporate sponsor of community content on the site. For £30 plus VAT per month you will be the designated sponsor of at least one article a month with your logo appearing if supplied. If there is a specific community group or initiative you’d like to support we can make sure your sponsorship is featured on related content for a one off payment of £50 plus VAT. All payments are made through a secure web site. |