Re: Growth Requirements

Peter Murphy said:

> A growing program usually indicates a good program since it
> is attracting new members every year while retaining current
> members.
>

Some snippage

> When increasing membership becomes the GOAL rather than the
> RESULT of a quality program, then all kinds of weird stuff can
> happen. We need to be careful about what behavior we reward
> because that's the kind of behavior we'll cultivate.
>

I believe that the "ideal" troop size is said to be 34 boys, 4
patrols of 8 plus SPL/ASPL. I happen to agree with this guideline.
If a troop is to be boy-run, then how could you expect an SPL to run
a decent program if he's got 200 boys? Managing a 200 person group
is a skill that few adults have mastered, let alone a 16 year-old
boy. So what happens is the adults will start to take charge.
That's not a quality unit anymore. So if a troop reaches this
ideal size and then is told to increase, are they not moving away
from a quality program? Quantity is not Quality.

Marc Godbout
SM Troop 98 (38 boys and doing just fine, thank you)

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