Our pack just participated in our local part of a worldwide conservation status check in urban areas called the City Nature Challenge. Because the overlap of scouts and scouters with conservationists isn't an accident, the person organizing our city's effort on behalf of the city was a scouter for many years and still runs a survival camp for troops. So we got to talking about more scouts than just our pack participating, and looped a commissioner in, who in turn connected the city organizer with council. So far, so good, let's do a good turn and be Earth Protectors.
We connected with council a bit too late to really market it through them, but our pack had a blast with it! Lots of really paying attention to nature. But as far as the community is concerned, we did it on the downlow because council asked to exclude the BSA logo from all the organizations participating displays! (To save the city a charge of $5000 to use the logo.) Even if scouts had been a significant portion of the observations in our city, the visibility would have been close to nil. Other non-profits and even for-profit companies helped as groups on behalf of their organization and were recognized for it.
It struck me as a policy that was clearly well-intended, but also a bit self-centered. Obviously we don't want to be too attention-seeking, but people do also need to see us around doing our thing for people to feel like we're a part of the community.
Welcome, @captkeating!
I can relate to your excitement about reconnecting to scouting as an adult leader! I'm sure you will have a great time together, while Building a Better World while you're at it!
I saw a joke BSA leader badge on Etsy the other day that said "CAT HERDER" and that seems to be the job as a cub scout leader! Good for you for stepping up!
I'm thinking about incorporating collaboration games into next year's pack meetings to give the cats some focused experiences with what happens when you collaborate vs don't 😂