Leaderboard

I don't like it. The change should be "completed the fifth grade" or 11 years old. I agree with eliminating the AOL "early admittance". 10 year olds are way to young. Provide them with a quality Webelos program and do not push them into a Troop where they will be basically a "Webelos patrol". BSA sucks at recruitment and keeps thinking changing requirements or ages, etc... will solve it. It usually does the opposite. Older scouts are ok with younger scouts as long as they are not too young. This will exascerbates the frustration of the older scouts. BSA has no experts wi

I've always thought before that having a wider age range in scouts helped promote the magic of older scouts working with young. To me that magic was what scouting was about. And yet I can see how splitting that age group could help the scouts see the transition from younger scout to older. I had a lot of conversations with scouts along the lines of you're no longer the young scouts, it's time to start helping out. Something about the UK group system could also help that as well. The BSA also struggles with the transition between age ranges because they're separate units. If the same lead

I think it’s a cultural thing. I worked a lot with the 14 to 22 year olds and gained so much respect from them, as well as pleasure with the experience. They are the noble product of patrol method and have so much to give back. But, our culture expects them to go out into the world and get educated and find their place in the community. Like some here, many at National and others outside looking in see scouting as nothing more than an after school babysitting program. Move on from youthful play time and get busy with serious adult life. I agree the BSA doesn’t give the older scouts any vision

All of the camps in Rhode Island have been leased for as far back as I can remember. They're owned by RIBS (Rhode Island Boy Scouts), one of the early organizations that merged with the BSA but continue to exist as the entity that owns those camps. Narragansett Council doesn't own any of them (there is a lot of cross-fertilization between the boards of RIBS and the council, but they are legally distinct entities.) So, there's a lot of precedent there, and yes, NCAP applies.

Took me 36 years to finally tell my folks.

Evening all (Or it is over here anyway!) so swinging by and saw my name in lights so thought I'd respond..., Anyway I think the first thing to note here is that this membership "surge" is really just recovering members that were lost during covid. Kids sign up to scouts because they want we offer. Which is basically being with your friends outdoors. The rest is just noise. When during covid we had to move online, and even when we were face to face it was inititally quite restrictive, a lot of kids quit. And if you look at news stories from this time last year it was reporting a huge drop.

This must be local or recent. When I was tracking crossovers 20 years ago, an average of 50% of Webelos crossed over to troops in our council. National average at the time was slightly less than 50%. We did not track AOL because that wasn’t important for us. I can’t remember the average for 1st year scouts dropping out, BUT, 1st year dropouts has been the highest dropout rate of all BSA ages since National has been tracking that data. At least since the 60s. Barry

Welcome to the forum, @DocDeVivo . Any uniform is acceptable, no matter how old.

This is from the 1949 copyright Pamphlet: Call you now upon your Father Without whom we are but nothing Without whom we can do nothing To look upon this Brotherhood With His Love and with His favor; That its work and upward progress May ever lead and ever guide us From the things that are of mortals, To the things that are eternal. That the candidates this evening May realize that they have started On the next step of their journey; Of their long and toilsome journey. That they may see -that we will help them Thr

When i ran CS day camp, irregardless of who owned the property, NCAP applied.

I have always interpreted that to occur when a Scout is promoted to the next grade. That is, just finished fourth grade, and is a "rising" fifth grader. Our registrar was fine with that...

I was one of those 18- 30 year olds. I served in a variety positions, including professional, in that age range: ASM, OA lodge officer, OA chapter advisor, AIA advisor, UC, and council training staff. Because of my age, I got along with the youth very well, and still keep in contact with a bunch of them years later. As for being asked, I think it varies. Some other Scouters had no issues asking me to help out. Others ignored me, told me I had not idea what I was doing or talking about, etc. It was frustrating at times.

This side note is based on my out of nowhere, self-motivated attempt to reengage at age 58. Along with the LC thing, I became a NESA member. I then began getting very infrequent emails related to Scouting and mostly NESA. Why didn't BSA reach out to me sooner? I receive my Eagle in 1975, Vigil in 1977 I think, and turned 18 in 1979. I have not been hard to locate, though I've lived all over the place. Never a letter to donate even. Odd. Rather foolish and shortsighted, me thinks.

From whence cometh these seemingly off-handed assertions and phantom statistic? Is your last quip stating children are at an equivlanet risk of CSA while wandering around in the mall with a friend as they are within an organization lead by adults? I may be misreading, but here are some statistics. Having a brain misfire. I'm trying to say avoiding creating potentially dangerous adult acquaintances means a reduction of CSA risk. Is that the ideal to separate oneself? Probably not, but just trying to figure out what you're saying and on what basis. https://www.rainn.org

The 18 - 30 year old age group is prime to help if approached. One of my biggest complaints of the BSA is that they seem to ignore that demographic. When I was in my 20s, I didn't have kids, had a TON of free time (compared to now) and was volunteering for various organizations. BSA never reached out (and I never even thought of it). I volunteered for sports clubs & FIRST robotics. If BSA reached out, I could have been a district volunteer or even unit. I'm convinced that there is huge potential in that group.

If nothing else, please take from those of us that are survivors that those you love and cherish may be victims but will in most instances not tell anyone.

My sister-in-law passed along some of my dad’s awards. Among them was a pin for representing the VFW in the Voice of Democracy essay contest at my high school. I didn’t think much about it, and we teased him that it was his way of getting his picture in the paper every year. I even submitted an essay which we then had to read to an audience of our teachers while being recorded (audio, no video). Even though my classmates produced much better work — thus getting their picture in the paper with Dad, I found it to be a rewarding and thought-provoking experience. Still, it didn’t click as to