EmberMike

"Co-ed is a major shift in the mission of BOY Scouts to say the least." The core mission of the BSA is unchanged regardless of who the members are. The name of the organization is not the mission of the organization. The BSA has been and will continue to be about character development, which happens to be completely aligned with the GSUSA mission. There is no shift.

It's a gamble I'd be willing to take. Unless someone comes up with some better idea for how to stop (or just slow) the membership decline. Maybe co-ed would be the old band-aid on a bullet wound, just slow the demise a bit. I don't know. What I'm not sure we've got much else to lose when the end could very possibly be just a decade or two away at the current rate of annual membership loss. The BSA has no obligation to, of course. But they do have the opportunity (for lack of a better repeated word) to offer a comparable program for girls. I don't see it as a burden the BSA would have to carry. I see it as a chance to broaden their audience and improve on what they're already offering boys. Guess it all depends on how you look at it. Opportunity or obligation, benefit or burden.

You're right, it's just rank advancement they're missing out on. Just a program of skills and leadership development that takes years to complete and requires kids to learn and show proficiency in a variety of subjects, develop a service-oriented mentality and provide service to the community, learn how to be better members of their family, their school, and their church, become good stewards of the environment, demonstrate they they live up to the oath and law, etc etc... No biggie, just a few requirements and badges, I guess. Oh, and they can start doing that 8 years sooner than girls can. And it's just Eagle, a high prestigious award that really has no true equal for girls. So yeah, you're right, not much of a difference.

If that's what you think, I wonder if you even read what I wrote. The program isn't getting stronger on the current trajectory. My reasons for being in favor of a co-ed program are almost entirely based on a desire for a stronger program, one that better equips kids to be prepared for their adult lives and one that will last more than another decade or two. Not sure how much more of a desire I can have to strengthen the program if those are my motivations. I don't think adding girls would do any harm to the program. But, entertaining your notion that it would for just a second, if it did diminish the program for boys a little, I'm still for it. Because I believe in the strength and benefits of the program already and think it's maybe the best youth program available to kids today, it has room to give a little if that means more kids can enjoy scouting the BSA way and that the BSA can endure to serve future generations. You've made it very clear you don't care about my answers. You've made up your mind that single gender is right, co-ed is wrong. So you question my motivation because since I'm so wrong about this, I must have some ulterior self-serving motivation for being in favor of this kind of membership policy change, right? I've made my motivations and my reasoning behind my stance on this clear. I've been through this subject a thousand times in my own personal observations and thoughts, and discussed it with I don't even know how many parents and scouters. So thanks for the suggestion that I reconsider my motivations and thank you for posing that question to me. But I'll let my previous statements on this stand, knowing quite well what my motivations are and having zero doubts about where those motivations come from.

You're defining "do more" as a handful of specific outdoor activities off of a checklist. The BSA program is far bigger than a list of outdoor activities. Talk about cherry picking...

That list doesn't address the enormity of what the Boy Scout program encompasses that Venturing does not. Nor does it address the many years girls have to wait to even join Venturing while boys can be in the BSA from 1st grade. I'm honestly amazed that anyone would actually argue girls can do more in the BSA than boys. It seriously is mind-boggling.

Are you actually arguing that girls have more opportunity in BSA programs than boys? I'd love to hear more about this idea.

I've never cared much if a kid turns 18 and keeps the badge on. At least for a little while. Eventually it might be worth suggesting the square knot. There's an adult leader in my area who is probably in his 50s and wears the eagle badge and the square knot. I've only seen him a few times but next time I might be compelled to ask about it.

Why are showers and toilets always the big concern about this? And why is it always brought up as if the BSA has no concept of how to handle facilities for a 2nd gender already? Every place I ever camped as a kid in scouts had female facilities and summer camps always had some female staff members. They made it work, and that was 20+ years ago. I'm sure today is no worse, and if anything I know at least one summer camp from back then has indeed upgraded their facilities and included more female accommodations. If I'm glancing through this forum and trying to get a sense for the arguments against co-ed, it looks like it boils down to boys need a place to be boys, maintain heritage, and toilets. I'm sorry but that's extremely weak. And if it's heritage, we've already burned that bridge decades ago. BP would be spinning in his grave to see how far away from "traditional scouting" we've come and include so many merit badges that have nothing to do with his founding principles and ideals. It's not a "must", it's a benefit. In my opinion it comes down to a few key things: Societal norms - Gender segregation is a thing of the past in nearly all walks of life. Men aren't exclusively the top of the corporate ladder anymore, our military is co-ed, few (if any) schools remain that separate kids by gender, gender equality in all forms of adult life is the new norm. I think we should be raising our kids to learn to succeed within that system, not within the century-old paradigm of gender segregation. Membership - How long does the BSA survive at the current pace of membership decline? Based on recent years and numbers lost in those years, we've got 20 years at most. If going co-ed can do for us what it did for Scouts UK, I think it's well worth it to secure the long-term future of scouting in the US. Opportunity - Girls should have the same opportunities to experience scouting and benefit from it, and let's face it, GSUSA doesn't provide a comparable program. If they did, we wouldn't be having this discussion and girls wouldn't be trying so hard to get into the BSA. Everyone knows this, even non-Scouters, and it's also why the top rank in GS doesn't get the same respect as the top rank in BSA. Heritage - Baden-Powell wrote and said a lot about how he viewed the world in his time, and how we should act as scouts and leaders. Some of it is certainly still valid today, some is not. Our obligation to the heritage of scouting isn't to abide by his teachings exactly as they were, but to take them and adapt them to modern society and adjust them over time as we learn how to do things better. We don't stick to early 1900s first aid methods because we know better now. We don't judge people on the shape of their face (BP said we could judge a man's character that way). We do a lot of things differently today because we've got 100+ years of life lessons and experiences to add to BP's teachings. I view it as honoring our heritage to alter the program as needed over time. To cling to the old teachings as gospel, frankly I think BP himself would oppose that.

In the numerous campfire experiences I've had with different packs, troops and across different districts, a lot of groups do songs around the campfire. Many units sing a lot of the same ones, too.

I've read those and other BP writings. He wrote some of that stuff over a century ago. And I know it's the basis for everything we do but I've read those books as fun looks back at how things started. There's a lot of stuff in those books that we don't do at all today. Our methods have changed over the decades and one constant I've found in numerous modern takes on Scouting is character development. That's the modern standard for the goals and aims of the program above all else. I have a lot of respect for what BP thought about youth growing and becoming men, but I don't see what place that has in deciding policy today in a program that has long since embraced a much broader sense of purpose. And also is partially co-ed already. Using phrasing like "boys becoming men" isn't in the spirit of Scouting today when we've got Venturing and now the co-ed STEM program.

Much like the fears people have about gay members overrunning units and transgender kids lined up outside a CO's doors, the idea that girls will immediately inundate the BSA with membership forms is unfounded and blown way out of proportion. I think we'd see a lot of girls joining, but but certainly not at every unit and level. I think so. Off the top of my head I can't think of any aspect of the program that would be prohibitive to girls. You know your choice of gender roles here is kind of funny, right? This is the BSA, singing songs around the campfire is a very "boy" thing to do.

There's definitely something to this idea. When I joined cub scouts as a kid in the late 1980s the percentage of scouts making it to Eagle was less than 2%. Now it's 6%. And the percentage rises despite falling overall membership numbers. The percentage shouldn't change that much no matter what is happening with overall membership. Scouting is no stranger to the competitive trend. When we're not embroiled in a membership policy controversy, many of the headlines we see about scouting are somehow focused on a competitive aspect of being a scout, like another kid running the table on merit badges and wearing 2 sashes with all of them sewn on. Competition is definitely a bigger part of all things these days. It's not all bad, competition can be a good thing. But where it fits into Scouting and how it works within the aims of the program is a tricky business. It's kind of ironic, though. We're living in an age where kids more and more want to be a "winner", and yet everything is so ultra-competitive now that it's harder than ever to win at anything.

Because girls weren't allowed in the boy scouts and girls wanted the same opportunity as boys to do the same activities and learn the same things. Not unlike today where girls in the US are still looking for such a program.

I've been hearing the "boys become men" thing more often lately. Where is that coming from? Is that documented anywhere? I was under the impression that the aims of scouting were (and still are) character development, citizenship training, and personal fitness. And none of those things are exclusive to one gender.

And it has absolutely nothing to do with co-ed scouting. Co-ed doesn't remove the merit component of earning rank.

Ignore it? I think they're part of it. Ultimately they can choose to do whatever they want and yet they have gone with greater inclusion every step of the way. Even without outside pressure. Was anyone pressuring the BSA to create a co-ed STEM program? This isn't always an issue of reacting to outside influences. Some inside influences are certainly in play on all of these issues.

A few years back I helped my nephew with his car. I did as little as I could, jumping in where cutting tools were needed and letting him handle as much of the build as possible. The car did not look like a speeder, and I was fairly sure that one of the wheels was pretty crooked. But somehow, the thing flew down the track and earned him a 2nd place trophy. He was thrilled, and I was happily surprised. Over the years I've seen cars that look like a disaster about to happen end up turning in good performances on the track. And likewise, cars that look like they were built by a NASA engineer not even cross the finish line. Sure there's a bit of science and strategy to this stuff, but luck is a big part of it too. I think parents that take over the build process do so at great risk of leaving the derby entirely empty-handed, both in terms of results and in terms of their kid's pride in the car they had little personal investment in. Only one of those things are truly within the parent's ability to influence. Race results are sometimes a complete surprise. The better bet, in my opinion, has always been to make sure that at the very least, a kid has a car that they'll proudly keep on a shelf in their room at home.

I agree. Lots of judgement here without knowing what the circumstances of many of these "eagle out" scenarios might hold. Ideally kids stick with it as long as possible, but everyone has different circumstances and goals, especially at that age. Even at 15, by that point a kid might have 8 years into Scouting. That's more time in an extra-curricular activity that most kids dedicate to anything these days. If a kid fulfills the requirements, they did what they had to do. Some kids will put more effort into those 7 or 8 years of Scouting and give more to their unit and fellow scouts than other kids who put into 10+ years and just do the bare minimum all along the way.

I've heard of her. I was thinking more like a girl that unofficially progresses through all of the ranks and then petitions National to allow her to earn Eagle. Might even be able to force their hand if someone were to do all of the requirements first. At the very least I'm sure the press would love to run with a story about a girl that gets all the way to the paperwork stage of the process and then gets denied by her district or national. Seems like the making for the kind of story that eventually changes policy.

Man, what a can of worms this is. On the one hand I'm kind of impressed that some units have gone rogue and allowed girls to participate and actually wear the uniform and seemingly progress in rank. On the other hand, my head immediately jumps to, "How are these girls participating fully when they're not registered members?" The liability issues and insurance issues alone give me chills. God forbid one of these girls gets hurt on a trip that they're technically not supposed to be on. This probably only works well at the Cub level without support from district. Or with unofficial support. Beyond that, I'd be really surprised to see a girl in a rogue troop start hitting the upper ranks or get through Eagle paperwork. Certainly wouldn't expect to see full sign-off from her district. Doesn't mean someone won't try, though. Expect to see the headline soon: "Girl petitions Boy Scouts to become first female Eagle Scout." It'll happen, probably sooner than we expect.

I wasn't part of those discussions, but if I were I would have said that I don't think there could possibly be that many gay scouts waiting to join and that expecting any big bump in membership from that change was highly wishful thinking at best. In North America, sure. But going co-ed has done great things elsewhere, particularly the UK Scouts. I wasn't necessarily arguing for co-ed scouting here, just hypothesizing the when and why of it from the perspective of National and solving the downhill membership numbers issue. I think everyone's personal beliefs would (and probably have) supply an entirely new and lengthy thread with discussion for months.

I believe you're right, although not sure I agree on the timing. The transgender policy was spurred on by the legal challenge from the NJ boy's family. I don't think the BSA would have voluntarily made that move so soon after the change to the gay membership policy. As it stands, the transgender change is actually a decent stepping stone towards total gender inclusion, so it stands to reason that if the BSA is indeed headed in that direction, they would have pulled the trigger on transgender membership at some point regardless of whether it ended up in the courts or not. But again, I don't think they would have done it so soon unless they had to. So the idea of a co-ed program by 2020 is, to me, a very aggressive timeline. The rollout, I can't really even imagine how that would work. Everything that needs to be addressed to make that happen, it's a staggering amount of work. Thinking about the re-write on handbooks alone makes my head hurt. But when it comes down to it, I do believe it will happen, and it will be necessary to save the organization. Nothing else seems to adequately address the steadily declining membership numbers. There has to be a breaking point at which the BSA will not want to cut more jobs or sell off more resources to survive, and they'll have to go co-ed. It will happen.

I agree. I've always liked that they try to bring some of these new elements into Scouting and always tie them to the traditional activities and program, but it's highly ambitious to do this stuff with the intention being that the kids make the connection. The one thing I've always heard over the years from people talking about Scouting is that they'd like to see more adventure (of course with "adventure" having a different meaning depending on who you talk to). But generally speaking, getting outside and doing exciting things more often. My viewpoint has been lately that there is plenty of opportunity for adventure and excitement, but it always competes with the book-learning stuff. I kind of hate to see kids sitting in a dining hall talking to a MB counselor about citizenship reqs when the woods are right outside.

I suspect the long-term goal is to go co-ed. Some of the language we hear coming from National definitely leads me to think that co-ed is not an "if" but more of a "when". Just in this transgender announcement they said, ""This is an area that we will continue to thoughtfully evaluate to bring the benefits of Scouting to the greatest number of youth possible." This has been a common theme for years now, this notion of extending the program to the greatest number of youth. Since the BSA has had severe difficulty even maintaining previous membership numbers, the only logical way I could see then actually growing the program would be to expand to previously prohibited groups of potential members. And quite smartly of them, if this is indeed the long-term goal, rather than jumping straight to co-ed they ease into it and start it off by allowing gay members, then transgender members. Next step might be something like lowering the age for Venturing or creating a younger branch of Venture so girls can get involved sooner. Globally, co-ed is the norm in scouting now. I think it's just a matter of time for the American branch of scouting to go that way as well. And personally, I'm all for it. One of the perks of holding out on a co-ed program for so long is that we've had the opportunity to watch it tried around the world and see that it actually works. UK Scouts are seeing a membership boom and girls are a big part of that. They expect continued growth in the coming years. Meanwhile the BSA can't even stop the bleeding and numbers continue to drop. Things seemed to level off for a while, but ultimately the trend is still downwards. At some point it may become a "What have we got to lose" scenario. There has to be a number that, once we hit it, National will simply take any steps necessary to save the organization. If adding girls to the mix keeps Scouting alive in the US, you can be sure they'll do it. Co-ed would also be a distinguishing factor for the BSA in competing with TrailLife.