PACAN

Just curious..did the BSA do any risk analysis on any of these decisions?    Or did they ask 3 people at the food truck and 2 said yes so they plowed ahead?     

So..if there are folks who were at the Annual meeting, what else was put out as solutions to the decreasing membership numbers.  Did any in attendance stand up and scream "how can we fix this before we go out of business" or just death by powerpoint?

Name Change....personally don't see hundreds of thousands of youth flocking the council offices to sign up

Coed Troops...is the official position that this too will increase membership?  Seems like existing co-located units MIGHT merge into one but that isn't assured.    CO still have the say.

Slides on how many girls are in the program but was there any discussion on how to help the other 85% of the membership?

another biggie...change the name of Rifle ranges...huge!

Reducing costs?   Registration, reduce the number of Councils through forced mergers, Loss of property, right-size the organization to match the membership?

Just curious...most of this blog's chatter is on name and coed.

So will there only be one handbook for coed troops?

Why do we need to be consistent with other WOSM organizations?   Educate me.  What has WOSM ever done for the BSA?

So...how is this going to be different?   I never thought the name was the reason kids joined.

Don't we accept all youth (except those who don't prescribe to the Religious declaration) now?   Will that change?

Do we anticipate there will be hundreds of thousands of youth who vanished to return? 

Will this bring the lost chartering organizations back?   

Do we continue with the marketing "we are cheaper than sports" ?

Do prospective parents believe the program has actually fixed their YP and their kids will be safe?

Just random thoughts.

There is theory and reality in the OP question.

Question for the former pros here....Did you receive any Customer Service training in your job?   and  Did you receive any "how to "manage" a volunteer workforce" training?

Seems like obvious necessary training for a DE to me since your workforce can make or break you.   If the DE has a "I'm in charge" attitude then his volunteers will say "Yes you are", and you will fail quickly.   Servant Leadership is essential.

JMHO.

Got the document. Thanks

@armymutt

Can you share the xls document or point us to where we all can get it.

Thanks

Cub scout retention is always higher than Scouts BSA.  I understand National's goal is 62% which is for both youth and adults registered.  I'm guessing they know the number for each.

So if you have a net loss in membership, retention is less than recruiting.   

JMHO

Numbers from a Commissioner

End of December 2023 was a little over 1M.

Nationally we dropped from 923,399 in January 2023 to 893,117 in January 2024, a -3.28 % loss.

Actually #1....if it is designated an official scouting activity, the Dads need to be registered with the BSA under the new rule on who can camp overnight.

Also under #1 completing requirements must be done as a Boy Scout.  There is language in the GTA that requires requirements to count if and only if done while a Boy Scout so parents can't claim their youth did that one as a 6 year old on a school trip. 

I just saw the same FB post from a different council

Saw a post on FB that BSA is eliminating the 25 joining fee but not to worry they are raising everyone's annual fee by $5.00

Maybe one or more of the professionals can chime in on why in the h*** it takes 4 months to process a charter.    

Our units updated the adults and scouts, hit verify, system said no errors, paid the bill and we were done.   Less than 30 minutes. 

Any of our number folks seen any end of 2023 numbers?

Lots of interesting thoughts.   We do not know her exact age but personally I have never seen any new scout hit the ground running and do their 1st PT test the afternoon of crossover to start the clock.  Those who are eager to get requirements done usually have a parent help them manage their advancement particularly when it comes to MBs.      Clearly the advancement program has changed that assists in this happening.     MB events where you can get 5 or 6 at a time (for a fee), Summer camps, and being able to work on all ranks at the same time etc.

JMHO.

The missing thing I see in this is at the bottom of the article

The Boy Scouts of America declined to comment on discrimination on the basis of sex within the Eagle Scout process. 

See the link.  12 y/o girl gets Eagle.   I have always wondered how much a youth gets out of the whole program when I see this.   Same goes for the relatively recent numbers of getting all the MBs.

https://www.newscentermaine.com/article/news/community/maine-girl-to-become-youngest-female-eagle-scout/97-0ab7560e-b967-458f-8011-9cbbf057e6bb 

The "funny" thing is that councils who added council fees to each scout (which was not allowed before but ignored) seemed to think this fee would be additive to FOS.    Another typical "no idea".   The parents saw right through this and the result is that the council fee is FOS and the FOS goals were never going to be met as the only ones who contributed FOS were the obligatory contributions from the Executive Boards who for the most part have no scouts in the program any longer.

I was wondering what OaklandAndy's percentage were compared to?   Sept 2023 or October 2022.

Based on some of the above posts, standby for recharter results!!

Couple of thoughts:

Has anyone seen this group's "charter"?

Still need to see the requirements to see how leaders can get all the requirements accomplished.

Given the new BSA President's stated goal to increase membership back to the "old days", is this new revamping of the entire Cub advancement designed to improve recruiting or retention?   

What is the current Cub recruiting from age to age now?

How many youth join Cubs as a 10 year old now?

"tongue in cheek comment" - will the BSA allow an older youth to just join and skip all the ranks and just do Eagle rank requirements?  😉

The scout badge became the scout rank in 2016.

Greenwich is one of the richest County in the country.   If you had their resources you would not worry about council operations budget. 

I understand that there are over 30 councils with less than 1000 youth.

The House of representatives can to elect a speaker (or not). 😜

Yes.  I believe that you can have a TM account with as few or as many scouts as you want.   TM sells you a license.  You populate your file