Treflienne

I've seen this all too often in my area. I've justed started a new discussion topic under the Girl Scouting heading about this.

I know that Eagledad and Malraux just commented in another thread about local elementary-age GS troops in their towns falling apart. I've seen it in my town, too. Way too often. I went to our service unit meeting last night. (For you BSA people, that is a meeting of any and all interested girl scout leaders and girl scout parents in the school district. Mostly leaders but a couple of parents.) There was a kindergarten parent there asking about formation of a kindergarten Daisy troop. And it was explained how we do it. One of the service unit volunteers (a leader of an older-g

If the scout were not a U.S. citizen, he might politely explain why he does not say the Pledge of Allegience (to the flag and to the republic). But I assume any scouters would be sympathetic to such a special case.

O Tannenbaum

Welcome back. I hope you have a great year this year with the boys.

That's not new. That's old. Very old. Kid gets home from school. In winter time less than an hour of daylight left. Mom requires him or her to go play outside during that hour, because otherwise the kid will be wanting to run around wild inside the house after dark.

You missed the first part of the quote, where she was criticizing BSA: I heard a certain amount of defensiveness also at our GSUSA council's "town hall meeting" back in May. As Hawkin said, "If you really don't fear your competition, you don't mention them. "

But what about this opinion piece, written by Aceveda, in USA Today last fall https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2017/10/24/girls-star-in-girl-scouts-supporting-players-again-in-boy-scouts-sylvia-acevedo-column/790244001/ She said "We are disappointed that Boy Scouts of America has chosen to open its program to girls in contravention of its charter, rather than focusing on the 90% of American boys not being served by Boy Scouts. We believe strongly in the importance of the safe, all-girl, girl-led and girl-friendly environment that Girl Scouts provides. " Sounded defensive

GSUSA has had a career-focus emphasis since at least the 1980's. (There was a program "From Dreams to Reality."). And this modern career-focused (and feministic) part of the program has existed along-side the camping-and-outdoor focus, somewhat displacing the former traditional-housewife-skills focus that went along with the camping-and-outdoor focus in the early years. GSUSA has been a very broad organization with people (volunteers) with lots of different emphases. What aspect of girl scouting the girls experience can vary widely with the interests of the local volunteers as well a

So what would the optimal year for wood badge be?

Even with the recent changes in BSA, the two organizations are still quite far apart. It will be interesting what effect this has on GSUSA. For a number of years now there has been a vocal minority (not sure how large) of traditionalists, long-time-members of GSUSA, who have been complaining about the direction GSUSA has been going, particulary about its turning away from the outdoors. Will people in this group defect and join BSA, ceasing to try to drag GSUSA back where it came from? Will GSUSA start to pay attention to this group now that there is a realistic possibility that the

While GSUSA and BSA have a common root (Baden-Powell, in Britain) they have been diverging almost from the beginning. They even jumped the Atlantic separately, with GSUSA arising out of Girl Guides (in the UK) which came from the Boy Scouts (in the UK). Looking just at the history of the scout law in both organizations: the BSA took the 9-point scout law, simplified the wording, added three additional points, and then has kept it unchanged for 100 years. The GSUSA took the (by then) 10-point scout law and kept it essentially unchanged till 1972 and had a major revision in 1972 and yet

I assume you already have the "Cadette Girls' Guide to Girl Scouting" which has some info about the Silver Award. As far as more info about silver, my council has a "Silver Award Orientation" that one can attend to learn more. Your council may have something similar. Here is the link for my council: https://www.gsema.org/en/events-repository/2018/silver-award-orientation2.html

Very interesting. That document referred to "The Scouts BSA Handbook for Boys and Scouts BSA Handbook for Girls" Makes it sound like they will have separate handbooks. How much will they differ? Just the pictures and the pronouns? Or also in the content?

I should have said "But are far as managing to live with the rules requiring that adults be registered" . . . . I'd rather stay out of the argument about ages and genders of required BSA adults. In my area, the GSUSA elementary age troops are typically rather small and single grade. (I suppose more like a den.) For a typical year we had 13 girls. Most of the moms were registered. 3 or 4 of the dads were registered. GSUSA distinguishes between leaders ("01s" and "02s", the "leader" and "assistant leader") who are encouraged to have training and other registered adults who need

I leave it to you guys to hash out just how bad the new rules are. But are far as managing to live with the rules: In GSUSA we were required to have two registered adults for every event. Also, any driver had to be a registered girl scout adult. So, proactively, we asked all the moms to register themselves (and do the CORI check) at the beginning of the year when they registered their daughters. Almost all did so. (They were all already used to CORI checks for school volunteering, etc, so they tought it was normal.) Thus if we needed an additional driver or a substitute adult in a

I just push straight throught the patch, using a rather skinny needle and also a thimble if needed. If the needle starts to flex, back off and try to push straight. I don't think I have ever broken an hand-sewing needle, though I have broken lots of sewing machine needles.

Each council sets its own policies. Of the two councils nearest me: one prohibits alcohol at all girl scout events. The other permits alcohol at adult-only events (think wine-and-cheese fundraiser). So this mom supposedly wasn't actually part of the girl scout troop campout. Not such a great way to get around the rules.

I don't know what council that was, and whether or not they were following its rules. But in my GSUSA council we are required to have a lifeguard on duty for any time we take the girl scouts swimming.

It's only six months till girls in Scouts BSA. Will you be ready to start up a girls' troop in February? I know that @AVTech is planning to be scoutmaster for his daughter's troop. I know the @Hawkin's daughter is already planning her patrol name and patch. @Hedgehog was talking about a linked troop. My daughter is eager to start as well. So, for any of you planning to be associated with a girls' Scouts BSA troop, how close are you to ready? Do you have the necessary five girls already planning to join as soon as possible? How are you planning to recruit more girls? Do

I'm new to BSA. But in other organizations I have volunteered in (church children's programs, stuff at the school, girl scouts, etc) volunteers typically sign up for the school year, not in perpetuity. Middle of the summer is the natural time to re-evaluate one's involvement. Does one want to do the same thing? Switch to a new role (more or less intense)? Volunteer with a different organizaton? Even scale back on volunteering to devote more time to other aspects of life? Don't be embarassed by changing roles. People do it all the time. And don't think of changing roles as quitting

My experience has been with GUSUA badges/patches. I always told the girls to sew on the patches. If you iron them on they very quickly fall off, even when the girls wear the vests/sashes infrequently.

Hand sew any patch that you think you might someday move or remove. Comes off without leaving all the marks that machine-sewing does. (Looks better, too.) Best way to hold the patch in place while sewing is with masking tape -- since straight pins don't do well with the thick plastic-backed patches.

So how common is this at boy scout camp? I've always viewed (girl) scout camp as a good chance for kids to get away from technology for a week. Back in my childhood it was transistor radios that were the banned item. These days our local girl scout camp says "The following items are not allowed at camp and should be left at home: cell phones, radios, CD players, iPods or other MP3 players, handheld gaming devices, laptops, tablets, and other electronic devices, candy, gum, food, alcohol, illegal drugs, weapons, pets and animals. If found at camp, they will be confiscated."

But who wants a water gun anyway? They are so wimpy. At my daughter's school's annual park outing the kids much prefer the water tubes (like a giant syringe) that send a large stream of water. And the kids who don't have those find it effective to fill a bucket with lake water and simply dump it over the other kids' heads.