Treflienne

I've got a request for the moderators:

How about a subforum on "Practical advice for launching a girls Scouts BSA troop" under the "Open Discussion - Program" forum.

We've currently got a couple of good discussions going: this one ("Linked Troop Mission Statement") and also "New Scout Troop" that would fit there already.  And I imagine there will be more in the upcoming months.  And it would help people looking for advice be able to find this good advice more easily.

A tangential question from an outsider, here:

How much does the CO influence the understanding of "morally straight" and "clean"?    How much does the CO set the tone for helping the scouts learn how to make ethical choices?

(Side question: is the 11th point of BSA's law, "clean", understood as being similar in meaning to the "clean" in Baden-Powell's tenth law (which was never adopted by BSA) "A Scout is clean in thought, word and deed."?)

Back to the orginial questions,  would a CO with clearly-defined moral standards (such as a Catholic church)  influence the troop's understanding of what it means to be straight rather than crooked in behaviour?   What about CO's such as hunting clubs,  utility companies, businessmen's associations?   Do they tend to be more hands-off on these issues, leaving it to the troop to figure out?

Why am I asking?   I'm hoping to be involved with a new girls Scouts BSA troop.  Don't know yet which of the local CO's for boys troops might be interesting in sponsoring a girls troop, also.   Don't know how much impact the culture of the CO typically has on the culture of the troop.

And for some types of social media there is the age issue.   You either have to be at least 13 years old, or lie about your age and claim to be 13 years old to use them.    This is awkward for things that should not be excluding the younger kids,  since we don't want to encourage them to lie about their ages.   (Haven't seen this issue in BSA yet, since I'm not associated with a BSA troop yet.   But the issue came up with the church youth group.)

1 hour ago, Treflienne said:

Helpfully,  the four boy scout troops in our school district have said that they will inquire of the families of their boys (

Maybe my tone wasn't clear.  I wasn't complaining.   I was trying to say that I was appreciative of the helpfulness of the local boy scout troops.   (And since they are willing to be helpful,  we need to be willing to be patient and go at their pace.)

I was also trying to hold them up as an example of how existing scout troops can be helpful to the new girls troops -- even if they don't want to become linked with girls troops.  And it might even take pressure off the boys troops to be linked with a girls troop -- if there is a girls troop already getting started in the area.

10 minutes ago, walk in the woods said:

same disappointment as any boy living in small town America

We live in a densely populated area.   Lots of people.  Lots of towns close together.  Lots of existing boys troops within a short driving distance.  (Actually three within WALKING distance.)   Small town America is a different situation.

2 hours ago, qwazse said:

The responsibility for starting a patrol then a troop, rests squarely with the youth. These girls need to dig really deep and ask other girls if they'd like to hike and camp together every month. This probably means talking to strangers ... every girl in their class ... every sister of a boy scout ... even if she is a couple of years older. Once they have their gang of five,

And if the girl has already talked to every girl at her school and every girl at her church and hasn't found five?   If she cannot talk to the sisters of the boy scouts because she does not know who they are?   

I think that in our locale we may need to combine beyond a single school or town to find enough interested girls.

Helpfully,  the four boy scout troops in our school district have said that they will inquire of the families of their boys (and also ask the cub scout packs to enquire of the families of their cubs) about interested girls that they know about.   The troops have the contact information for their families.  My daughter does not.  Helping put the interested girls in contact with each other, so that they can make further plans, is something existing troops can do to help the new girls troops out --- even if the boys troops have no interested in being linked with girls troops.

1 hour ago, Eagledad said:

These adults are eventually going to be leaders in a boy run Patrol method troop program. Patrol method is supposed to be safe place where Scouts grow by experiencing the consequences of stepping outside of the Scout Law and Oath. How can a troop be a safe place if adults are debating whether or not to report the scout to Council. Please convince me the future of Patrol Method isn’t hopeless?

I don't understand the connection you are making to the patrol method.  Could you explain a little more please?

10 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

don’t know John, I think times have changed. Parents today don’t seem to trust other adults holding their kids accountable, just ask my high school teacher son.

Scouts has the advantage over public schools, in that it is an activity that the family has chosen of their own free will.    In Girl Scouts, at least,  anyone registering has to agree to abide by the girl scout law -- for the girls being registered by their parents, the parent agrees on their behalf.   (Really -- there is a checkbox on the registration website that you have to check off, or you cannot register. )

That is one of the beauties of refering the kid back to the scout law .   The adults' whims are not the standard of behaviour;  the scout law is the standard of behaviour.   And you know that the parent has already agreed to having the kid follow the scout law.

13 minutes ago, John-in-KC said:

may I submit a good path to deal with this kind of boisterousness is to simply ask the boy to recite the Scout Law, and then ask him if he was being friendly, courteous and kind?  99+ % of the time, he won’t be able to hold eye contact as he says yes. 

I would do exactly this with my Brownie and Junior girl scouts.  (Same age as cubs.)   I'd pull the girl aside for a quiet conversation. I'd have the girl start reciting the scout law and then I'd stop her once she got to a relevant point, and ask her whether what she had been doing was living up to the scout law.   (We never got past "honest and fair, friendly and helpful, considerate and caring" before finding something relevant.)  Ususally the response was a realization of why what she had been doing was wrong, a fervant determination to do better,  and improved behaviour.  (At least until the next time she forgot and did something thoughtless.) 

Also: no need for a troop "Behaviour Contract".   We have the scout law.

4 hours ago, Eagle94-A1 said:

Also pointing out how even if her father goes with her and is her buddy, she still cannot go because of no female Scouters. SHE WILL BE CAMPING WITH HER DAD! (emphasis) He's was pumped up about camporee when I talked to them about it.

While you might simultaneously pursue other options, trying to recruit a mom of a scout in your troop is worth trying.  But advertise it as an opportunity, not a chore:

Moms of scouts:

We have a unique opportunity this year.  Do you want to get a glimpse of what your son and his buddies do at scouts -- without giving them the impression that you are hovering or interfering?  And without signing up for a major job in the troop?

This year, as every year, webelos will be camping with our troop at the Camporee, to get a taste of what scouting is like.  The difference this year is that there are now girl Webelos, but the girl Troops will not form up until next year.  So this year, in order for a girl to get a picture of what her girl-only Scouts BSA troop could aspire to be like next year, she needs to visit an existing boys' troop.

In fact we have a girl Webelos who is planning to come, with her father, to our troop's camporee.  Despite camping with her father, the BSA youth protection rules require a registered YPT-trained female adult at the event, since we will have a girl at the event.  But because the girl will be camping with her father, this registered YPT-trained female adult will actually have nothing to do except to be there and not get in the way.

So.  This is your opportunity.  Come see what your son does -- while being able to explain to him that you are helping out the troop, not intruding on his space.

You might find that you have a curious mom who is willing to help you out and come along.  Some moms may have stayed out of troop life because they have not been wanting to intrude on their sons' boy-only space.

Long term: it would be great if BSA revised their rule to say that if a kid is accompanied by a parent or guardian, there is no need for a matched-gender troop adult.

5 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

s this an example of girls taking boy out of boy scouting? 

We've had discussions under the theme of keeping the program fun for the boys, instead of the adults. I remember one discussion where the CM asked if he should keep singing the scouts' favorite song, "Greasy Grimy Gofer guts" at the pack meetings. SM's struggle with the same questions of their scouts as well. Blood Circle has been around since at least the 60s.

Well, some of the girl scouts were singing "greasy grimy gofer guts" back in the 1970s.    I haven't heard it recently, though.

48 minutes ago, shortridge said:

the modern term “safety circle”

Not so modern.   Girl Scouts were using this term at girl scout camp, back when I was a kid.

1 hour ago, Eagle94-A1 said:

Whittling Chip requirements. It specifically states "Pocketknife," not "plastic cutlery knife" not "imitation wooden knife", and not "popsicle sticks."

1 hour ago, Eagle94-A1 said:

On a side note, I am also culpable in changing the requirement. I had folks at day camp teaching Whittling Chip with wood carving knives from Paul's Supplies https://pauls-supplies.myshopify.com/collections/knives/products/carving-knife which is technically a fixed blade, not a pocket knife. But at least it was a real knife.

Looks like a nice tool.  

But the kids also need to learn how to open and close a pocket knife without cutting their fingers.   At least my Brownies and Juniors took some practise to be able to do it safely.

And don't knock popsicle sticks as a possible learning tool to be used for a few minutes very early in the learning process.    My girls had to demonstrate that they could listen, pay attention, and  follow directions well enough in opening and closing a fake popsicle-stick mock-knife,  before I handed them a real pocket knife.   This allowed me to identify which kids were going to need more focussed one-on-one supervision as they started using the real knives.

Also:  don't assume that the addition of girls is going to water-down the interest in knives and other traditional scout stuff.   You may find instead that cub scouts and scouts BSA attracts the kind of girls that want to do the things that BSA does.

On 9/30/2018 at 10:50 PM, qwazse said:

But here's a lot of discussion on the topic:

https://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/2017/01/23/which-scout-sign-and-salute-do-i-use

Hi qwazse,

Thanks. That was an interesting article.

Coming into BSA from a different scouting organization, the BSA take on the relation between the scout sign and the scout oath/promise takes a little getting used to.

WAGGGS and other parts of WOSM have a three-part promise/oath for guides/scouts:
1) duty to God and king (or country)
2) to help other people, at all times.
3) obeying the scout law
And the scout sign with its three fingers reflects those three parts.

(Brownies originally had only a two-part promise and a two-finger sign --- they did not yet promise to obey the scout law.)

29 minutes ago, ItsBrian said:

Honestly, you don’t need to be exact! My family & everyone else I know uses the closest one they can find. If you sew it correctly, you can barely notice a difference. 

I agree with ItsBrian.   It doesn't need to be a perfect match.

But if you really don't have anything close enough, then take the item with you, go to JoAnnFabrics or whatever your local sewing-notion store is. (Walmart?)   You'll be able to hold the spools of thread right up to the patch to find something quite close.  And if you need to pick between slightly-too-dark and slighty-too-light, pick the darker color thread.  It will show less.

2 hours ago, Eagledad said:

One Council Trainer said that he was watching Wood Badge course change from a leadership skills course to a scout skills for adults before his eyes and there was nothing he could do about it. His trainers needed training because they were hung up on scout skills basics.

And from the YPT2 thread:

1 hour ago, Eagledad said:

But, finding leaders willing to take over at Webelos is challenging enough without finding one with outdoors experienced.

So,  where is the right place to fill in the missing scout skills?    I went to IOLS and it seemed more like a very-fast-overview of what you should know, than a way to actually learn it. Some stuff I am fine on:  knots,  lashing, pocket knives, camp saws, cooking over a campfire, etc.  Other stuff I don't know yet:  axes, water purification,  bear canisters, etc.

55 minutes ago, walk in the woods said:

Training is important and valuable.  The problem with training is it produces trained (i.e. by-the-book) scouters.

55 minutes ago, walk in the woods said:

My experience outside scouting with people who are book trained is they tend to crash into a program like stampeding elephants, waving the book, and explaining how everybody is wrong.  Sometimes they are correct, but they are nearly always wrong. 

Yup.  That is a danger for new volunteers.   Thanks for the warning in advance.

1 hour ago, Eagledad said:

First, learn the BSA Mission and Vision. Preparing  young people to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetime by instilling  in them the value of the scout oath and law are the adult leaders primary task. 

1 hour ago, Eagledad said:

That is a quick list of what I feel new adults need to learn. It seems too simplistic to some and too idealistic to others. Scouting is a values program that uses the outdoors as the tool for practice.

Hi Barry,

I really appreciate your thoughtful answer.   And that is where I'd like to go with a new girls' troop.   To quote Baden-Powell "There is hardly one of the Guide Laws that is not better carried out  after you have been living and practising it in camp."  (from the 1929 Scouting for Girls handbook)

I also really appreciate your willingness to give advice, despite your concern that introducing girls into BSA will mess things up for the boys.   I certainly don't want to detract from the boys's program.   I just want a more traditional scouting experience for girls than the vastly-modernized program that is the current GSUSA.  

2 hours ago, Eagledad said:

So the bigger question is how much new blood can an organization handle without changing the dynamics of the organization? Based from my limited experience in my very small world, less than 20%.

That sounds about right.   The challenge will be to try to be an exception to that 20% rule --- the girls' troops will have more new blood than that,   can they still have a good patrol and troop experience?

8 hours ago, Eagledad said:

Yep, and it supports my deepest concerns of inexperienced adults leading the program. I can't see it going any direction other than Advancement based Eagle Mill camping programs. 

5 hours ago, Eagledad said:

If one doesn't know, how can one get there? Observations show that one doesn't get there.

5 hours ago, Eagledad said:

I guess this is considered pessimism in your business. We call it planning a head in mine business. 

I have read a lot of really thoughtful, helpful, insightful posts that you have written on various topics.   You obviously have a lot of valuable experience.   

And since "A Scout is cheerful" and "A Scout is helpful",  I'm hoping you can put aside the gloom long enough to consider a question: What do you think is most important for the new-to-BSA volunteers to learn?   How would you recommend they learn it?  I'm asking because I will in all likelihood be one of those new-to-BSA volunteers with a new Scouts BSA troop for girls (but only if we get enough girls and enough volunteers to get a troop going).

Actually,  I'd appreciate input from all y'all, not just Barry.

That Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts are part of the same organization, not two different organizations.  (I've been hearing that for years.)

1 hour ago, SSF said:

I personally always thought that was very juvenile, and deceptiive, on her part.

She may simply be trying to sidestep the phenomenon in which women (in some areas/fields) are not assumed to be competent until they have demonstrated that they are.  Do I guess correctly that she works in a male-majority field?  (If she were in a heavily female profession, such as elementary school teaching, people would not assume that "Chris" was a man.)

6 hours ago, Hawkwin said:

IIRC, when all this started to become news, there were stories about how BSA approached GSUSA but was rebuffed.

One such snip:

I think they would have made it work if they could.

I think the organizations are just too different.  One or the other or both would have had to have changed a lot for the two to have coordinated their programs together.  I think that coordinating the two together, even if the attempt were to meet halfway, would have required a lot more change from BSA than simply adding its own girl program.  And I doubt if GSUSA would have wanted to meet halfway, either.

11 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

when the BSA decided to change to the SA and not combine with the GSUSA to build better programs together.

I don't think that combine with GSUSA was an option.   Can't do that unless GSUSA also wants it.

33 minutes ago, gblotter said:

why then do we see mountains of programs tailored specifically for the needs of girls? Programs promoting girls in STEM,

14 minutes ago, gblotter said:

So now that boys are the segment of society that is falling behind

But the boys are not falling behind the girls in math.  See this recent article

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/06/13/upshot/boys-girls-math-reading-tests.html

And math competency is the absolutely required background for doing well in science or engineering. 

For one of the younger groups,  if you want to stay with Kipling and have a nice theme story:   Mongeese.  (from Rikki-Tikki-Tavi.)  Motto "Go and Find Out"    (Instead of Mowgli and the wolf cubs.)

Or switch from wolf cubs to foxes:    Cubs --> Foxes and Beavers --> Kits .   (Lots of clever fox stories out there, though the foxes are not always as helpful as Rikki-Tikki-Tavi.)

51 minutes ago, Eagle1993 said:

Girl Scouts do seem to have a minimum number of leaders to youth ratio that actually exceed Boy Scouts.

It varies by age-group, and it varies by council, and more are required for field trips.  One year my fourth-graders invited the first-graders to go on a cookout with them.  The Daisy troop had to come up with *four* adults to accompany their nine girls, which was tough to get on a Thursday afternoon, when the schools had a half-day.

By juniors (grade 4) the total number of girls per adult, even for field trips, is more than one mini-van can hold, so if you get enough adults to drive, then you have enough to for the adult-to-youth ratio.   (And , at least in my council, parents must be registered and CORI'd to drive any scouts other than their own.)