yknot

I'm not sure about that. I think LDS was partly to blame for membership declines before it left. It never should have been allowed to create a program within a program. Allowing it to do so gave the LDS undue influence over scouting policies in general, including a really onerous over emphasis on religion in the program. Without that influence, BSA likely would have been able to better adapt to changing social values. Without LDS, it would have been a lot easier for BSA proper to open up membership in general while still allowing COs the prerogative to follow their individual principles for their particular units. LDS influence made it impossible to adapt in my opinion. Before the CSA scandal and Covid hit full force, I really thought the loss of LDS influence would eventually be a great membership opportunity. Going forward, LDS scouts and COs would be as welcome and valued as any other religion or CO in BSA, but without the paralyzing outsize influence. Scouting was never meant to be solely a youth ministry program.

One of the most alarming, although slightly funny, experiences I had on this subject was with my last AOL den. At their cross over ceremony they were so pumped and ready to be Scouts. All they wanted to do was camp, hike, shoot, high adventure, etc. And then the Scoutmaster got up and said a few words of welcome to them. He spent the next few minutes talking to them about leadership, hard work, merit badges and how Eagle Scout would look on their college applications; how important it was to "get it all done" before things got real busy for them in high school. He told them that the challenges they would face would help them develop life skills they would need. He told them being in scouts would develop leadership skills that would be recognized by future employees and help them get a job... I never saw a bunch of 10 year old kids deflate so fast. Parents couldn't pull out the checkbooks fast enough but all those pumped up scouts were suddenly full of apprehension and somber faces. What was thought of as fun suddenly sounded like work. I think as adults we sometimes get carried away with things that seem important to us but are not necessarily as important to kids. I do believe a lot of kids walk away, especially during those critical cross over years, because scouting at times is more what adults want it to be. You can still supposedly be a boy led, patrol based unit and have the culture largely driven by adult expectations and egos.

Combining 4th and 5th graders with kindergarten and first graders is one of the top reasons cited to me by parents as to why their older scouts stop coming to pack meetings or even leave scouts. For a youth organization, BSA often seems to know little about kids. The idea that 9 and 10 year old kids will enjoy "teaching" or "running" things for younger kids when they themselves still want to run around and have fun isn't all that practical. Most anything designed to appeal to 4th and 5th graders is likely to be too long for K-2. In the school system, we always broke things down K-2 and 3-4 or 5. In recent years, grade level specific even has become more the norm. Even at the troop level, it can be a stretch to have 10 year old and 17 year old kids together.

I wish someone would make a documentary about this.

Whenever YP comes up we seem to instantly sort into these completely polarized nuclear bomb positions. Yes, BSA has improved its YP. Yes, it is harder to abuse children in scouting today. Yes, child sexual abuse is a prevalent problem in society. On the other side of the coin, has BSA done everything it can to minimize CSA? No, This forum is full of areas where BSA can and must improve. If scouting survives bankruptcy it will not survive a round two of child sexual abuse cases. That is simply the reality. One of the biggest conflicts I see is that one of the few action items in the BSA reorg plan is a focus on increasing membership. Historically, this National focus on increasing and maintaining membership is what has contributed to our youth protection gaps and resultant crisis. The focus needs to be on running a safe program. An increase in membership would be the hoped for result.

I keep getting confused on the fees since I'm no longer in Cubs. So National is now $72, plus there is a $25 new member fee, plus there is an adult volunteer fee of $48 -- that would apply to any parent who signed up as a Tiger den leader or assistant den leader, yes?

That's the way it has been. But maybe it needs to change. Top leadership being completed disconnected from program has been, in my opinion, a slow building disaster for BSA. I think senior leadership needs to have program on their dashboard so that they can better provide support to volunteers in the field. Focusing on fundraising totally detaches them from what scouts is all about. It hasn't been working. At all.

I've brought this up before and it's not entirely the same context, but there is a certain degree of forensics that can be done that can provide some validity even to claims that are missing information. If you know that Scout X claimed abuse during period Y in Z vicinity but is lacking some key data, you can match that up against similar claims made during period Y in Z vicinity. Meaning, if a scout forgot his unit number but knew the time period and location, if there are a dozen other incidents within those same parameters, it lends credence to his claim.

I was a Pack Committee Chair for many years, plus a Den Leader throughout, so I heard the parent feedback while also having to ensure the health of the program. - Be careful about fundraising. This was one of the biggest sources of parental dissatisfaction. It is good you are offering a buy out option. Many families will go for that. Others, however, will have to fundraise in order to participate. My advice is to offer a menu of options so that no one feels stuck with a fundraiser they can't succeed at. - Try to do pay as you go as much as you can. That way families can opt out if they can't afford something, but make it clear you also have scholarship options for those who can't. - Don't focus on one big, painful, fundraiser. There are lots of smaller, easier ways to raise funds. For a couple years, we ordered bulk pizzas at a discount before pack meetings and sold slices at a profit. People were happy to pay $2 a slice and not have to worry about dinner that night. It was both a service to our families and a fundraiser. Look for those kinds of things. - Forgo the uniform for the next couple of years. Do a pack t shirt. Opt out of Scout Life. - I was not above bending some rules. Councils don't want you to approach local merchants but the reality is local merchants have no interest in supporting boy scouts in general. They are happy, however, to support the local kids and families they see around town. A few gift cards can go a long way towards keeping your blue and gold food costs down, etc. A pasta and pizza night from a local eatery where 10% is donated to your unit is great. These businesses would never respond to Council. They would however respond to a local unit because they know the kids. - . I

https://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2021/06/23/619808.htm

Welp, I hope the focus stays on youth protection and that if there is any good that comes out of this horrific mess it's that fewer children are harmed in the future in scouting and elsewhere. I hope eyes have been opened and that things are learned from this. I'm not a survivor so I can't presume to know how any of you feel about that but that to my third hand perspective would be at least some kind of nameless but worthwhile monument to your pain. BSA cannot forget what happened. It can't keep happening.

We do and we don't. The unit is advancement focused. It's youth led, but with adult expectations that the boys internalize. The scouts prepare hard prior to crossover. Then there is a standard camp out or series of meetings in the spring post crossover where the material is gone over again before anyone will sign off on anything, so to their minds they've done it twice. Then in the past they've been told they must attend Dan Beard/First Year scouting at summer camp so they do it all a third time. Then, none of the SM/ASM team trusts camp sign offs, so they have to sometimes do it a fourth time if they weren't smart enough or motivated enough to get the sign offs in the spring. Lately, there's been some give on camp because of poor feedback and lost kids. This unit is kind of an Eagle mill. The SM is a great guy but he will not tolerate any sitting around at camp in a hammock or doing anything that doesn't serve advancement. The parents scream if kids don't come back from camp with four and five merit badges. I don't know whether it's because they were raised this way or not, but most of the boys are very focused on checking off every box they can and design most meetings around that. It's good for the very focused boys, but we lose a large percentage of those who are more chill. I should actually not say "we" because my younger son and I finally dropped out this year. He's more of a hike and what kind of bird is that kid.

4H offers pretty much everything depending on where you are so if you are in a camping club or are working on a high adventure type project, yes they do unit like things. However, there is generally a lot more parental involvement and it's often more of a group setting. It's also not as much tent based. When I was a kid we camped a lot but it was in everything from group cabins at summer camp to empty barns to pop up campers and the backs of pick up trucks. It was usually a bunch of kids stuck together and a leader somewhere. I was not in a camping club but we often camped to be near our projects either at a fairgrounds -- think jamboree type set up -- or nearby or for fun.

Maybe this has been their strategy all along and why they have fought losing the HA bases. If you look at the problems with youth protection, liability, structural issues with oversight, insurance, BSA may have concluded it really can't run anything other than a family program at the national level. This way it will preserve the charter, preserve the boy scout name and legacy to some degree, and leave local scouting to whatever councils/unit survive or are able to continue on their own.

I don't think it's credible to claim it's due to search engine issues. It would be pretty magical if 4H was somehow invisible throughout the interweb. 4H historically has also always served far more youth than scouting. Right now the membership is somewhere around 6 million to BSA's 700,000. Even if many parents, lawyers, and the media somehow colluded not to link the 4H name to abuse cases, there would still be a lot of cases out there. Activities in 4H can be similar but the program dynamics are completely different as I outlined above. It is largely a group activity done in public. There are opportunities for abuse as there would be anywhere kids are present but they would appear to be less. There are a lot more women involved. Parents are also far more likely to trust a boy scout leader or a pastor with a child because of institutionalized assumptions about character. As I've also said before, in 4H as a kid you are much more on your own with other kids and it is more kid run. There is no real advancement process that drives adults to become directly involved with youth. The idea that a child wouldn't remember that someone who abused them was a 4H leader because of a lack of uniform is nonsensical. I don't mean to be defending 4H so much, I am more using it as an example that the scouting program is inherently attractive to predators and creates unique opportunities for them. I think until scouting confronts that and figures out ways to address it better instead of trying to deflect it as a societal problem that can't be helped, the future of scouting, and the kids in it, isn't safe. Others have been focused on the money and numbers throughout the bankruptcy process here but this is the aspect that has riveted me.

4H members can also do high adventure and more outdoors oriented projects depending on the state and county but the process is very different and there is more parent involvement. 4H offers almost everything, so it is a fine slice of the membership pie but then again 4H enrolls many, many more kids than scouting. I think the membership now is over 6 million. Many 4H clubs, regardless of what subject, still camp as part of the experience and also attend 4H camp. When I was young, we camped with an adult leader, but it was generally a group bunkhouse at a camp. You were never really alone with an adult.

That's why I said Google yourself for headlines and cases and see what you think. I find very few. Google Scout Leader Sex Abuse and 4H Leader Sex Abuse and see what pops up once you get past the recent mass filing. If cases were as rampant in 4H as in scouting, wouldn't someone somewhere have been filing more cases than the handful that come up? It also was and is a different environment. Before two deep, the whole advancement process in scouting with scoutmaster conferences, sign offs, skills demonstration, etc. created a lot of opportunities for a predator to cut a kid from the herd. In 4H, it's pretty much all public. You don't do anything with an adult leader, you exhibit at a fair, you present to a group, etc. There were also a lot more moms involved in 4H as both leaders and chaperones. In my opinion, women have traditionally been more vigilant about who is doing what with kids and keeping track of where they are, although I think many more men have started adopting those strategies as well. Traditionally, a lot of the scouting program has tried to minimize 'mom hovering' especially at the troop level, but it seems there may have been a downside to that. There is no other youth organization that does that except for maybe some of the marquee sports cultures at the older ages.

One of the differences to explain it might be that 88% of abuse perpetrators are male. Scouts, especially at the troop level, has been predominantly male. 4H leadership gender varies. There is plenty of camping and outdoor activity in 4H, but the leader/member dynamic is also completely different. Most of the 4H I was involved with was also kid run, but the program really didn't have a lot of opportunity for one on one contact with a leader. Just based on headlines, there seem to be very few cases of abuse in 4H. Google scout abuse and you get dozens if not hundreds of hits for cases filed or reported on in scouting. Google 4H leader abuse you get few. There could be a media bias there, and maybe we'll see more, but for now it appears other youth organizations are safer. Even among sports, most of the abuse cases seem to be at the late middle school/high school level. There are very few at the elementary school ages but there are plenty of cases in that age group in cub scouts in scouting.

Some version of the ineligible volunteers files have been in existence since 1919. They were referenced in the 1930s. BSA long knew it was a particular target for pedophiles. 4-H is also a 100 plus year old legacy youth organization and no such files exist there.

I think they have no idea. There has been no communication from BSA to the COs other than what has been funneled through Councils. That is mostly a feel good message and in many cases there is no communication channel from the Council/District/Unit to the CO. I don't know about other CO groups, but from what I've seen from the UMC, it's still largely very vague and muted. They are concerned but still want to support scouts, at least according to the latest information I've seen. I think it's unethical that BSA is not being more forthcoming, especially with the smaller and individual CO groups. At one point they may have thought they could have managed the situation, but that is obviously not the case. I imagine if the worst happens, BSA public relations will attempt to blame it on victims' lawyers and victim lawsuits, but as all of us who are on this forum know, this train has been pulling into the station for at least 18 months. There is no excuse. I think the vast majority of COs have no idea about the omni site or anything else.

That would be a best case scenario if it is limited to the BSA relationship with COs. In a worst case, zombie world scenario, we could see hundreds of local small COs wiped out or affected by this. For example, the Methodist Church. I work with is a state based council. A host of smaller churches by me are barely functional, but they do have some property and assets. If the UMC had to respond to the cases in our state as a council, it would likely result in the closure and sale of dozens of small churches, their parsonages, some local camp properties, community buildings, etc. If Chapter 11 is meant to leave BSA functional, does it also ensure that any COs are left functional? Most are teetering on a knife's edge.

I have wondered that as well. However, while many COs are poor, many are rich so I guess it would be worth it to drill down to that level in the long run. But that would take so much time.

I think that's largely going to be the Councils going forward? Could be good, could be bad. It might force Councils to finally understand and deal with local unit issues if they are knee deep in them. One of the dysfunctional aspects of the scouting structure is that we have different levels operating in different directions to meet different goals. This might collapse the CO/Unit/District/Council layers into one more functional entity. The bad side could be if instead of learning Councils simply tried to mandate down to units.

What I have seen in numerous COs near me is that they are mostly legacy units with relationships going back decades in the community and the members have no idea what those relationships are other than to provide meeting space and benign support. All they know is that once a year some nice person from the local boy scout troop whom they have known for years stops by and asks them to sign something. Some COs were very hands on because they used scouting as an outgrowth of their youth programming and ministry. Others may have started out like that, but over the decades as church memberships declined and more kids joined from other churches and faiths, it was simply seen as a community service in which meeting space and benign support was provided. BSA was aware of this but didn't intercede because it would have decreased membership if some of these COs understood what they were truly responsible for.

That is something I agree with. The uniform today I think is more for nostalgic adults than the kids. It should be a survey question. It's the only activity I can think of other than marching band where I hear kids regularly complain about discomfort. They are basically still wearing what an old British guy -- a Lord no less -- wore in 1910.