malraux

My unit currently runs that way in scout book, that girls and boys dens are mixed in the database. It does make administration much easier and no one has yelled at us about it.

I do like the Canadian approach. In short, parents have a cheaper/faster path to get clearance to attend events like campout, but that clearance is only good for 5 events. After those 5 events, they must register and have a more detailed check. That seems to balance the two competing concerns. more parents at events is good for helping address youth on youth abuse/bullying/etc.

Also if you are integrating it into summer camp, no one wants to load up on a bus to drive to a school. And while you can get access to classrooms occasionally, its much harder to get access to fancy equipment like auto shop services.

Bullying and youth on youth abuse are very interrelated though.

To the extent that it matters to units right now, its about the UMC and others hesitating on recharter. At my LC they are slowly dropping DEs and other staff. Only about half the districts have a staff person at this point, one camp has no staff, etc. Without recruitment I dunno if the council will survive to the end of bankruptcy.

Its more that I get really leery of very wide zero tolerance policies and was giving a specific example.

Yeah, big difference between two 12 year olds sharing a SI swimsuit issue and a SM showing graphic stuff on his phone. Both require a response, but it doesn't sit well with me to say that the 12 yo should get kicked out of scouts and reported to police for that action vs guided in appropriateness.

I think there’s a difference between tolerating it vs expecting it. I expect that there will be some, because humans are humans. i would see our goal as preventing the situations most likely to cause issues, having good screening mechanisms to prevent known abusers in, and making sure that everyone is working to detect problems when they are at the lowest intensity possible (which also means the lowest harm possible).

I do think it’s reasonable that if we are going to approach this with having council scout executives able to exercise judgement over what is actually problematic instead of strict zero tolerance policies, then having an auditor come behind to be sure the SE is using appropriate judgement is a good thing.

Safety of members seems to be something like accounting wherein its really good to have outside eyes on things.

His point one that youth on youth abuse and is greatly heightened with large age differentials that we currently see in the scouts BSA program is concerning.

Looking to the north at how Scouts Canada does things, it seems in line with what Mr Johnson would envision. https://www.scouts.ca/resources/bpp/policies/volunteer-screening-policy.html Their volunteer screen procedures are also more strict. https://www.scouts.ca/resources/bpp/procedures/volunteer-screening-procedure.html Of course, Scouts Canada has a yearly fee of ~$180.

Taking his recommendations of limiting age ranges in contact with each other also probably means splitting the scouts BSA program into 11-14 youth and 15-18 aged youth, similar to the scouts and venture scouts groupings in other countries.

Either a registered leader, or create a somewhat cheaper/steamlined background checked certification.

Yep, that is my concern. The combination of cost and time will make it very difficult to recruit youth and get them on a campout quickly. And because in Cubs every youth has their own parent watching them, I don't know that the situation is as high risk as it is on a troop campout.