carconcad

Seattle: obviously we are not doing enough things, or the right things, to encourage more boys to join. Give me some ideas of good recruiting tools!

Again, we have three boys now and are moving up three more in June. I am the ASM (yes, my son is in the Troop). The SM is an Eagle Scout from way back and his son is one of the three also. Youth Protection is not the issue here. My frustration is not that I think that I am in a dying unit. The issue is that it takes more time than some would think to create a fully-formed Troop. I guess I don't appreciate the council telling me that they are willing to pull the plug when we have just begun to get things rolling. Anyway, lest this turn into a gripe session, I am looking for alter

Thanks to everyone for their opinions. True.....an effective Troop should have many more boys (just look at the BSA literature that shows nearly 30 boys in a "small" Troop). Nevertheless, we have what we have and I am not willing to call it quits for lack of numbers. The next Pack or Troop "down the street" is 20 miles away. What we have in our town is it. I can't argue against poor retention other than to say that if you have three boys to start and one leaves, that is a 33% drop (as opposed to 10 and one = 10%). As a new troop with new boys (11 and 12 years old) with new leade

Thank you for the reply. I understand the guideline of a minimum number of Scouts and leaders for the sake of logistics and effectiveness. In a perfect world, and a larger community (our town has 1880 people), that would be great. However, our mini-Troop is one of the most active in the district, if not council. We participate in mulitiple events, are active in the community, and work with the Pack to support their training (i.e. first aid for Webelos, etc). Our Pack has doubled in size every year (we are just waiting for the time when the Troop will do the same). In fact we should b

What is the official BSA rule for starting a new BS Troop? Our Troop was started two years ago when we needed a place for our single Webelos to move up to. He was joined by two more boys from school, which made three total. Since then those two boys have dropped out, but were replaced by two more rising Webelos (still three total). Our feeder Pack is only three years old and has not supplied a large number of Webelos for transition to the Troop yet. Now our council is laying down the law that we can not recharter the Troop without at least five boys on the roster. Where is