Recruiting Drive

[WVCubDad 11]

We had the first of two recruiting nights at our local schools tonight. We got 1 new Webelos, 1 Bear, 2 Wolves and 2 Tigers at my son's school. The Webelos was unexpected since his school only goes from K to 3rd grade.

 

My CM gave me a well stocked box of forms and information sheets, pens and a sample New Cub Kit that our District gives out (racing lunch/pencil box, Cub Scout bumper sticker, wristband, Pinewood Derby card and Matchbox car). He also let me choose from several fold-out display boards of pack activities photos from the last few years. I let my son choose the board that appealed most to him - lots of rain gutter regatta, fishing derby, and Pack overnighter photos as well as series of photos from a Pack trip to see a Hagerstown Suns minor league baseball game.

 

One thing that struck me as kind of odd was that although the District had listed about 10 packs along with contact information, I was the only Pack at our school for the event. Just my son and I in uniforms with the display. Fortunately I remembered to get the meeting days and times for the other packs and had one boy who needed to meet on a night other than Tuesday.

 

In the packet that I got there was a whole plan for the evening as well as a layout for a flip chart brief. It looked like a schoolhouse solution for how to run a recruiting event, good but really structured. Since I didn't know how many others would be there, I decided to go off the cuff and I guess it worked out well since there were about 8 families there.

 

What have others experiences been with events like this? Do you usually compete with other Packs at the same schools for kids?

 

We live in a small city of about 15,000 in a county of approximately 79,000. My Pack had people at 5 or 6 schools and I haven't heard what their response was yet.

 

Thanks for any insight. I get to do this again a week from Thursday and would like to be better prepared.

 

John

[briantshore 14]

This is the first year that I helped out on recruiting. In the past they always did it on weekend when I work. We had 3 Cub Scout Packs there, along with 2 Boy Scout Troop that cover my town. We had a good turn out, and I would guess that each Pack picked up at 30% growth in registered members. The only problem I saw is that most of our Packs are still very weak in adult help. I was very hesitant to try to promise a program that I could not guarnty would be there for them. For Example, my Pack has no Bear Den, becouse of no parents willing to be Den Leaders. We may loose all of our Wolves this year also if we do not get some adults. Support from Council was really great, and I hope our future will be positive