Cub Scouts and the Modern Family

[SeattlePioneer 144]

Perhaps it's worthwhile to consider Cub Scouts in the light of our modern families:

 

Many modern families have no father in the picture. Cub Scouts can give boys a quality male figure and experience in their lives.

 

Many modern families are small, with one or no siblings, and perhaps no brother for a boy.

 

Cub Scouts can provide a band of brothers in a den, and perhaps an experience with a reliable older brother in the form of a Den Chief (Boy Scout volunteer with a Cub Scout den).

 

I've had a number of moms tell me they highly value having men as Den Leaders. Unfortunately, we've had no success attracting Den Chiefs so far.

[howarthe 42]

I agree. Cub Scouting can provide boys with brothers and father-figures that they might not have at home. We don't have any male den leaders in our pack either, but I've heard of packs where all the den leaders are men. I guess the moms in that pack don't get home from work early enough. We might get a male den leader this year. He does contract work, so his schedule is flexible, and he just loves spending time outdoors with his own boys. One problem that the "modern" family creates for our pack is that we have a few boys who are home with mom during the week but they are out-of-town with dad on the weekends, so they can make it to den meetings and pack meetings, but they miss out on many of our outings. This doesn't have to be a problem. If dad is stuck for something to do with the kids this weekend, he could take them to the scout outing

[SeattlePioneer 144]

Hello howarthe,

 

 

Actually, all the Den Leaders, ADL and Cubmasters in my pack are men. The moms are the committee people.

 

I started rebuilding the pack four years ago, and I suspect that my presence gave other men "permission" to be program leaders.

 

I'd REALLY like to have more Boy Scout participation in the pack, but so far I haven't been able to stoke up interest in that.

[Ohanadad 10]

My problem in recruiting Den Chiefs is that our troop meets at the same day, same time but different location. That means Den Chiefs would have to miss their troop meeting which no boy wants to do. I could recruit a Den Chief from a different troop, but one of the advantages of having Den Chiefs is that as the cubs transitions to the troop, they have a friend already there. I have a good relationship with the SM and getting Den Chiefs from another troop would just feel weird.

 

In our pack, most of the Den Leaders were moms. We had a few Dads, but not many. I think its because most of the Dads were sports coaches or helping out with teams so it left the Moms to do scouting.

[DeanRx 69]

The largest obstacle to den chiefs is TIME.

 

The Boy Scout is already going to at least ONE scout meeting a week for his troop and likely at least ONE patrol meeting every other week (or sometimes once a week). Then you have weekend outings with the troop at least once a month.

 

Trying to ADD on an additional meeting two to three times a month for a pack meeting and den meeting(s) means the Boy Scout has at least a meeting every week and most likely multiple meetings every week! Add in one additional extracurricular activity (sport, band, drama, debate, etc...) and the Boy Scout is overbooked at that point.

 

So, unless the aim of scouting is to make the kid choose BSA over another activity (which I do not think it is) - the idea of Den Chiefs is great in theory but overlooks what many adults overlook when trying to put together a perfect system - TIME!

 

Realistically, how much TIME do you expect a Boy Scout to put into the program on a weekly basis and not get burnt out?

 

We joke about 1 hour a week for adult leaders and know its not even close to being true. Most adults are not coaches on top of BSA leaders and even fewer have work they bring home every night (i.e. homework) like these kids do. You really got to take a hard look at the TIME expectation before you expect these boys to spend all their weeknights mentoring cubbies.

 

Again, I think its great in theory, but pretty impractical in reality.

 

Dean

[SeattlePioneer 144]

Hello Dean,

 

 

I agree with you that time is a major issue, but it doesn't have to be a barrier if you keep in mind that Den Chiefs should be a Scout program that is fun and rewarding for the Den Chief like any other Scouting program.

 

That means giving Den Chiefs a meaningful role in the program, teaching or leading a portion of the program each week, not being help meets for the Den Leader.

 

Also, you don't have to tromp all over the Den Chief's time every week. Perhaps the Den Chief can attend one meeting a month, or attend particular meetings when his help will be especially valuable.

 

I haven't attracted any Den Chiefs for my Cub Pack from a neighboring troop. But my plan is to ask the Troop leaders to have Order of the Arrow members attend our recruiting night September 12th wearing their sashes, and to help boys and parents make stomp bottle rockets and then take charge of the stomp bottle rocket launch competition while we are signing up parents.

 

We'll see if that works. If it does, I'll look for other ways to attract at least some part time Den Chiefs. For example, the pack meets from 6:30-7:30 while the troop meets a half mile away from 7:00-8:30. I might occasionally ask Scouts to attend the first half hour of the den meetings and then take them over for the troop meeting.

 

My theory here is that creativity and flexibility might make the Den Chief program start to work.

 

Another neighboring troop provides Den Chiefs for all the dens in a successful pack, and has for years. I had a great Den Chief when I was a Tiger Cub Den Leader for that pack. The boys are still busy, but they choose to offer a very valuable service as a gift.

[ScoutNut 147]

Den Chief is a LEADERSHIP POSITION with both a Troop, and Pack, not a "program".

 

A leadership position that definitely requires more of a commitment than other Scout leadership positions.

 

For instance, your plan to have a Den Chief attend your Pack/den meeting from 6:30-7pm only, and then to get driven (by more than one person) to their 7pm Troop meeting, still makes the Scout 10-15 minutes late for his Troop meeting.

 

Attending only one (or one half) den meeting per month, or only an occasional special appearance (1-3 times per year), is hardly showing leadership. I would think that a SM would be hard pressed to approve 0.5-4 hours time,as having fulfilled a four month Position of Responsibility.

 

A Den Chief is part of the leadership team for a specific den, and as such should be coordinating his activities with the den leader (not with the Pack's UC/CC/CM/etc), and his SM/SPL. The den leader and the Den Chief work together to fit their schedules, and make the best use of the Den Chief's time/skills.