Are local Girl Scout Councils allowed to add girls to a troop without leader consent?

[SSScout 1615]

  Wow, way to resuscitate an old thread.    We never did hear back from   onetallmama, did we?    Guess we scared her  off with our encouragement as to how to work her group....

 

And yes, Welcome @@Bridget_in_MD.   I am in Mungumry County Murlin.....  Or are you up near Balmer?  

Edited July 31, 2017 by RememberSchiff
sent a notification to Bridget

[SouthernTierScouter 12]

Its rather interesting to me how different BSA and GS are. In our Pack we are always recruiting, wanting more Cub Scouts, the more the merrier, please join us! My daughter's primary GS Leader (my wife is a Co-Leader) doesn't want to do any recruiting for them. This will be their second year (1st graders) but the woman doesn't want to allow any more girls in. We have a small pool of kids to pick from in our area, but still, why would you not want more kids to experience your scouting? I just don't get that.

[Stosh 3452]

Sorry, I don't have any constructive comment to make on this.  I have no idea why anyone, especially 1st graders, would tell a girl they couldn't join.  Makes no sense to me.

[Hawkwin 299]

I have to say as a dad of a Brownie that got turned away from the entire district due to the three Brownie Troops being "full" thus being forced to be a Juliet for a year (when we could have just quit), nothing sucks more than being told we don't want you in our troop.

 

It would seem that it is in the best interest of GS to work with the leaders and the parents to find a way to include all interested girls, even if that means recruiting more parents (like a willing and dedicated dad) to take on more troop responsibility to help the leaders.

[SSScout 1615]

Bridget:   Where are you when we need you?    Like has been said (by me) in another thread,  (can't get the italics off) ,  this one item is somehow indicative of the current brouhaha: 

 

1) No one is required to join either organization. Choose the program that suits your kids' interests and your desires.
2) The present GSUSA and BSA have very different programs and philosophies. Units in GSUSA are owned by the local GS Council. All money and unit gear is owned by the Council and parceled out to the unit. Sell cookies? Council gets money. BSA units are owned by a local organization: a church, synagogue, fire dept. PTA, even a hardware store. Sell popcorn?  Unit gets 1/3, Council 1/3, Popcorn 1/3. Unit can do what it wants with it's gear and money.
3) BSA: Leaders are recruited, trained, encouraged to get out and do stuff, especially let the BOYS plan and do stuff. There is a definite program of advancement and adventure. GS: If a woman wants to have a GSTroop, she can. If she wants tea parties, or fashionistas, that is what the GSTroop does. If she wants to hike /camp, she does. (she does?) BSA: many female leaders. GSUSA: Males are refused.
4) Membership: I once asked a GS Brownie leader to join us in a Cub recruiting event , she replied :  “oh no, we don't want any more girls, we have enough." (?!?!?!) If the GSleader wants no more girls in her clique, she need not admit them. BSA: You better have a real good reason not to admit a boy to your Troop (Charter org only wants certain religion, for instance).
5) When the GSTroop members graduate, that's usually the end of that Troop. No continuity. My home BSTroop just celebrated 65 years. There are Troops 100 years old.
6) Echoing a previous comment, when a GS leader wants to operate her Troop ala BSA , she is often chastised and denied GS support. Smaller Patrols making up the larger Troop?? Older girls mentoring younger? Every girl having a chance to lead? Doesn't seem to fit the GSUSA model some how.
7) See number one again.

See you on the trail.

[HelpfulTracks 478]

  Wow, way to resuscitate an old thread.    We never did hear back from   onetallmama, did we?    Guess we scared her  off with our encouragement as to how to work her group....

 

Don't think anyone scared her off. By the looks of it she posted and never came back. Her last activity is 4 minutes after she posted.

 

Maybe her issue was resolved, or she just needed to vent.

[JustAScoutMom 15]

I really don't understand how they can mandate it.  They do not own the troop meeting location.  Logistics could play a part in how many girls you can accommodate.  Small house?  Can't keep more than 8 girls comfortably in one room?  If that were the case, I would NOT allow more than 8 girls in a troop.  And throwing a girl on you that has no relationship with any of the other girls?  Hardly reasonable to have a stranger in your house wandering around, even if its a 10 year old girl.  

[SSScout 1615]

Oh, I think my daughter might have accepted GS if Elsa had been her GSTroop Leader.... 

[RebekahTN 1]

I am currently a Girl scout Co-leader of a Brownie troop. In previous years when my now 27, 23 and 21 year old kids were in scouts I was a GS leader, co-leader and Den monther during their scouting times. When trying to compare Boy scouts and Girl Scouts you would think you were comparing apples to apples but really you aren't. You are comparing apples to oranges, Not even yellow apples to green apples. Because they are set up so differently. You can compare them but when you say Boy scout Troop or Cub Scout Troop or Pack or Group it does NOT comapre to a Girl Scout Troop. A troop in Girl scouts is more like a Den in the cub scouts. While some Girl Scout troops are multi level (more similar to a Cub Scout Pack) that is not the goal in Girl Scouts. When they do have multi level troops they do break down into what ya'll are calling Patrols or dens and everyone would do opening and closing things together and break down by level (Daisy, Brownie, Junior, cadette, ect) Similar to (Tiger, Wolf, Bear, ect.). This is why the original poster was saying 14 was pushing the limits. We have 18 and it can be very overwhelming at times. Luckily several parents stay and are willing to help out any time we need them. We have Daisy's (little sisters of the Brownies) and Brownies and break down as such to make it more manageable. It would be MUCH easier if they were seperate troops. 

Also our "troops (your dens) don't get together and meet with their Service Unit (your Pack) as a group monthly. We do try to get the girls together several times a year. Also were you would have several packs in a county we only have 1 service Unit. So there are several Daisy, Brownie and Junior troops in the county but they aren't grouped like your packs by school or church or whatever.

Also there ALL girls in scouts are "Girl Scouts", they don't break them down like Boy scouts and have Cub scouts and Boy scouts. 

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2) The present GSUSA and BSA have very different programs and philosophies. Units in GSUSA are owned by the local GS Council. All money and unit gear is owned by the Council and parceled out to the unit. Sell cookies? Council gets money. BSA units are owned by a local organization: a church, synagogue, fire dept. PTA, even a hardware store. Sell popcorn?  Unit gets 1/3, Council 1/3, Popcorn 1/3. Unit can do what it wants with it's gear and money.

It is true that they are set up different for the most part -as you said Boy Scouts are owned and meet at schools, churches ect and often times the leaders don't even have scouts in the Pack/den/or even scouts at all that they are leading. Were my son met the Pack leader had been a pack leader for years and didn't even have a son. His wife however did co-lead a girl scout troop with me and they had 2 other daughters in scouts as well. I think this is were training/finding leaders is different and why Girl scouts don't do as much recruiting. For us we don't already have leaders that have been leading for years, on recruitment day we have a bunch of girls wanting to sign up with no leaders to put them in or there may be a troop that had someone moved or quit for whatever reason that is willing to take a girl or 2 but not the whole 20-40 girls wanting to sign up. So they say if you want your girl to be in scouts we are going to have to have someone step up and be a leader. Then they need trained before they can start meeting and it can be overwhelming. So when you are talking about doing a recruitment for girls you don't already (for the most part) have a place for them to go. They won't automatically go their schools "pack" because it's not set up that way.  

Council, at least in our area, does NOT get all of the cookie money. The split is very similar to the popcorn. We just earned just under 3000.00 selling cookies this year (18 girls selling).

 

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3) BSA: Leaders are recruited, trained, encouraged to get out and do stuff, especially let the BOYS plan and do stuff. There is a definite program of advancement and adventure. GS: If a woman wants to have a GSTroop, she can. If she wants tea parties, or fashionistas, that is what the GSTroop does. If she wants to hike /camp, she does. (she does?) BSA: many female leaders. GSUSA: Males are refused.

See above: Since the Pack leaders and even Den leaders stay the same year after year even if their child is no longer in the group, boy scout leaders have an edge. From my time in Boy Scouts I noticed the Den leaders were more like our troop leaders and you did have to find Den leaders each year, but the main people over the pack stayed the same and you had the encouragement and help of them at the meetings. For us we met at the school cafeteria and every week not just once a week and they broke down into dens after the intial call to order. See, this is much less scarey to step into than no one there at all to help on a weekly/monthly basis. You have books with badges to earn and you definitley can do "tea parties, or fashionistas, or hike /camp or whatever interest the leader or her girls. If a parent was to step up and say my daughter wants to do this, is it possible as a troop, (and I had no interest or knowledge about it) I would say sure, what day would you want to lead that meeting/outing. If my daughters troop continually refused to let me run a meeting for something that interested my daughter I would start a new troop the following year and do more things my daughter wanted. I'm sure other girls would be more into more balance as well. When recruitment came up I would be there and say I could take up to ever how many in this age group. 

Cub scouts (1-5) is more family orinented (whole family goes to meetings as well as camping trips) and Girl Scouts is more individual although parents are encouraged to volunteer and help plan. The entire girl scout program (k-12) is more like Boy Scouts (after Weeblos). 

Males most definetly can be a leader or Co-leader in Girl Scouts although it is not encouraged. I had a dad as a co-leader about half way through my middle daughters scouting experiance. Other co-leader moved out of town and he stayed at each meeting anyway and was very involved with his daughter (single dad of 1). So that was an established troop and everyone already knew him. Not sure it would have gone over as well as an initial leader. He slept in his truck on camp outs and we had to have another mom volunteer to be in tents with us to meet safety ratios. Again (whole families are GENERALLY not encouraged to join like in Cub scouts. Think Boy scouts here even for  K, 1st and 2nd graders).

 

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5) When the GSTroop members graduate, that's usually the end of that Troop. No continuity. My home BSTroop just celebrated 65 years. There are Troops 100 years old.

See above -this WOULD make it much easier - but not how it's set up.

 

[RememberSchiff 3655]

@RebekahTN , welcome to scouter.com 

[Cleveland Rocks 75]

4 hours ago, RebekahTN said:

Council, at least in our area, does NOT get all of the cookie money. The split is very similar to the popcorn. We just earned just under 3000.00 selling cookies this year (18 girls selling).

Not sure which Tennessee council is yours, but the profit breakdown for GS Heart of the South Council, according to their website, shows that for every $4 box of cookies sold, the baker gets $1.03 (25.75%), the troop gets 59 cents (14.75%) and the rest goes to the council ($2.38, or 59.5%).

That's the same breakdown for our council, as well as the other GS councils in Ohio, although troops can earn an additional 3 cents/box in our council if they forego the tchotchke prizes. And in our council, the extra dollar they charge for the S'Mores and ToffeeTastic cookies goes almost entirely to the council. The baker still gets their $1.03 on those $5 cookies, and the amount to the troop goes from 59 cents to 65 cents. The council's portion goes from $2.38 to $3.32.

The other two councils in Tennessee do not publish their cost breakdowns online like GSHOS does so I cannot say how they do their cost breakdowns.

The popcorn breakdowns I've always seen have it roughly a third to the popcorn maker, a third to the council, and a third to the troop. There are some variations, and some councils have been experimenting with plans where the troop gets up to 50% profit (but with a limited selection), but for the most part I think you'll see third-third-third.