ParkMan

A 21 year old Scoutmaster in 1989 would be 52 today. EDIT: Sorry - I see someone already made the exact same point. Sorry for the double post. Wishing there was a delete post right now.

I mostly just meant that I think it's unlikely that the Biden-Harris administration is going to try and make an example of the BSA. President-elect Biden, being a Scout himself, I think is less likely to turn both barrels at the BSA in an attempt to make a point simply because he can. I don't think that institutional excesses leading to child abuse is something on his list of standard issues. I doubt very much that he'll do anything to intervene and try to stop the bankruptcy or lawsuits. Perhaps he'll get asked at some point and throw some moral support towards the concept and benefit of the program, but I cannot imagine it going much further.

I suspect the charter will as no-one really cares about it. I suspect it's really an "inside baseball" kind of thing. You're right though that no-one will back the BSA. There are just too many people - including many who post here - who have bought into the concept that the BSA needs to be held accountable for what happened those many years ago. This is as much about punishing the BSA as anything for many people. Though, I wonder if this would be the only saving grace. Biden, as a former Scout himself, has more familiarity than many. Also, Biden strikes me as more of a pragmatist than an idealist. I have a feeling that he's more likely than many to look at this and say - this is going a bit too far. Penalize the BSA sure - but destroy it over events of 30+ years ago is a bit much.

That makes sense. If the theory is that claimants will go after the local councils, then that seems very similar to the CO idea where they all submitted claims.

Yes, that's the unintended consequence in all of this. But, I know there is a vocal percentage that feels the BSA must be held accountable for what happened in the past - including a number of people regularly posting on this topic. What we are beginning to see is that the cost to the BSA is very likely the liquidation of the assets of national and the local councils. It was always an unrealistic expectation that the BSA would have to pay but find a way for insurance to cover most of the bill.

Any organization that wants to accomplish a goal uses metrics to force focus and measure progress. In the case here, non-white ethnic groups are underrepresented in the BSA. Similarly, the BSA put a lot of energy into developing programs for girls and so it is natural to want to bring more girls into the program. It is correct and appropriate for the BSA to challenge councils to develop concrete plans to achieve these results. A councils plan to increase membership in these groups needs to be based on actionable strategies. They should not simply look at a DE or a district and say "recruit more girls." Instead, middle management (i.e. field directors and council VPs of membership) need to be tracking specific actionable steps designed to accomplish the goals. For example, if a goal is to start three new units for girls in a district, then a district needs to have a plan for how they will achieve such a goal. What are the 15 prospective COs that the DE will approach? Who are the 10 most likely existing leaders who would serve as either CC or SM in a new troop? What 5 packs that do not have troops is the district going to target to encourage development of a new troop? The historic practices that led to shoody membership numbers in the past are the result of poor middle and senior management. It is not in a councils best interest to have fake scouts and units. So, if that is happening, the council VP of membership and the council board needs to be on top of that and highlight it. In a more general sense, there have been salesmen fudging numbers since there have salesmen. That doesn't mean you don't have sales quotas - no, it means that you have management enforce proper oversight to ensure that salesmen are doing their jobs correctly. Unethical salesmen get fired and ethical salesmen promoted.

Pretty sure that National intends for councils to develop recruiting strategies that increase the number of "youth of color" and girls. Why is it dumb for them to encourage councils to develop proactive strategies that increase membership among demographics that are underserved today? Biggest problem in our council today with membership is that we have effectively don't have a proactive strategy.

In this process, did you learn how to determine an amount for the claim? I gather that one has to file a claim for a set amount. However, how does one determine an amount for claim that may or may not one day be filed for an event that may or may not have occurred? As I've looked this process, that's been one of my lingering questions.

Your council is one that continues to break my heart. I have a pretty good council - sure, it's not perfect and I've been known to grumble and have a rant or two. But, all in all, it's a pretty capable group and everyone - professionals and volunteers alike are working to make it a good place where Scouting can flourish. Your council though just continues to sound absurd. I sincerely hope that this new effort leads someone at the territory level to recognize the problems with the professional overreach in your council. I hope this results in some changes in the makeup to your council's board driven by territory.

Nice idea. I'd be up for making council names be more community oriented again. I don't mind the administrative ideas here. Organizations need structure and goals to help them work efficiently and effectively. Not every decision in Scouting can be about unit level activities. However, I find that many of the issues in Scouting today stems from the simple reality that the administrative structure is preventing concerted effort on the core issues that are hampering membership in the program. Until we figure out how to deal with local membership losses, the program will continue to shrink. Merging councils or putting more pressure on DEs won't solve that. More beascout websites won't solve that. You've got to engage unit leaders in wanting to recruit. You've got to figure out how to excite people not in the program to want to join, to start new units.

The logic behind not merging weak units is that it doesn't really address the underlying problems - a lack of organizational strength in the unit. Most units that fail do so because they don't have the sufficient structure to support the unit leaders. Unit leaders get burned out and then the programs shrink and eventually go away. It's seen it time after time after time. When I see a unit that has a weak leadership team, I know it's days are numbered. Putting two weak units together rarely results in a strong unit - it just delays the inevitable. The better approach is to help the unit rebuild it's organization. It's like the old quote: "Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime." A good DE should rally support for the unit such that they rebuild themselves. I'm not sure how often this really happens though.

I think it's just not something that is terribly relevant at the district level and below. I'm fine that the region/area level is taking this on - and I commend them for doing a thorough job at it. It's just difficult for that level to have an impact on trends like recruiting and volunteerism without some larger, increasingly bold moves. They really have to dig down into the hard problems such as why districts and councils struggle and come up with concrete solutions to those problems. Perhaps their lighthouse council notion is sufficient for this - it just strikes me as too subtle a change to have a measurable impact That's a remarkably well thought out analysis. Yes - I would concur with just about everything you wrote in the five different items. I can attest that I see similar things in my neck of the woods. Perhaps what is needed is for the district I am in to come up with a 4-5 year plan to change things. If we can get success in our district from it, maybe it's an approach that others can adapt in their own districts as well. I do see that in our district, we are very short sighted - what does our Webelos camping event look like next spring? What training courses will we hold next fall. Those decisions are being made in a vacuum outside of a larger results oriented plan. Maybe that's where we start. I'm not too worried about the professional overreach in our area. It's a funny thing - the problem is so overwhelming for our poor overworked professional, I'm not sure how effective he really is. It's a crying shame because he's a really good guy with strong volunteer program experience. He'll listen to volunteers and work to make them successful. He's just doing 20 different things because that's what the job asks of him. I'd rather focus him on 4 or 5 important things - but that's not my call.

Which is the core issue with the management of the professional. There is too much pressure on professionals to meet metrics. Aside from shady accounting, the current manifestation of this pressure is that professionals have a tendency to make numbers however they can without fixing the core issues. In our district, 20% of the units account for 80% of the membership. As such, professionals squeeze the performing units to add a few more scouts while no one is addressing the issues that are preventing the small units from growing.

Interesting observation. I'm going to guess that it is because they know that national doesn't possess the technical capabilities to do a council turn around. I've argued a few times that they best thing national could do is to establish a consulting group within the BSA that can go out and work with target councils on how to improve operations. For example - as a district leader, I would welcome the availability of a group of experts that I could work with on improving district operations. I would rather fix our operational issues than continue to just apply band-aid after band-aid. But, there is nothing like that which I can see.

That will be an interesting thing to watch. I can see your point - simply making larger, less manageable councils won't necessarily solve anything. Yet, I look around the map and see lots of small councils with probably just a couple thousand Scouts. I suspect that in some of the less well managed councils one of the primary issues is the lack of operational knowledge. Lots of inefficient, mismanaged teams - council boards that don't know how to build council & district teams to accomplish their goals. I believe the core theory is that by merging an underperforming council with a high performing council that things will improve. The fallacy of that of course is that the governance model in Scouting makes that exceptionally hard to achieve.

Where this has the potential to help is that it will lead to weak councils being merged together. Where this will not help is that it's not proscriptive. It doesn't add much in terms of new ideas on how districts & units operate any differently. As this is where the magic needs to happen, I am not optimistic. One big concern about the new 16 territory structure is that it will funnel territory support through council boards and professionals. As the real challenge is in the districts and units, I don't see how the new structure will actually help resolve problems. Council board people & professionals will make things look rosey for the territory folks which will end up not having any real impact where it's needed.

From what I can see, these things are all fine. The issue isn't that the council has a strategic plan with lots of business jargon. The issue is that councils don't know how to use them to achieve the results they desire. Similarly, this national plan is fine and it's probably marginally better than what we have now. It is however lacking a key understanding of how councils will operationalize all of this. They appear to be setting up a big stick approach by holding the threat of merging councils out there as incentive to meet these objectives. The plan is lacking two key components though: how to better focus the program in a way to increase the attractiveness and marketability of Scouting to youth. how districts will realistically operationalize any of this in a way to achieve results. For example - I see councils now writing up a membership plan based on numbers and demographics, but having no idea how to then turn that into new Scouts in the program. Membership is inherently a unit activity and so all the council membership plans by council board members will be meaningless until they are turned into something that units can act on. Another example - I see a requirement that every unit have a commissioner. We've been trying in Scouting for 40 years to achieve that, but it has not happened. Council commissioners will now create new mandates that every district commissioner recruit a full team. Yet, district commissioners are not equipped to do this. The issue here is not one of intent, it's one of technical skills. How does a district commissioner really go out in an era of declining Scouting membership and recruit experienced Scouters to serve as unit commissioners? These things are all fine ideas, but until councils figure out how to operationalize these things, they will continue to struggle. Perhaps this new structure will find a way to recognize best practices from councils that are successful and then promote them so that less successful councils can learn from them. But, with diminished professional staffing it seems like a long shot.

My primary concern with the "advanced scoutmaster" label is that is too niche. The Scoutmaster role is one of many in Scouting. It is important - sure. But so too are Cubmasters, Crew Advisors, Den Leaders, Committee Chairs, Committee Members, District volunteers, OA advisors, etc... When I view the Wood Badge curriculum I see an attempt to impart skills that help a volunteer in how they approach their volunteer role. Wood Badge really isn't trying to teach anyone what their job is, it's trying to impart skills that help in how you approach the role you have. How to try to raise the level of your ambitions for your role and think bigger. How to set larger goals and strive to hit them. Why would we want to replace that with a training for Scoutmasters and then try to shoehorn every other position into that class? This is where I think we're having the wrong conversation. The point isn't to replace the current Wood Badge with a advanced Scoutmastering version - the point is to create a new advanced course for Scoutmasters.

The BSA needs both courses - a leadership development course and a Scoutmaster course. What problem does making Wood Badge into an advanced Scoutmaster class really solve? I'd argue that our most underprepared position in Scouting today is that of our Committee Chairs. These are the people who need to be building strong packs, troops, and crews and in many instances are simply not prepared to do that. As such, you've got overloaded Scoutmasters and Cubmasters who simply don't have enough adult help to make the programs work. You have unit organizations that don't know how to onboard new leaders or how to develop succession plans. You have units that have no idea of how to recruit or market themselves. You don't fix that problem with a course for Scoutmasters.

If the issue is lack of basic leadership training, then lets augment Wood Badge to cover that. I don't think creating more obstacles to attending is going to resolve that issue. That, and I think you'll find that youth signing off adults is inherently not practical. I'm all for focusing on youth leadership, but I don't think Wood Badge is the place for that. Put that in an advanced Scoutmaster course.

I think we're mixing a couple of things. First, and my primary point - regardless of whether Wood Badge is the best designed course or not, it doesn't justify the level of negativity that the course receives. It's a course designed to help us be better Scouters. On the averages, Wood Badge courses are better organized and better put on than probably any other training course in the BSA. Yes, it's easy to find things that could be done better. Yes, there have been jerks that have take the course. But, it doesn't justify the open hostility that the course receives. On your suggestion of Wood Badge only being open to "1st Class Scouts.'" - why? Wood Badge isn't an outdoor skills course. I think an advanced outdoor skills course is a great idea, but it's not this course. What does it benefit a den leader to get to 1st class. What does it benefit a Cubmaster to get to 1st class. A Troop Committee Chair, etc.? I'd tihnk you could accomplish much the same by having a roundtable discussion on what leadership is and how the various leaders have seen it illustrated in their Scouting roles. So instead of jumping quickly to skills and techniques around leadership, spend more time defining it first.

My kids swim team did this. At swim team sign up, they had large boards where everyone had to volunteer twice. My wife wasn't interested, so I became a lane timer. It was fun and a I volunteered a few more times too.

I've always been a big believer in the notion that the troop adults have to really cultivate adult involvement. It's not the CC's job alone to find more volunteers. It's not the fault of the parents for not stepping up. At every turn, the leaders have to be asking themselves - "How do we get more parents involved volunteering?" It starts with the little things. When a parent makes a comment about something small - the signups for an event or whether an email went out or not, then invite them to take on a little project. Get parents out camping with you. Can parents to hang out at meetings. We noticed a trend where the pack had no problem getting den leaders, but we struggled with getting ASMs in the troop. Then, we realized that part of the issue was the enormity of the role as ASM. So, we started them with really small tasks and let them get comfortable first. Before too long, we had more adults helping out. But, the challenge is that a CC cannot do that. It takes an ASM or SM to do that. As such, our SM needed to change his approach slightly. Before too long he had an ASM or two who could help with some of the other ASMs and get them going. Like anything, you've got to focus on what you want to have happen. You want more adults to help, you have to focus on getting more adults to help.

I can imagine that - makes sense. Why teach a class to those who are going to leave. Wherever it comes from, there is far too much criticism of and around a course that is intended to help leaders be better Scouters. Whatever the course is - basic training, IOLS, Powder Horn, or Wood Badge - taking a course is a good thing. I've said this before - but I get the sense that in the Scouter ranks we've created something of a culture where it's considered OK to be critical of those that are perceived to not be a "real Scouter". Wood Badge, too many knots, silver tabs, whatever - we spend far too much energy knocking these folks.

I don't know the mindset at the time as it predates me, but I can only guess it had something to do with making the course seem desirable by making it exclusive. By creating something with status that can be seen as an award, it then makes it something to strive for. The OA isn't all that different for youth. By creating an honor, we make it more desirable. There's probably some logic about human nature in that, but it seems to have created a bunch of issues amongst the volunteers by doing it. Today that fill the class mentality is an unfortunate by product of the process. It makes sense that if you're going to have a course that you have a full course. Unfortunately, instead of leveraging that as an opportunity to encourage those who could benefit to take it, you end up with the "gotta fill the class" byproduct. I'm not sure how to resolve that one - maybe fewer classes?