Scouterabouter

Our crew is fortunate to have a beautiful small mild river with one Class 1 rapid behind our church where we often take a nice two hour canoe paddle- 10 min drive to put in and 10 min to the church from where we take out… We have a new high school opening up a mile down the road this fall and the crew would like to host a tubing event as an open house/ membership kickoff. We would treat all visitors as non-swimmers with PFD's and close toe shoes mandatory of course, liability release forms with medical info, adult kayakers “sweeping†the group and we would follow other standard BSA procedures… How do we open the event to non-registered youth (and potential adult leaders) and CYA at the same time? Suggestions are requested & very much welcome…

After some years of their existence, our council does not have an active Venturing committee or VOA...and just a few active crews. I am a crew advisor for one of the larger crews and represent Venturing on the council training committee. I have been asked by council professionals to meet for lunch to discuss the program. Most of the recent DE's designated for Venturing attended my presentations & training classes to learn about Venturing - I stated to the new DE charged with helping crews & posts that I believe the council must make a stonger, clearer commitment to crews.... heck, even maintain a proper contact list of active, viable units. What should we as Scouters expect of our councils for support for this under appreciated part of Scouting?

Officer planning session went better than I thought would...we are off to a good start...thanks to all for the great ideas and comments.... business meeting this week with seperate parents meeting too...

Go Go Laser Tag ran the event & provided all eqipment - we set up the course ...over 2 hours for $200... multiple games with up to 20 participants at a time...kids had a blast (adults too)

Thanks for comments... I am blessed to have a great adult committee to work with... the "I" was specific to my duties as advisor, but it is correct to always share the load and to involve others. Our VOA is not active presently, as Venturing is not a high priority in our council. As for the recruiting, here's a recap.... our Cub scout pack had a outdoor laser tag event...the crew members suggested it also as a Open house activity. We posted the event on fb along with an ad for membership in our crew... very well attended. fb ad was very simple to create and hit a target audience. It complemented the traditional means of getting the word out... We have an active fb page which our crew uses -btw.... We went from 4 to 18 members.

$60 of facebook ads, set up table at school registration (we were given a poor table location), letter to parents of church youth and mailed a invite to youth, and word of mouth.

Hello! Our crew lost most of our members and most importantly, our key officers to graduation last year. Fortunately, we completed a successful membership drive for the new school year and we have a lot of enthusiasm. We had officer elections where the expectations and duties were clearly laid out to the entire crew. While I return one officer in a new position, I realize after our first short meeting with the new officers, that we are young, inexperienced and the president uses "me" instead of "we" - both in tone & word... As a 9 year advisor, I have helped our officer corp come around before, but this one looks to be not just a challenge, but possibly a problem. I need really some encouragement here :-) We have a combined officers seminar/ briefing before our next full crew meeting soon. Suggestions? Ideas as I prepare for it? Thanks!

Thanks for the great info and suggestions! Our crew had a great meeting last night... planned upcoming meetings include burger night, service project cleaning up shut-in yards, helping support a local bike race (SAG station) and campout with pack & troop.... we have 8 active youth and 3 adult leaders... I too believe consistent, frequent quality events will grow our numbers...

Great info by all! Thanks for giving me ways to manage & grow our program!

I am the advisor for our small but active crew... I challenge our officers to make recruitment a priority, but not much success, even with targeted events... ideas? What's worked for you?

I am the former Cubmaster and present Chartered Rep of our Scouting program of our church. We sponsor three active units which have a close relationship; sharing a hut, equipment, siblings and leaders... we serve over 60 youth. We are blessed that the units communicate well, but we are having growing pains. I sense that we are in need of a joint committee to handle common issues and responsibilities- scout hut care (clean up days/ ongoing needs), joint unit events (Planning meeting at start of year, Scout Sunday, crossovers & end of year joint campout etc..) and other items which need discernment by the 3 units. I understand and encourage that each unit is autonomous, but we need to continue to cooperate for the good of the program...Does anybody have a template for the above? Goals? Written guidelines? Organization? Whats worked for your CO? Thanks!