Good morning everyone I was hoping you would share your ideas on what makes your Roundtable successful or what areas that you think could be improved upon.
I am a UC in my district and attend our district RT regularly. For about the last 8 months our RT attendance hasn't been all that great, with maybe 4 to 6 units represented on the Boy Scout side and less on the Cubs. I should point out that a new RT commissioner was assigned toward the end of last year and the gentlemen is giving the job 100%. He is open to suggestions and tries them with some success but it just hasn't been enough to boost attendance. I don't think it is the fault of the leadership that is running our RT.
It's my opinion that BSA hasn't adjusted the RT program enough to keep up with cultural and generation changes of its current members. Some of that is obvious by just attending RT and looking at who's in attendance. Very few attendees who are under the age of 50. Now that is not a knock on our older generation of scouters. What I am saying is that maybe a younger generation of scouters doesn't find that RT provides them anything of value.
On National's website under "Roundtable Support" this is the first sentence:
​"Roundtables play a significant role in providing continuous supplemental training for unit leaders."​
It also says that "Roundtable is used to provide program topic ideas for the unit leaders."
National has slowly been adjusting to the generational differences in scouting. We are seeing a bigger push to conduct online training. Something in my opinion that takes away the value of networking with one another that a classroom training would provide; but also if it was going to be something they were going to use as a tool it should have been implemented 10 years ago.
Using RT as an opportunity to present program ideas also provides little value. We are in a technology driven age. When people, not just scouters, want to know something it seems like they don't talk to each other. They pick up their phone or their computer and start punching away at the keys, hit enter and there's their answer. I won't go into other contributing factors such as time and economics.
I think it is time for BSA to assess the value of RT and restructure the program to make it more useful. My suggestion would be to use RT as a platform for units to discuss with each other areas that they have identified as needing improvement and get ideas on how to improve from other units. Also the units could become more involved in the district by offering suggestions to the district staff. For lack of a better term, simply a brainstorming season.
Case in point, I'm not on this forum asking you all about training or programming ideas. I have identified an area needing improvement, in my opinion, and ask you all for your thoughts.
I look forward to hearing your thoughts on this topic.
