JSL3300

100% this. Our council just announced that they'll be doing a council fee that matches the national fee so now before one single activity, it is $170 to be a scout. As far as I can see, this gets you zero fun. My family has two scouts and two leaders. We're looking at $470 before a single camping trip, rank patch, anything. Maybe the small expense was once a draw (When my boys started in 2018, it was $33 for national, $42 pack fee and that wasn't even very long ago!) but that's in the past.

Continuing to think on this, and am wondering if there will be a box to check for scout that are on scholarship- if their renewal emails can be sent straight to the pack. If anyone is national is listening, we need that to be an option!

We have never charged our volunteers to volunteer. We know how many volunteers we need to pay for and divide that cost and build it into what we charge scouts. Now each adult will get an email charging them $60 to volunteer each year. I can't think through just yet if we will attempt to reimburse that or what that will look like. I agree that this sounds ok at first glance but will actually lead to added work on the part of the (paying) volunteers running each unit.

Yup. Until a few weeks ago, that list of "approved" camps was just the council camps. I think there are a few more now. Hoping that list continues to grow.

Maybe. From the local units I've talked to, including our own, it is just making people feel like they are running underground organizations. We do our spring camp at a rotation of state parks. For the last two years at the bottom of the info sheet for spring camp, we put this: Anything else? Actually, yes. There is one caveat we have to be clear about for spring camp. Over the last couple of years, Great Trail Council (which is the local body that we answer to) has made a policy that Cub Scouts cannot family camp anywhere except council owned camps. Our fall camp is at Camp Manatoc which is a council camp. State parks and private campgrounds are not. Therefore, this cannot be an "official" scouting event. We frame this more as a group of friends getting together for a camping trip. What this means is that the insurance that we are covered by during official events will not apply. By coming to this event, you take on personal risk. We apologize that we have to be weird about this, but we just want to be super transparent about how it all works. We really hope that this policy changes soon. I'm sure the legality is questionable. I don't feel awesome about it, but I do feel awesome about getting the scouts out into the woods and letting them run around and have fun. We went this past weekend and it was a blast. While I understand some of the heart behind the restrictions they're putting on cubs, I don't know that it's accomplishing any of what they are hoping for...

Yeah. From how this reads, nothing with change? We've always checked in and out with the campmaster anyway. What I do wonder is about the ban on shooting sports for cubs when not at a council event. Prior to that rule change, our council had rangemaster training and each unit that wanted to do shooting sports would send someone to get trained so they could do shooting sports on council property during unit campouts. They changed the rule to say cubs could only shoot at council events. Maybe now that camp is technically a council event, maybe one of the things they can bring back is letting cubs do shooting sports and camp. Fingers crossed. Edit: Emailed camp director. Not going back to old style of range renting. Bummer. But glad we can still camp.

Looks like my council has come up with a work around? A loophole? I don't know, but I'm here for it since we had already reserved our site for our annual fall camp. Waalaa, your pack camping trip is now a council camping trip! Cub Scout Short Term Camping

This is so relevant to a conversation we've been having with our oldest son. He crossed over last year and the biggest shock to his system is how un-fun Boy Scouts is vs Cub Scouts. I love that distinction between joy and fun, because I actually think what is missing from his troop is joy. Even the things that really could be fun are often not because there's not joy behind it. That's really interesting and something to think on. Honestly, being in this troop has been hard on my typically joyful son. He just doesn't get why they're all so grouchy! We're playing in the woods, what is there to be grouchy about?! That said, it's been incredibly character forming. He has learned so much about what kind of leader he doesn't want to be, about changing the culture of a group from within, about maintaining joy when you're with grumps, and asking questions and being curious even when there's a good chance your question is going to be met with eye rolls. We've given him the option to switch to another troop, but he's like, "I want to see what I can do here first." I think that to overcome the tendency for teenage grumpiness and apathy, adult leadership that is strong in joy is probably a necessity. I am a Webelos den leader for my younger son and I've been just about sick at the idea of sending my precious scouts who have been led so far with joy and the desire to nourish into this troop. I will not be taking on a large leadership role at the Boy Scout level so it feels like feeding them to wolves, but hopefully they'll go forward with how they've been scouting all along and it will slowly make a change. Thanks for giving words and new ideas to something that's been floating in my head a lot lately. I'll be following this discussion because I think it's important.

My husband and I lead the Cub Scout pack that both of my boys were in prior to last year, when our oldest took the leap into Scouts BSA. The unit he chose is small and the SM and ASM are both older guys with no kids in the program. The older scouts were not overly welcoming and one of the boys that crossed with mine dropped after a couple of months because he felt bullied. We had a transparent conversation with one of the families from our pack that also picked that troop to cross into. We both revealed that we felt incredibly uncomfortable sending our boys into the woods with these men and older scouts. Because we all four led at the pack level, we already had YPT and what we decided is that one of the four of us will go on every campout until we felt comfortable letting them go solo. We didn't express exactly why we were doing this, but the SM and ASM have been completely fine with it and always check in to see if we're coming. I don't think it should be a policy that people without children in scouts can't go camping, but I do think it should be made obvious to parents that if they want to take YPT and camp with the troop that they are welcome. I don't think it's overprotective to be wary of a group that has had years and years of this type of history.

It would be interesting to know. They can't have the numbers for how many didn't sign back up at the beginning of this year, right? Their only insight into our roster is recharter and crossover. I'd love to see these numbers again in January.

If I'm not supposed to share this level of detail, let me know and I'll remove. I can't see any reason these numbers shouldn't be public, so here's what one district is looking at: Packs Current Scouts as of 10-21-22 Number of new Scouts 2022 Scouts Last Year End Diff 3300 39 13 37 2 3384 22 8 14 8 3385 56 15 57 -1 3387 35 5 48 -13 3390 24 1 42 -18 3402 44 8 44 0 3403 9 3 0 9 3405 17 3 11 6 3409 25 5 25 0 3411 65 15 40 25 3454 54 12 56 -2 3455 31 13 26 5 3501 50 7 55 -5 3502 19 6 11 8 3506 45 8 38 7 3507 41 10 39 2 3508 11 1 20 -9 3512 10 0 26 -16 3513 40 14 30 10 3517 82 16 80 2 3519 16 6 12 4 3520 36 19 23 13 3527 20 0 25 -5 Totals 790 188 786 8

Our district just sent out cub recruitment numbers in an effort to draw out registrations that are laying around. Included in the table are numbers at the end of last year, recruitment numbers and numbers from as of 10/21/22. Almost exactly the same amount were recruited as left. Last year ended with 786. Right now there are 790. There are a couple outlier packs that either gained or lost 15-20 but most groups are up or down 2-8 scouts. Some exactly replaced those that left. I see this as not great or terrible news. Our pack is up 2. I like where we're sitting and don't see it as a numbers game at a hyperlocal level, but know that all of that adds up if we look at the bigger picture.

This is a really good point. Because it starts at Kindergarten, it's possible that even first grade parents feel like it's "too late" for them to start because it's a program in motion. Now, we see the majority of our recruitment numbers in Lions and then get a smattering in the other grades.

Oh my gosh, this is exactly it! Cubs is so fun and that initial run at scouts just... isn't. I think we have extraordinary mediocre leaders, both youth and adult, in my son's troop and that doesn't help matters. It makes me feel better to know that that rocky transition isn't unique to our situation. I'm trying to better prepare the den of Webelos that I lead now for that transition. Hope that leads to more retention for the group.

We charge them the same registration, which goes straight to national and we can't do anything about. We've made everyone's registration slightly more to absorb the $25 new scout fee because it feels so gross to ask new folks to pay more. We don't have pack dues, but we do have a minimum fundraising requirement or buy-out option, which we don't push with the Lions at all. If they fundraise, great. If not, also fine.