Ideas for May Cub Scout Recruitment Flyer

[AdkPaddler]

I'm responsible for coordinating our May cub scout recruitment drive and want to know if anybody has suggestions for my brochures that will be handed out to candidates.

 

I have heard that May is an excellent time to publicize council summer day and overnight camps as a recruiting tool. I have heard that this is esspecially successful for recruiting new tigers, since tigers require an accompanying parent at day camps, and tiger parents, at the day camp, become indoctrinated very easily into becoming volunteers.

 

The local council will print up a single page with full color photos on top with the words "JOIN CUB SCOUTS". I have a one and a half inch white space that I can add customized text. My current plan is use the following text:

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Cub Scout Pack XXX Open Recruitment - Join the Excitement!

 

Summer Day Camp, Overnight Camps, Pinewood Derby, Crafts, Activities

and Making Many Friends!

 

(in smaller text)

For boys entering kindergarten through 5th grade in September.

Stop by our table during xxxx at xxxx on Wednesday May 10th, between 5:30 and 7:30, or call Jane Smith at xxx-xxxx.

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Any suggestions or comments are welcome!

 

(Our council supports kindergartners as Lions, hence the reason boys entering kindergarten are also included.)

 

 

[gwd-scouter]

Welcome to the Forum AdkPaddler.

 

Since I've never been involved in a Cub Scout recruitment other than the public school roundups each Fall, I can't offer much in the way of advice for your upcoming recruitment. From the way you describe the flyer I think it will be great. Just the right amount of info and hopefully color "action" pictures of Cub Scouts having fun.

 

I am wondering if you already have the den leaders for these new recruits in place? Are you trying to get new Scouts to fill small returning dens for next year? If you are doing an open enrollment for your Pack and folks drop by your table to sign up, how are you going to know how many new den leaders you might need?

 

For example, at the end of the day you find out that 10 boys have signed up that will be entering 3rd grade next fall. That's a brand new Bear Den. Will you now call the parents of each of the boys and ask who will be the DL and ADL?

 

Maybe you already have these things figured out and just didn't post it in your message. In that case, ignore my questions.

 

 

[mbscoutmom]

Those are very good questions, gwd-scouter. I hope someone has some answers to them, because I want to know, too. Our district has been making a big push for on-going recruitment this year, even to the point of signing boys up without asking the pack leaders! Maybe it should go in a different thread, though.

[briantshore]

Is there another Pack locally that could handle any overflow? Yes we would all like more members in OUR Pack, but our main goal is to get more boys in the program where ever they can be fit in.

[ScoutNut]

If we had 10 new boys sign up for the same den, the first place we would look would be our current families in that level. We know them, they know us & we know who would do a good job as a den leader. Per BSA guidelines on selecting new leaders, we would make a list of our top picks & approach them individually, starting at the top of the list.

 

If we had no takers with current families, the next thing would be to see if the current den leader could manage with everyone for a while. Not ideal, but until the new families could be evaluated & prospects approached, it might work short-term.

 

AdkPaddler, the flier should be fine. We use the council fliers every year for our roundups too. Let us know how the Kinder grade den works out for you.

 

[BelieveinScouts]

Hi,

 

If you send me your E-mail address I'll send you a couple of Flyers I made up for all our Schools (over 1000 Flyers) just using graphics and Word Art. I put down my number, but when they'd call, I'd direct them to the appropriate Pack. I don't care which Pack they decide on as long as it gets Boys into Scouting. I also made up a Day Camp Flier, and a Tiger, and Cub Scout Brochure. I'll be happy to share all of it with you.

 

This is the first year we've ever done a Spring Recruitment, so we'll see how it goes. Our DE also went in and did School talks and brought in Council Flyers too. I made sure mine were dropped off about two weeks before he came in. That way it hit them twice, and paved the way for him.

 

We also contacted the Newspaper and they put our recruitment night in the Community Calendar, and we got them to run it on our local cable channel.

 

Just Let me know. Good Luck with your Recruitment. Watch out though. We did such a good job last year, that our little Pack of 30 boys, now has 58!

[Lisabob]

We had a good deal of success with spring recruitment. Day camp is a huge draw.

 

We've used the council flyers plus local identifying text that adkpaddler describes, with good results.

 

The one and only drawback we had: some parents would sign up their kids to go to day camp and then after camp they'd vanish. This tended to happen more with older boys (4th/5th grade) who had not been part of the pack previously, and who had little brothers. In several cases I'm certain parents signed up both boys as a convenience to the parent, when the older one had no interest in scouts. Still - we were always glad to have all of them along. If they have a good time at camp they may even change their minds and stick around in the fall! Just don't get too over-excited about the longevity of your new recruits until you get to know them and their situations a bit.

 

Good luck! Let us know how it works out.

 

Lisa'bob

[cyboji59]

Our flyer had summer events and contact info on the back. Our pack has 9 events for the summer. We get the boys registered and had them temporarily adopted by experienced dens for the summer. Second year we have done this and seems to be working well. Boys are having fun with it!

After the aug-sept drive we evaluate how many new dens we need and act from there.