Reasons for Declining Membership

[Kudu]

THE #1 ANSWER as to why they weren't scouts...

 

Because no one ever asked them to join.

 

I'm with Bob White on this one! I can usually persuade half of a sixth grade audience to sign up as wanting to join Scouting, see:

 

http://www.inquiry.net/adult/recruiting.htm

 

But the bottleneck in the follow-up phone calls is not the boys' perceptions of Scouting (which admittedly are not initially very good as I go into a recruiting assembly), but the resistance of their parents:

 

1. Competition from other activities, such as youth sports: This is common, especially with hockey parents. I'm surprised that you didn't list the mother of all "other activities:" SCHOOL! If you schedule a recruiting assembly after the first "progress" report home, then you are going to run into BIG problems when you realize that all six grade boys are failing school :-/

 

6. The policy on gay membership: Over the years a couple of our Scouts have left when they found out that a beloved family member was gay. But right now we are going through one of those cycles where the youngest Scouts are vocally anti-gay. Ours actually take some comfort in telling each other that "gays aren't allowed in Scouts." This phase seems to wane when they get a little older and realize that girls find them attractive :-)

 

13. The ACLU: The ACLU has no bearing on my Troop so far, but since our existence depends on recruiting from within the public schools during school hours, the nightmare scenario for us is local religious fundamentalists getting headlines for kicking some little skeptic out of their Troop.

 

scoutldr writes:

 

What was expected by the Council staff, was "just read the material and play the videos...how hard can it be"? In fact, when they declared "100% mandatory training", even the Council secretaries were pressed into service to be "Trainers".

 

Why is the professional staff running the training program in your Council?

 

Kudu