POLL: Should Boy Scouts Recruit At Public Schools?

[fgoodwin]

Should Boy Scouts Recruit At Public Schools?

 

http://www.koin.com/Global/story.asp?S=5386567

 

PORTLAND - A long, drawn-out fight over the Boy Scouts of America has finally come to an end.

 

The battle pits the Scouts against an atheist mother with the Oregon Supreme Court settling the score.

 

The question is whether Scout should be allowed to recruit at Portland schools. Nancy Powell says no -- because they promote a belief in God. She filed a discrimination complaint 10 years ago when her first-grader was required to listen to a Boy Scout recruiting presentation.

 

But a supreme court opinion released this week says the organization did not discriminate since they extended the offer to anyone who wanted to sign up and because they aren't primarily a religious group.

 

9/9/2006

[OldGreyEagle]

I think Boy Scouts should be allowed to recruit members on the same level as any other non-school sponsored organization. I do not think they should receive "in class" time unless that same "in class" time is also available to other non-school sponsored organizations.

[Beavah]

I think that it should be up to da teachers/principals, eh? Yeh enroll your kid in a public school, you're entrustin' them to the care and values of the local public.

 

If yeh don't like the values of your local community, yeh should send your kid to a private school, or school him at home, not try to force your community to school all its kids your way.

 

 

 

 

[trlarue]

My pack wasn't allowed to have school night this year. We could hand out flyers on open house. I think we gained about 10 kids. If the BSA is not allowed to give material out to school age kids, how will it survive?

[packsaddle]

Actually she was pitted against the school board, not BSA. The title of the suit was "Powell v. Portland Public Schools".

 

I think in-school time should be jealously reserved for academics, something that is sorely needed in this country. No outside group should make presentations during the school day, including BSA. If BSA wants to arrange a meeting after hours for recruiting, that is OK as long as other groups have equal access. Or they can rent billboards, or do some skywriting, or ads in the paper, just like any other organization, no problem.

[OldGreyEagle]

the best recruitment that can occur in schools, public as well as private, and this may actually occur during class time at that is when the cub scout is telling his friends what he "got" to do because he is a cub scout. Whether its a trip to the fire house, police dept, sewer plant or whatever.

 

The best boy scout recruiting occurs when the scout tells about how he earned the SCUBA patch at summer camp and everything he "got" to do. Maybe a white water trip, climbing at a local gym or even outdoors. Doing a midnight hike lit only by a full moon, the possibilities are endless

 

The best Venture recruiting is when the girls and boys are in the school or the mall telling others how they just canoed, kayaked or cycled how many miles and saw whatever, that they are planning a whole week doing whatever it is they want to do.

 

See a trend here?

 

The best recruiting tool is a completely jazzed up participant, they will speak with words and in a style we adults can never effectively present

[Merlyn_LeRoy]

And at the other end of the spectrum, the worst recruiting is probably when their gay & atheist friends are excluded. This will be an issue as long as scouts have gay & atheist friends.

[msnowman]

I'm in the camp of as long as other youth centered groups are allowed equal access to the schools for recruiting BSA should be allowed to recruit there. However - class time is not the proper time for anybody to recruit for anything other than academics. At the recent open house at our town's only school there were tables for the Girl Scouts, PTO, Cub Scouts and Rec Department Sports. I didn't see a table for Royal Rangers/Missionettes, Awana, Spiral Scouts, Atheist w/o Foxholes or whoever else might want to get the parents & childrens attention. However, if they had asked to have a table, they would have been allowed to. Every group that comes to recruit has some sort of membership requirements. To think that BSA is the only group that has requirements that could be considered "discriminatory" is short sighted and naive.

 

YiS

Michelle

 

 

[evmori]

And at the other end of the spectrum, the worst recruiting is probably when their gay & atheist friends are excluded. This will be an issue as long as scouts have gay & atheist friends.

 

There is no bad end when Scouting is involved.

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10

[Hunt]

"And at the other end of the spectrum, the worst recruiting is probably when their gay & atheist friends are excluded. This will be an issue as long as scouts have gay & atheist friends."

 

Do you really think this is true? Whatever you think about it, I suspect that the exclusion of gays and atheists would actually be a selling point in much of the U.S.

[Merlyn_LeRoy]

Yes, absolutely. Why would a kid want to join an organization that keeps some of his friends out? Would a kid with Jewish friends be particularly drawn to join a private club that didn't allow Jewish kids? Why do you think a kid with gay and atheist friends would react any differently to a private club that doesn't allow gay and atheist members?

 

There also doesn't seem to be a lot of support for the BSA's exclusionary policies among the kids who are members.

[Hunt]

"Why would a kid want to join an organization that keeps some of his friends out? Would a kid with Jewish friends be particularly drawn to join a private club that didn't allow Jewish kids?"

 

Well, sure--lots of kids are in specifically relgious clubs. I guess I'm just not persuaded by your perception that excluding gays and atheists is a net negative in terms of recruiting in the United States today. Given what has happened with gay marriage proposals in so many places, I suspect that the opposite may be true. Certainly, in certain localities (probably including where I now live), it may be a negative, in many other places (such as the place I grew up), it wouldn't be. But honestly, Merlyn, if I could prove to you that allowing gays and atheists into Scouting would severely harm recruiting, would that have any impact on your opinion of what BSA should do?

[Merlyn_LeRoy]

Hunt, to match the situation with scouts, the club would allow kids of any religion, except Jews. I don't think many kids would think that's the right thing to do.

 

As for harming recruiting efforts, that seems to be the current situation. But in any case I don't think policies should be set by "whatever increases membership the most."

[jr56]

Sorry Merlyn, You can't satisfy all the people, all the time. Trying to deny public access to any group that doesn't do that is a waste of time.

[Merlyn_LeRoy]

I haven't tried to deny public access to the BSA or any other group.