I need district training ideas

[Scoutdebi]

I have recently taken over as the District Training Chair and find basic training at an all time low. I checked all records, updated unit info and discovered we are about 27.5% trained. I would like to get to 50% by the end of the year. Any and all ideas to motivate leaders and encourage them to get to basic training would be appreciated. It has been about 4 years since there was a real training chair in the district. HELP!!!

[Bob White]

Since the needs and characteristics of every district are different, it would be hard to tell you what would work for your district.

 

The basics of course are

Who, What, Where, Why, When, How

 

Who is going to do the training

What training is needed

What will consitute a successful trainig (it's not attendance)

Where is the training going to be done

Why will it get people to come

When will thew courses be held

How will it be promoted

 

What other questions can you think of that would be applicable to your district?

 

Good Luck

BW

 

 

 

 

[acco40]

I'm sure others have real numbers but your 27.4% of trained leaders is not far below the "average" from what I am told; about 34%.

[fotoscout]

I continue to think that one of the things we dont do very well is to communicate and reach out to new leaders. We seem to have convinced ourselves that the CCs, MCs , DLs, CMs, ASMs, & SMs all promote the program to their new leaders. Personally I dont think this happens. Many new leaders are left out in the cold to sink or swim by their own merits.

 

My suggestion, and this has worked for me, is to pick up the phone and make a personal invitation to your new leaders to come to training.

 

 

[Twocubdad]

I'm not involved in training so I look at this from the point of view of a consumer of training services. My advice is for you to look at this as a marketing/customer service problem.

 

Think creatively about how you can deliver your service to "new customers." Our council training sessions are always on Saturday at one of about three locations. If that doesn't work for you, you're out of luck. Obviously, weekends are best for most folks and that's where you're going to get your biggest turnout. Think outside the box. How about some of these Monday holidays? Not that many people really go out of town. Would more attend if they could bring their children? What if you piggy-back training onto existing programs? Can training be offered during summer camp?

 

Secondly, ask. Pull the names of 15 untrained leaders and ask them what you can do to make it easier for them to get trained. Don't make them think you're trying to corner them, but let them know you are doing research to improve the program.

 

Foto is on the right track. We have discovered with day camp that relying on Roundtables and the chain of command to get information disseminated doesn't work too well. Something the Red Cross in our area has begun doing is sending me a post card saying "You are eligible to donate blood again on (date) and here are the next three bloodmobiles in your area." See what resources the council has to send a postcard to each untrained leader letting them know of upcoming sessions in their area. I obviously don't know how big your district is, but even if you have to manually sort through a set of mailing labels shouldn't take too long.