Attending District Committee Meetings

[BSA24]

Instead of just my previous "No taxation without first doing something for the units" rant, I'd also like to offer a helpful suggestion.

 

It is a radical suggestion, but I honestly think it will work.

 

The district committee should announce a date that they will all step down and become commissioners. Commissioners are usually the old leaders who were old boy scouts and they are supposed to help guide units along and keep them strong.

 

The committee is where most of the politics and arguing happens, and when the older scouters occupy these positions, the same old stuff keeps happening, and the young guys don't feel like they are going to be welcomed or listened to.

 

Therefore, I suggest finding a young guy and putting him on the ballot for chairman, take your old guy and make him commissioner, and let the old guys wear the red patches and give the district over to some younger folks with a total cleaning of the house.

 

A good old boys club stays that way because the older folks, who think they are perfectly nice people, keep telling the younger folks that they don't want to do things their way. So, my suggestion is step down, step off, and give the wheel to the kids.

 

 

 

[Eagle732]

I don't attend district meetings or roundtables. No one from my unit attends them either.

My unit doesn't attend district events.

We went years without ever seeing a UC.

I served on the Cub Scout Day Camp committee as a top staff member for 10 years and enjoyed it, but no more.

I served on the district training team for years and enjoyed it but no more.

They are lucky that my unit will even recharter in our council, there's been discussion that we move to a neighboring council. I had to convince the CO that in the long run that was a bad move. They bought it for now.

 

The Good 'Ol Boys Club would be a nice way to describe the Key 3.

 

 

[BadenP]

Eagle 732

 

The only problem with your approach is that your unit will become isolated from associating with other scouts and experiencing larger scouting events, and that would be sad for your boys. Scouting is a brotherhood. Our venturing crew is totally self dependent, yet we do district and council events with the other crews every year because we believe this kind of association is not only good and fun for the teens but they get to see what other crews are doing and to make new friends, which IMO is also a vital part of the scouting experience. Twenty of our crew went to the 2010 Jamboree for two days, as visitors, and were able to meet and associate with other Venturers from all over the country, and a group of foreign Venturers. They still talk about what a blast they had.

 

So while it is good to be independent and self contained, it is not good to isolate your boys from the larger scouting experience.

[Eagle732]

I don't see it that way BP. We don't have time to do Camporees and such, we do our own activities.

We do trips with other units and we have a small troop (3 boys) attend summer camp with us.

We do Philmont through the council so were with other troops on the treks.

And we have several of our boys active in OA that attend events (6 of use are going to Fall Fellowship this weekend).

 

If you recall I posted a while back about changing councils. Our DE refuses to this day to meet with our CO. The result is that we don't communicate with the district any longer. Wonder how they're going to get our recharter check?

 

 

[BadenP]

Eagle 732

 

I understand your problems with your DE/council/district but remember they are just the political side of scouting. Total isolation will eventually lead to stagnation and a stale program, which will lead to kids dropping out, and in a small troop like yours that would be disasterous. One valid point SP has shown in this thread is that without a functioning and healthy district and council the scouting experience for both the youth and adults will be severely limited and probably not too much fun. I know this may be debated by some but IMO no unit leader or leaders alone can deliver a truly complete scouting experience to their youth. Instead what you get is a distict/council with small units, huge turnovers in both leaders and youth, and an overall poor quality scouting program.

[Eagle732]

We communicate and interact with other units, just not with the district leadership.

 

I don't consider us a small troop at just over 30 boys. We've doubled our membership in two years and not because of anything the district has done. Boys come to us because of our outdoor program that is led by the Scouts (at least that's what I'm told).

 

When the current district leadership leaves we will go back to participating at the adult level in district activities. This was the agreement I made with the CO in order to keep us in the council. BP you don't really understand the situation, but there were legal issues that I don't want to get in to.

 

The scouts have the option now of doing camporees etc but they choose not to.