Terminology: Venture Crew to Venture Patrol and Venture Crew/Venturing Crew

[Eagle92]

Ok folks I thought I might post a few observations. on why some old timers might slip at times and say Venture Crew instead of Venturing Crew. My memory got jogged a little when I was look at my BSA Library and I found some 1990s books.

 

If you look back, the Venture Crew replaced the the Leadership Corps around 1990. The Venture Crew was the older scout patrol, and they allowed Venture crew to earn the Varsity/Venture letter, and earn the various pins. At first the pins were separated; certain topics applied only to Varsity Team, others only to Venture Crews. This changed in 1995 when all pins could to members of either unit. Don't know how popular this program was in other areas, but it was not popular in my neck of the woods. My summer camp created a high adventure program based upon some of these awards with no luck.

 

At the PDL-1 I attended, we were told about Venturing, and to distinguish the to Venture Patrols were within troops, Venture Crews were a separate entity. It was mentioned that this would cause definate problems. At the NLTC in August 1998 when Venturing was formally unveiled, some presenters, like the ones I attended, still called the units Venture Crews. However, in looking at the literature that was on the cd-rom that was handed out, they were listed as Venturing Crews. just some useless trivia from an old fogey.

 

Now you have the rest of the story.

[emb021]

All this is documented at my site devoted to Senior Scouting programs of the BSA.

 

I was involved as a Boy Scout leader when the Venture/Varsity in-troop program was rolled out, and we formed our older boys into a Venture Crew.

 

I was also around when Varsity Scouts were rolled out as an official program in 1985, and saw a few Teams get formed, all as spinoffs of troops (and which subsequently died when all the boys aged out).

 

I have kept abreast of the changes in all these programs, and documented them at my site.

 

I was involved in Exploring when Venturing was about to be rolled out. I learned of the roll out prior to it happening, thanks to being involved in Scouts-L and other on-line forums. When I heard they wanted to call the units "Crews" I disagreed on several points:

 

* "Crew" to me was always a patrol-sides subdivision of a unit. The old Explorer Scout Posts and Sea Scout Ships were divided into Crews. This is why the groups at Philmont are called "Crews": they are small, patrol-sided groups of older scouts.

 

* "Venturing Crew" would be too easily confused with "Venture Crew" (they hadn't yet renamed that group), which continues to this day, despite the fact the "Venture Patrols" are that widely used.

 

I personally suggested they instead call them "Outfits". Outfits was the unit named used in the old Senior Scout program of 1945-49. Senior Scout Outfits allowed boys to experience Explorer Scout/Air Scout/Sea Scout programs in one unit. And bring back the name would avoid the confusion.

 

Further, I suggested the "Venturing Outfits" allow for 2 styles of organization: 1) the club-style organization of President, VP, Secretary, Treasurer or 2) more traditional patrol-like organization used in most scouting units of Ventuiring Outfits being subdivided into Crews lead by Crew Leaders, with a Senior Crew Leader and the like. Each Venturing Outfit would decided which organizational style worked for them.

 

Needless to say, neither happened...