Foward or Fold?

[Blaze66]

Ok the future is now. As some of you may know from other posts I have made, I have always been real active as an adult in Cub Scouts, (long after my son had left the pack and moved to the troop) because my pack folded when I was a youth and I felt left behind. Also because our Pack and Troop are both chartered by the same organization and I feel that without a strong Pack you can't feed boys into the Troop and keep it strong.

 

Well we have come to a delima.

 

Our pack has been on the decline for the last three years due to many outside interests by the boys in the community. (ie.. sports, church based youth programs, school activities) Also our small town lost its only industry three years ago when the company sold off the textile plant. We have two neighboring towns who's packs seem to be thriving. Infact one of the towns just had a second pack spring up last year. We put on an excellent program in our pack. We have lots of zingers we throw in to keep the boys interested and we try to camp at least three times a year with the pack as a whole. Webelos do an extra two camping trips a year for 5 trips total. The boys we have leave the pack don't leave because they don't like it or loose interest (except for the few I have mentioned in other posts), they leave mainly because it interfers with their sports practices or games.

 

Well we have come to a crossroads. Our Cubmaster (my wife) has lost interest in the pack. Our son has been out for 4 years now and with a daughter in highschool now she wants to move on to other community groups to help out with. Our Bear leader (who has been doing bears for almost 8 years) her son moved to the troop 3 years ago and she is ready to get out also. Our Wolf leader is a husband wife combination team also. They have an older son who went through all 5 years of Cub Scouts but dropped out after a year of Boy Scouts. Their younger son is a Wolf this year but is wheel chair bound with MS, so he has to have one parent with him where ever he goes. Once he has finished with Cub Scouts in three more years, both of those leaders will be gone. Only reason they stay is because of him. That leaves only me. Right now I do both Webelos Dens and have done so for the last 5 years. But I too am getting burned out. Mostly because we are not getting any new leaders coming in to the pack. The parents we have either just don't care a thing about being leaders and taking on the responsibilities or (and I hate to say this but I know every Pack has them) they are just not mentally capable of being leaders. The few parents we do have that would make great leaders, are so strung out with work and other groups they do, they just won't take on the added responsibilities of leadership with scouts.

 

So the delima is what should we do? We hate to see the Pack fold for alot of reasons but we haven't been able to come up with any good solutions.

 

Here are a few ideas we have been discussing...

 

Slow phase out... under this plan we would not hold any round ups. After this year there would be no more Tigers in the den. After next year no more Wolves... then Bears and so on and so on till the last Scout remaining leaves which if the ones we have now stay would be in 4 years.

 

Move... Under this plan we would help the boys we have now move into other packs in the near by towns. This wouldn't be a real big problem because most of the ones we have in the pack now have come to us from those towns. I think only about half of the boys in our pack actually live in the town where we are chartered. Under this plan we would fold after this year.

 

The other plan we discussed was just to get all the parents together in a meeting, tell them at the end of the next recharter we were leaving and see what happens.

 

We can't find any good answers. I guess there aren't any when your talking about folding a Pack.

 

So lets go from here and see what advise yall can give us.

[Bob White]

Whether or not scouting continues is a decision for the charter organization to make since it is their pack, not the volunteer leader's. The only decision for the leaders to make is, do they want to continue to serve the charter organization and the youth.

 

Group recruiting does not work. You need to identify the individual job, the skills needed to do it, the resources available to help, the individuals with the needed skills for that job, and to ask them personally to to become a scouting volunteer. This is the job of the committee.

 

So the first thing that has to be determined is, does the Charter organization want to continue serving youth with the scouting program?(This message has been edited by Bob White)

[Shell in WA- USA]

I'm not sure if this would work for you, but this is what we did in our pack;

 

Our pack also was at a crossroads. It had gotten to a point somehow that all the leaders of the pack were at the Webelos stage with their sons. All at once they would be leaving the pack. (Avoid doing that in your packs! Try real hard to always get "new blood" so that doesn't happen)We tried to "Warn" the other partents that this was coming and still no one stepped forward. So we tricked them!

 

We organized a pack campout that attracted all but one scout and parent in our pack. Then while most of the experienced pack leaders took all the kids lake fishing, we kept the parents in camp. We treated them with specially made boxed lunches while some District people came in and did a basic training with the parents - to a point where they could go take their specific training.

 

Once that was done, we reminded them that we all were moving on in 4 months (again!) and that now that they are all trained they should be more than capable to run the pack once we were gone. We explained that these boys needed leader such as their selves to continue to grow and learn just as they did with us. But we also make a pact with the "new" leaders that we promised to on hand for at least one year to mentor our counterpart for the following year. And whomever stepped forward that day could work along side us til the end of the school year, when we were passing the baton.

 

Most were nervous about running a den by themselves, until we pointed out to the that they had each done so in the year. - forgot to mention this, we, as leaders, purposely had each of the parents take a turn or to organizing a den meeting and running the meeting under our "supervision."

 

We all told them that unless people steeped forward, these boys who were at the lake down the path would no longer have these experiences without one of them. But it was entirely up to them. Either people step forward or we would have to take measures to close the pack.

 

One by one, they started to fill the roles. We left that weekend with all but two leadership role filled (8 out of 10 ain't bad!). We did do as promised and mentored them for the year. Although once they got started, it wasn't but a couple meeting before they felt confident to do the meetings or run the pack. Most completed their training within 6 months.

 

I had another scouter friend who told me that they had the same situation and what they did after telling the group for two years this day was coming was to do the crossover with 19 webelos then the Committee Chair stood up and showed the room all the webelos AND parents on the other side of the bridge.

 

He said, see over there? There are 19 Webelos and parents that will be joining other Boy Scout troops in the area. Let's bid them ado. Everyone clapped as the webelos group left the building. Then he said, out that door, the Packs Treasurer, Secretary, Outdoor planner, Webelos Leader I and Webelos Leader Two, Wolf leader, and Tiger coach also left. Now who will step up to fill the void or do we need to close the pack for these boys left? (Boys in room by the way!)

 

She said people were shocked about eventually, the leadership roles were filled.

 

Hope this will strike an idea for you. Let us know how you solve your situation.

[Blaze66]

No it's not really up too the chartered organization. I know I know... in virtual scouting the chartered organization is in charge. But not here in the real world. Our chartered organization has not really been insturmental in our Pack for many many years. Other than giving us a place to meet they haven't really been much support to the Pack. And Committie? What Committie? We are lucky to just have leaders. The 9 years I have been associated with this pack there has never been a "committie". Now thats not to say we don't have people listed as committie members, and pay their recharter fee every year, but they don't take a real interest in the pack. We have tried the one on one approach to gaining new leaders and it hasnt worked either. Like I said we had people that were capable, but they don't want to get involved. We recruited four new den leaders two years ago and none of the four are still here. One was a supposed Eagle scout who joined with his step son and said he wanted to become a leader.... So we put him with the Wolves. He got ticked off cause we wouldnt let him do camping with just his den, so he left and took two families with him. We found out shortly after he left that he really wasnt an Eagle scout and that he had been in some trouble where he came from. (all this before they did the background checks). Two of the other leaders were husband and wife team. They came in all fired up ready to go to work, she wanted to be ACM and he was going to do Webelos. Well he was x military got here and found out you couldnt run a pack like the military and didnt want to follow all the rules so he made ups some excuse as to why he didnt have enough time to help out anymore and after 6 months quit. Then is wife, she stayed on through the year and then said her kids werent interested anymore and then she left. The other leader we recruited in that same group, he was all excited... former scout... had two sons one wolf and one tiger... wanted to be on committie and had even expressed interest in being the new CC when we rechartered last year, but after the first camping trip he went on and he found out that cub scouts only do car type camping... he left and took both his sons and they went to a Church Based youth camping group.

 

Our chartered organization just doesnt have anything to pump into the Pack. And I don't say a whole lot real bad about them cause its my church! but its made up of alot of older people. Of the younger ones in the church, their boys are either too old for cub scouts or too young. We only have two boys that attend the church that are members of the pack. There just isn't alot of base in the church to pull from and there isn't alot of support other than giving us a place to meet. Infact we have had to move our meetings nights once already to accomodate them last year and this year we thought we were going to have to move again because they started a new program and wanted to be able to set up for it during the time we were meeting.

 

No it's not up too our chartered orgainzation as to whether or not the pack remains viable. Its up to us few volunteer leaders to decide. Because if we leave the pack will die. Period We already know because we have talked to the CR and he talked to the church deacons and they don't have anyone to put into it and if we go they are going to let it go. So forget all the policy and procedures and all that BSA how its suppose to be. Im telling you how it really is. The only reason the Pack is still here now is because of that little bit of love and support it has gotten from the five active leaders it has right now. But we can't be den leaders for ever. All but two of us have stayed way past what we aggreed too when we got into Cub Scouts and the only reason we have stayed this long is because we didn't want to see the pack fold and we couldnt recruit new leaders to take our place. (not that we havent tried). But its getting old. We are getting older... Our own children have moved on and we have tried to move with them but are stuck between what we want to do and what we feel obligated to do.

[EagleInKY]

Blaze, I feel your pain, and I've seen this happen. Certainly, your structure is pretty common out here in the real world - unfortunately.

 

Trying to be optimistic here, is this a chance to bring the CO back into the picture. What if you went to them and said something to the effect that "You've been a great supporter for Cub Scouting, and you have served the community well by allowing us to use your facility as well as your good name. We've come to a crossroads, and we're in danger of lowing the pack. Do you have any interest keeping this organization going in this community? If so, are there some resources you can bring to bear to help? If not, we're concerned that we won't be able to keep it afloat."

 

Maybe they'll become interested when they find out that it may fold.

[Blaze66]

Shell, that's exactly what we did four years ago when our former Cub Master left. She had been there 13 years and was ready to go. I was at the time the Committie Chair and also running the Webelos Dens. We had 10 Webelos cross over and they took two leaders with them on top of our CM leaving. We had a meeting, told everyone it was important information about the Pine Wood Derby (which we did have something to tell them about it... and its the only thing they really got fired up about and would come too). They got in the room we sent the boys off to their dens to meet and i shut the door and locked it. Told them here is the deal... we have been to some of you individually and asked if you would help us out with leadership in the pack and you turned us down, now here is the deal... we have these positions to fill ( and we put a chart up on the board showing them along with what the responsibilities were) and said now if we cant fill all these positions then we are going to have to close the pack and all those boys that just walked out the room wont have a pack here anymore. Well everyone save of two in the room agreed to help with some of the positions. We even had about half of them fill out applications and pay their fees that night! Then the came in as assistants in the dens so we could let them watch how its done... then we let them run a few meetings... then slowly one by one they fell off.... came up with excuses... till we only had about two actively staying... which are the two we have doing wolves right now... husband and wife team. The rest aren't here anymore at all their son's either quit or they crossed over.

 

Our pack is small... we only have 15 registered boys. Four Tigers ( of them only one parent is capable of being a leader, but he runs his own business where he works at 6 days a week and he teaches bible study three nights a week in our church. So he wont committ. One of the other parents, works at night and she takes a break during the time of our meeting to come up there with him. She is just lucky she works right up the street from our meeting place and can do that. But she is usually late getting there and has to rush out the door as soon as the meeting is over. The other two tiger parents, just arent mentally capable of being a leader. I know that sounds bad but there isn't any real nice way to put it. Thats just a sample of one den in the pack. The rest are basically the same.

[evmori]

Blaze,

Tough situation! I'd do what EagleInKY suggested. You might be surprised by the response.

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10

[Bob White]

It absolutely is up to the chartered organization in the real world. That is the real world of scouting. Blaze if you have no relationship with a chartered organization and no committee for years, the pack was going to die anyway.

 

The lack of involvement of the Co and committee is what has caused you to get into this situation. In an organized pack you bring in new leaders every year, not by luck but by plan. The reason all your leaders are ready to leave at once is due to, poor adult recruiting, program leaders burning out from doing the committees work, lack of long range planning by an administrative committee.

 

This problem did not develop overnight, it crept on you a little every year, and either no one saw it, or no one knew to act on it sooner.

 

This has nothing to do with athletics or other programs, nearly every community now days has a plethora of activities available for youth. It requires any program that wants to be successful to be "the best show in town". If it is not you then kids will go to where it is. It has been that way for decades.

 

I was a scout in the 60s in a suburb of Chicago and there were tons of things we could do besides scouting. The Pack and the troop lasted over 30 years and folded due to leadership problems.

 

I have run into some of those leaders as an adult and they blame, parents, sports, homework, the Vietnam war, penicillin, the invention of the yo-yo, the sun was in their eyes, yada yada yada.

 

The essence of scouting is in every boy. Whether or not kids have scouting depends on charter organizations choosing to have scouting or not. If your CO still wants a scout unit then you can't close it. You can leave, that is your right. But just because you don't want to be in the church choir does not give you the authority to eliminate it.

 

The choir belongs to the church, the scout unit belongs to the CO. It really is that simple. If the CO wants scouting to continue they will have to get involved. If they choose not to then that is their choice not yours. The Charter is not with you it is with the CO.

[Blaze66]

Eagle, our CR did that as I stated in another post. He wen't to the deacons and they basically said, we don't have the human resources in our church right now to help out, plus like I said they don't have parent's in the church that have kids of scout age, they are either older or younger and they don't want to get involved in anything their kids aren't into.

 

Basically now its not about keeping the pack going, its about whats the best thing to do for the scouts we have right now.

[Blaze66]

Bob you do what you have to do! Thats the way it really works. Our pack has not in the 9 years I have been here had a committie that did anything and the CO has never done anything either other than gave us a place to meet. The pack was active for 7 years before I came into it and it worked the same way. I know that's not how it is suppose to work... I have been through all the training and I know what the orgainzation of a pack and troop should be, but the reality is that alot of packs and troops are running the same as we are. And its because of one thing and one thing only because we ( or a few parents who have taken responsibility) have stepped foward to do it for our kids! (or someone elses kids we have grown attached too or felt sorry for.) I know this is how more than half the packs in our district are running and some of them have been around since I was a youth. The CO we are at now did not choose scouting to promote in the community not in the sense that someone in the Church stood up and said hey, lets start scouts in our church. They became the CO because another pack in town folded and one of the people in that pack said well ill go to my church and see if they will let us meet over there and they said well yeah but is it going to cost us anything thing... they said no and they said well sure come on... we dont mind... and its just been that way ever since. They don't care one way or the other whether we are there or not. We can say all day long that well its not up too the volunteers as to whether the pack stays or not, but it is because without the volunteers you can't have a pack cause there is no one there to run it. And saying well if the volunteers leave and the CO decides not to have a program anymore, all your doing is transfering blame for the pack's demise, from the volunteers to the CO.

[Bob White]

Blaze I am only going to make these last two points to you, because you are at a distinct disadvantage since you are in the thick of the battle it is very difficult for you to be objective.

 

First. Don't kid yourself that a lot of packs operate for years without a committee, thats just not true. Some do but not for long, like you are finding out, it is a sure fire ingredient for disaster. Let's say that 5 packs and 5 troops in every council operate without a committee, that would be a lot. That would account for less than 3000 units nation wide. That might seem like a lot. BUT you need to realize that is only 2% of units.

 

So 98% of units do not operate like yours.

 

Secondly "And saying well if the volunteers leave and the CO decides not to have a program anymore, all your doing is transfering blame for the pack's demise, from the volunteers to the CO.

 

That's exactly right. The unit is the COs property, the COs Program, the Cos responsibility. Fail or flourish it comes down to the CO wanting scouting, supporting scouting, selecting and keeping good leaders. You serve your CO by delivering the program but it is THEIR unit. The CO has the ultimate responsibility for the program.

[Shell in WA- USA]

Our last pack didn't have a CO, we were "A group of Concerned Parents." The first pack my boys were in had a disinterested CO also.

 

Bob's right, ideally, you should be able to go to your CO for help. But that doesn't always work. Many CO jsut provide the place, the group has to run it. However, if you really need help, contact your UC or DE, they may help you go the right direction also.

 

And don't take defense at what I'm going to say, it's only meant as constructive critism and for things to think about.............

 

Maybe the current way the pack is run needs some reconstruction also. After reading your second and third posts, with all the volunteers dropping like flies and the current workforce around for years and years; Maybe there's something that needs to change to encourage new members, more adult involvement and make it a fun learning experience for the boys. It might be time for the pack to do some sooul searching of their own and figure out a new appraoch tot he waythe pack it run. Maybe the parents aren't comfortable about stepping forward because they don't feel welcome, trained, included. Maybe when they do step forward they arent' getting a clear picture as to what to do, where to go for support, etc.

 

Maybe the boys are dropping because the activities and rank advancements are "fun" for them anymore. I really hate the agrument about Sports vs. Scouts. Barring the parents influence, the kids are going to gravitate to what's fun for them. Make the pack and den meeting mean something to them and they will come...in droves! And if sports is heavy in your group, perhaps an adjustment during the season is in order? ie. change pack meeting from Thursday nights to Weds Nights?

 

You will NEVER get all the parentd to volunteer, but there's bound to be someone in the crowd that's just waiting to be asked or encouraged to step up.

 

In our old pack the small job was appreciated just as much as the big ones! HAve you tried a talent sheet to the parents? And volunteer list consisting of big and small (ie CM, DL, phone calls, rides, asst leader, printing, newletter, etc.)

 

Just some things for you to think about. Hope it helps

 

As always, FOR THE BOYS!

 

 

[evmori]

"The choir belongs to the church, the scout unit belongs to the CO. It really is that simple."

 

Not a good example since the choir members are almost always church members. Most CO's don't require church membership.

 

Blaze,

When I was a Cubmaster, we had very little support from our CO. The only thing they did was supply us a place to meet. They started charging us for the use of a room to hold our Blue & Gold then were ticked off because we didn't sweep the floors! And that was what part of the fee was for!

 

We had 50 kids at the time which was a +15 increase over when I started. They are still going strong! Real world.

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10

[Blaze66]

When I refer to alot of packs troops etc. I can only relate to what is in my area, not on a national level. Scouting is a big thing in some parts of the country and not as strong in others. It's not as strong in our area.

 

We put on a great program I think. Infact we have been a model pack for other packs in the area as far as what we do for advancement for the boys. They all have a great time and of the ones that stay they do look foward to whats next.

 

But yes Shell, alot of it here has to do with what the parents want the boys to do. Sports is a big thing in our community, always has been even when I was growing up. Every parent in the community pushes their kids into sports regardless of whether the kid wants too or not just for the fact that they think they might be the next Jordan or McGuire or maybe they are living out their child hood fantasies through their kids. I just had one boy a next door neighbor in fact that just dropped out of the troop because of the parents. The kid was dying to get into scouts. The parents wouldn't let him in said it was because he didn't have the time and they didnt have the money... although both the parents go to the gym three or four nights a week and they had enough for two of the kids to take guitar lessons twice a week. So anyway after begging and begging they finally let him join. Heck I even paied his registration after he had been too three meetings and one campout and the parents still hadn't done it. The he comes in saturday morning and tells my son he cant come back to scouts. I stepped in and asked why, he said cause his parents thought it was more important for him to go to the gjm and work out with them so that he could start playing baseball and football next season. He really wanted to go back but his parents didnt think it was what was best for him. Thats just one example of why most boys that leave for sports goes. And we have tried moving the meeting nights. We even went to the park department in town and tried to work something out with them but it doesnt matter. 85% of the kids in town play some sport at the park. We have 15 baseball teams during that season. 10 basket ball teams during that season, 5 football teams and now soccer is starting to take a hold, they had 6 teams of that playing last year, and all of this is just in the cub scout ages 1st thru 7th graders.

 

So it's not how fun or exciting we make the program because we do thing that other packs in the area don't do, we even have some scouts in our pack that have come from other packs just because they have alot more fun with us.

 

I agree with you Shell on the reconstruction part. Thats what happened three years ago when our last CM left. We couldn't get anyone to come in because she had her own way of doing things and no one liked it and so basically she was pushed out by parents who wanted to complain before we even were able to find a replacement. That's why my wife became CM because we looked and looked right up till time for recharter and no one came foward wanting to do it, so she took it because we had to have one, plus some other parents said they would support her by assisting, but they left not long after they started because they didn't like some of the rules and didn't want to get trained and felt like it was taking up too much of their time. Just one excuse after another.

[Blaze66]

Ed, I have heard of other packs in our area that have the same situation where the CO charges for a room to meet in or a place to hold the Blue and Gold. Our CO isn't quite that bad although we don't even try to hold our Blue and Gold at their fellowship hall. We just go to the town community building. Most of the CO's in our area (BOB I said Our area not the nation as a whole so don't throw out some statistics to me) but they are just the CO's for Packs and Troops because it makes them look more appealing to the community not because they are trying to deliver a program. It's not the CO's delivering the program anyway its the Volunteers. If I didn't go to the church where we are chartered, I wouldn't see anyone there at all throughout the year. I doubt the CO can even name the leaders in our pack with the exception of me, my wife and the CR because they we are the only ones they ever see and thats only because we are members of that church. And ironically it wasn't our church that drew us into scouts, it was scouts that drew us in to our church. We had been going to scouts at this church for so long we finally decided one day hey I wonder what the service is like and we knew some of the people that went there so we took in a regular service (not just scout sunday) and liked it and finally ended up moving from another church and joining here. So it looks like the Church would take that example and use it and scouting to its advantage and pump some life into it.

 

But I guess we have kind of drifted away from reality here because the reality is, the leaders the pack has now are burned out. They want to go and we know when we leave the CO will not keep it going. So which is best if you know its going to fold, a slow transition out, or walk out the door and don't look back?