New Venturing Crew Here!

[Vcrew421]

After 10 yrs of GS, I have just started a Venturing Crew and couldn't be happier.  Have an amazing CO!

Just had our first recruitment event, which was more about being visible to the CO parish and making connects then actual recruitment.  Trying to learn as much as I can about the rules and our program, but I'd love to hear from Crews and their tips for newbies!

What was the first trip you went on?

How did you deal with funding when popcorn sales aren't going so great?

 

Thank you

[qwazse]

Welcome, and thanks in advance for all you do for the youth! You're in for a wild ride!

Our first? I can't remember if it was caving or whitewater rafting and subsequent camping. Then there was the go-cart evening. Then Seabase. Then skeet shooting. Then Skiing.

The high-schoolers in our community generally found employment to pay for their extracurriculars.

Car-washes are usually work well.

[thdewey]

Congratulations and welcome to Venturing!!

Venturing is the best scouting experience you will ever find. New challenges and adventures await!

Get involved wih your council VOA.  You can meet other crews, see what they are doing and plan a jpoint adventure! When your Venturers see that there are other Venturers in your area they will feel like they're part of a larger team. 

Here is a link to my tips for new Advisors.

http://www.aventuringwewillgo.com/2015/09/what-does-successful-crew-look-like.html

 

Good luck and see around the campfire!

Tom

[ArmyScout]

How do you start a Venturing Crew.  Our Sr Scouts just turned or turning 14.  I fear we will lose a few of them as thier High Schools are far from the Jr. High where we meet.

[ParkMan]

28 minutes ago, ArmyScout said:

How do you start a Venturing Crew.  Our Sr Scouts just turned or turning 14.  I fear we will lose a few of them as thier High Schools are far from the Jr. High where we meet.

I'd contact your district executive.  He/she can walk you through the process of creating a new Venture crew.'

But, the best thing I can suggest is to learn about venturing and see if the program is something that would be appealing to your youth.  Both Scouts BSA & Venturing offer programs for youth at the high school level.  They each have different programs that will resonate with different youth.  I'd encourage you to learn more about Venturing and see if it sounds like a good fit.  A nice place to start is to go through the BSA online training for venturing leaders.

[ArmyScout]

Yes I have taken the online courses for Advisor, Bd of Review, and Committe. Browsed some of the Training for Ventures.  I have broached the idea with some of the older boys and got vocal Yeah's.  I'm weary of approaching the executives as I have Wood badge coming up next Month and I don't want to over extend myself.  Or set expectations I am not Prepared to yet meet.  Perhaps that could be the drive of the 5 goals for my ticket.  We shall see.

[qwazse]

@ArmyScout, ask yourself a simple question:

What do I have to offer that would motivate 14-20 year olds in my community to be constantly supervised by myself and one other adult? Is it worth them giving up their jobs, extracurricular activities, and other activities? Could they do just as well hopping in a couple of cars and going off on their own?

[Rock Doc]

First crew adventure was ATV riding. All participants completed their ATV safety certificate and then rode all weekend! We're a pay as you go crew right now, but starting to build a fundraising culture. Get involved with your council VOA for local connections, and reach out to the Areas and Regions to attend larger events. 

[mrkstvns]

On 9/2/2019 at 6:57 AM, qwazse said:

@ArmyScout, ask yourself a simple question:

What do I have to offer that would motivate 14-20 year olds in my community to be constantly supervised by myself and one other adult? Is it worth them giving up their jobs, extracurricular activities, and other activities? Could they do just as well hopping in a couple of cars and going off on their own?

Good question.

It's often tough to come up with the kind of activities that truly represent an "adventure" for the youth. If you can't do that, the kids won't want whatever it is you're offering.

I think BSA's "Powder Horn" training is a good way to find out what some of those "adventures" might look like in your area. 

Hopefully your local Powder Horn is a good one.  Some are not that good and will not give you enough of what you need to keep the youth interested.

The challenge for Powder Horn organizers is to keep the boring, lame nonsense out of the program.  This is important. When I see a Powder Horn program that includes "Scouting Heritage" or "STEM activities", I'm switched off of their program like a porch light at bed time!  ONLY give  me stuff like sea kayaking, mountaineering, air boats, reef diving, etc. 

[qwazse]

@mrkstvns, Powder Horn, even an exciting one, inspires folks to up their skills and open their minds to new opportunities. That could allow their older scouts (e.g., those of you with a bevy of young Eagles asking "What's next"?) to form a leadership corps that puts in extra time to master particular activities. There's nothing stopping a troop like @ArmyScout's from allowing older scouts to have the space (e.g., letting them be in one patrol or form a leadership corps) to do that.

But, wanting to master some super-activity doesn't is not a reason to start a crew. I went over this with my SPL and a few of the older scouts at cracker-barrel this weekend. I made it clear how demanding being a venturer was for a scout already in a troop. They have some ideas of activities and friends who weren't scouts who might join them. And I encouraged them. But I didn't whitewash the brutal honesty that very few of their friends outside of scouting have developed leadership, so it will fall to them to get the crew flying. And if they have leadership positions in both troop and crew, then both SM and I (assuming that I can't find someone more capable than me to be their advisor) would not lighten up on their workload.

Now, what do I have to offer these scouts? I told them it was "leadership" as opposed to "leadership development". They will lead from day one by recruiting advisors and committee. They will lead as I push them to serve and Council, Area, National, and maybe even Global levels. They will make the phone calls, reserve the camps, feed really good ideas back to the troop and do most of the heavy lifting for implementation.

(Regarding STEM: Scuttlebutt from my relative with two boys who transferred to TL/USA is that many troop dads are engineers in the space industry, and their is some pretty manic home-grown gear that appears on camp-outs. This should come as no surprise that STEM=excitement. After all, the Super Soaker was invented by a NASA engineer.)

[Eagledad]

Three out of five Venturing Crews fail in four years. That number is significant because that is about the length of time the supervisors want to hang around. Also, crews that don't have a specific theme like Law enforcement, Aviation, sailing, scuba, and so forth typically fail quicker because the scouts loose interest in finding activities that hold the interest for the whole crew. Specific theme crews do better because the sponsors tend to have a special invested interest and the only scouts who join tend to have the passion for that theme. 

Of course any crew can be successful if enough scouts have the drive, but usually the sponsors and advisers are the key.

Barry

[Eagledad]

6 minutes ago, qwazse said:

(Regarding STEM: Scuttlebutt from my relative with two boys who transferred to TL/USA is that many troop dads are engineers in the space industry, and their is some pretty manic home-grown gear that appears on camp-outs. This should come as no surprise that STEM=excitement. After all, the Super Soaker was invented by a NASA engineer.)

Cool!

Barry

[mashmaster]

Awesome!  My son is in a Crew and also a Ship.  I am the Skipper of the ship.  You'll notice with the older scouts that they really can do just about everything other than drive other scouts to events.  You really get to see them excel  greatly and fail badly.  Sometimes at the same event 🙂

For fundraising, we sell, deliver, and spread mulch.   That is a great return on investment and the scouts being older can do the work.  We also hold an annual garage sale with the profits going to the crew.  Everyone brings stuff from their garage or gets stuff donated from neighbors to sell.  Our church has an annual garage sale so they setup a booth along with the church.

[mashmaster]

Also, the key to survival that I have seen for Crews is to never stop recruiting and try different methods to recruit.  each wave of scouts will want to do something different.  If you only recruit once a year or when the crew starts dwindeling it is hard to recover.  there isn't a natural crossover point like from packs to troops.

Also, we have a very specific rul of no "purpleing" ,  mixing of blue and pink.   Not dating allowed between crew or ship members.