Part Four -- Scouts BSA for Girls Course Corrections?

[Cburkhardt]

What suggestions do you have to upgrade the Scouts BSA program for girls?  This can include operational matters at the unit and council level, as well as suggested program  or management changes at the national level.    

[Cburkhardt]

Unit Level.  Adapt unit web sites to more directly explain the relevance of Scouts BSA to girls.  Form advisory committees of outstanding women in the community who can present as role models during unit meetings.  Target and recruit outdoorswomen from the community to join the Troop Committee.

Council Level.  Assure long term camp bathroom facilities are better managed.  There is some youthful teasing of Scouts entering and exiting these facilities.  This should include entirely separate facilities.  Task commissioners to work with girl troops on growth, including organizational and operations approaches that work especially well for girl troops.  Focus on one-patrol troops who need help in scaling-up.

National.  Encourage formation of more “stand alone” troops which are not linked with boy troops.  Establish merit badges in topic areas of widespread interest to girls.  Examples could include ballet, sports and hobby endeavors popular with girls, fashion industry, and interior design (many of these appeal to boys as well).  Update marketing materials to reflect that a girl who chooses Scouts BSA is not making a “new” or “alternative” choice.  Focus girl-specific marketing on outdoor programming to take advantage of BSA’s superior offerings and position in the marketplace.  Emphasize outdoor experiences girls have in a Scouts BSA troop that they can’t get in other organizations, including other all-girl organizations.  Position Scouts BSA for Girls as the best option for a girl in the minds of girls and parents – we need to respond to the approaches of other organizations.  The time to be openly proud of what we have accomplished in our girl troops is now.

[qwazse]

I think the best thing that can be done is to encourage BSA4G scouting alumni associations (e.g., subsets of NESA and O/A) to follow up with young adults who were members of Scouts BSA girl troops and ask them if they’d be willing to give a presentation (maybe a video interview) of their experience as a scout and how they would like to see things evolve for our scouts of tomorrow. These presentations could be at troop meetings, round tables, or council and even community events.

In fact, a repository of videos from adults speaking to future youth and parents about the positives and negatives of their experiences as scouts would be a tool for course corrections as well as recruitment.

Another very-long-term tool: World Jamborees and other international scouting events. Getting our capable female youth and young adults to experience how coed and unisex organizations around the world make things work will yield the best results in developing better training and facilities management tool.

[Cburkhardt]

The lack of mid-course corrective suggestions tells me BSA is using a great approach with the all-girl Scouts BSA troops.  I’ll admit I struggled a bit to come up with the above suggestions I made.  We just need to keep with the current approach and do more of it — just like with the boy troops.

[Eagle1993]

What is BSA's goal?  I think the only way you can say anything is a success is to set a goal and measure against that value.

UK scouts has 443,777 6-18 year olds in scouts and a goal of 547,000 by 2025. They have detailed breakdowns of this goal.   What is our goal and a council by council look at progress to that goal?

UK scouting has about 4% of youth registered (excluding waiting list of 90,000 youth).. BSA is about 1.5%. UK is at 87% of their 2019 numbers... BSA is at 50%.  I struggle to see much to cheer about in terms of BSA youth participation.

In terms of girls and  the summer camps I have attended, the number of girls seemed to jump quickly in 2019 and haven't  grown that much since.  I typically only see 1-2 patrols of girls out of 25-30 at camporees.

What should be done varies by council and unit.  I believe drastic changes are required  and most if not all of those apply to both girls and boys.  It all starts with our national leadership.  

[Cburkhardt]

Eagle1993:  My views on Scouts BSA Troops for Girls regard program quality and feasibility at the unit level.  What specifically are the "drastic changes" you seek?  I'm guessing you are focused on the above-unit levels. 

[Eagle1993]

On 1/17/2023 at 11:45 AM, Cburkhardt said:

Eagle1993:  My views on Scouts BSA Troops for Girls regard program quality and feasibility at the unit level.  What specifically are the "drastic changes" you seek?  I'm guessing you are focused on the above-unit levels. 

Correct, most of the issues are above-unit levels.  At the unit level, the program works well for girls.  While GSUSA has a great K-5th grade program, it drops off significantly after which is where Scouts BSA shines.

What would I change going forward?  Just a few ideas ....

1) Councils need to be much more active building up Girl Troops.  Perhaps even finding district/council level volunteers to help create the Troops.  I have heard of several stories where girls in Cub Scouts had no Troop to transition into. 

2) Support new Troops to help build up equipment.  One girl Troop I met at summer camp was in sad shape in terms of equipment.  It is expensive and takes years to build up patrol boxes, stoves, troop tents, dining flies, Klondike sleds, white gas stoves, etc., etc.  I expect Councils could likely find equipment from Troops in decline that could be used by these new Troops.  We need strong girl Troops in all districts and councils need to be more active helping to ramp this up.

3) National & local advertising campaign ... most girls have no clue this is an option 

4) Tools and direct support from councils to recruit 11-17 year olds into Girls Troops ... most of our recruiting experience is at the Cub Scout level ... GSUSA dominates there

5) National working on corp. partnerships (GSUSA destroys BSA in this area).  

Many of these could apply to boy troops as well.

My #1 issue is Roger Mosby.  Seems like a nice guy, but not a great leader of an organization. 

 

[HashTagScouts]

47 minutes ago, Eagle1993 said:

Correct, most of the issues are above-unit levels.  At the unit level, the program works well for girls.  While GSUSA has a great K-5th grade program, it drops off significantly after which is where Scouts BSA shines.

What would I change going forward?  Just a few ideas ....

1) Councils need to be much more active building up Girl Troops.  Perhaps even finding district/council level volunteers to help create the Troops.  I have heard of several stories where girls in Cub Scouts had no Troop to transition into. 

2) Support new Troops to help build up equipment.  One girl Troop I met at summer camp was in sad shape in terms of equipment.  It is expensive and takes years to build up patrol boxes, stoves, troop tents, dining flies, Klondike sleds, white gas stoves, etc., etc.  I expect Councils could likely find equipment from Troops in decline that could be used by these new Troops.  We need strong girl Troops in all districts and councils need to be more active helping to ramp this up.

3) National & local advertising campaign ... most girls have no clue this is an option 

4) Tools and direct support from councils to recruit 11-17 year olds into Girls Troops ... most of our recruiting experience is at the Cub Scout level ... GSUSA dominates there

5) National working on corp. partnerships (GSUSA destroys BSA in this area).  

Many of these could apply to boy troops as well.

My #1 issue is Roger Mosby.  Seems like a nice guy, but not a great leader of an organization. 

 

I don't disagree with some of your ideas, I just have significant pause when solutions are "Council, Council, Council". To me, Councils will respond in kind with the need to raise registration fees, summer camp fees, and activity fees to pay for more staff if we expect them to lead this. Volunteers- District Chairs, for example- can't make outreach for requests of units that have gear that they don't need and field connecting them to the units in need. Every OA lodge has all the contact info for every SM/Advisor/Skipper and unit committee chair, as well as Cubmasters, in their Council at their disposal, so you could also approach them just to handle the communication piece. 

Our Council has struggled with girl troops. About five have folded this year for lack of numbers to recharter. Many of our family packs only have 1-3 girls in each level, so the pipeline to those units in the same CO are slim. At the end of the day, the "rush" in the beginning was to create units as sister units to existing boy troops, and it has materialized into a mediocre reality. We have suffered in the same way. The challenge I've had is trying to convince our adults that we need to look to neighboring family packs that don't share a CO with a troop, and recruit from there. If the 1-3 girls in those packs are going to go on from AoL, where are they going to go? Could they scramble and find two other girls to start a troop? Sure, but the evidence is in that nearly every unit in the Council that started that way just a few short years ago is now either defunct or doomed. The problem is a) getting anyone other than me to actually go and take on that extra effort, but also b) our boys troop is not exactly fairing exceedingly better, and everyone worries that if we invite Council into our business to help they are going to recommend merging the boys troop with another unit. In my opinion, old thinking that we needed at least one troop in every town may no longer be the best philosophy in a number of parts of the country. Many of the youth sports leagues here are now no longer singular-town specific, which only boosts my convictions it isn't just BSA that struggles. And many of those sports leagues are competing for sponsors, just like Scout units are. The local soccer league charges $85/season for the little tikes in instructional league, and they have about ten sponsor logos on the back of their shirts. What GSUSA has done, and the BSA has no answer to, is licensing their brand- Girl Scout cookie flavored ice cream, coffee drinks, etc.

Female adults are also an issue. It is a rarity that any of these girl troops - and also true of our venturing crews and sea scout ships- are fortunate if they have more than one female adult who will participate in all activities. Our Lodge struggles as of late as well, and we came close to having to bar female youth from attending one event last year because we didn't have a female adult until last minute. 

[Eagle1993]

2 hours ago, HashTagScouts said:

Our Council has struggled with girl troops. About five have folded this year for lack of numbers to recharter. Many of our family packs only have 1-3 girls in each level, so the pipeline to those units in the same CO are slim. At the end of the day, the "rush" in the beginning was to create units as sister units to existing boy troops, and it has materialized into a mediocre reality. We have suffered in the same way. The challenge I've had is trying to convince our adults that we need to look to neighboring family packs that don't share a CO with a troop, and recruit from there. If the 1-3 girls in those packs are going to go on from AoL, where are they going to go? Could they scramble and find two other girls to start a troop? Sure, but the evidence is in that nearly every unit in the Council that started that way just a few short years ago is now either defunct or doomed. The problem is a) getting anyone other than me to actually go and take on that extra effort, but also b) our boys troop is not exactly fairing exceedingly better, and everyone worries that if we invite Council into our business to help they are going to recommend merging the boys troop with another unit. In my opinion, old thinking that we needed at least one troop in every town may no longer be the best philosophy in a number of parts of the country. Many of the youth sports leagues here are now no longer singular-town specific, which only boosts my convictions it isn't just BSA that struggles. And many of those sports leagues are competing for sponsors, just like Scout units are. The local soccer league charges $85/season for the little tikes in instructional league, and they have about ten sponsor logos on the back of their shirts. What GSUSA has done, and the BSA has no answer to, is licensing their brand- Girl Scout cookie flavored ice cream, coffee drinks, etc.

 

I think you make a good point and I agree, most councils struggle with their current responsibilities.  

I started the 1st girls den in my council and my daughter was the 1st registered girl in Cub Scouts in my council.  It started with ~10 girls or so across several different grades.  The biggest group came from a GSUSA troop that folded.  Over time, GSUSA did a better job in my school with retaining Troops and girls decided to stay in GSUSA.  My daughter ended up dropping out of Cub Scouts in 4th grade when there were no remaining girls in the Pack.  She is happy hanging out with the boys, but also wants some girls present.  We attempted recruiting, but every girl interested in scouts went to GSUSA (my daughter did as well).

Similar story with our girl's troop.  We started strong with some very active girls.  However, it never really rose above 7 girls.  They were adament, they wanted to remain linked to the boy's troop ... but over time, more and more dropped out.  Most dropped out as they are very active with sports, rock climbing, dance, etc. and just didn't have time for scouts.  Some had similar comments to boys who leave ... scouts is becoming boring (they don't want any meetings, just go out hiking, camping & canoeing).  Perhaps if we had a 20+ girl Troop and the girls all had friends they would have stayed.  We are now down to 3 girls (including my daughter).  If we don't get more, the Troop will fold.

I've talked through my council and many girl units have similar stories.  Initial surge, then this decline.  I am interested in a council by council breakdown of girls in scouts as the story may not be consistent nationwide.

Personally, I would welcome the council coming into my town and setting up a dedicated girl Troop.  Grab the 3 girls from the 3-4 different girl troops in the area to form a 10-12 member troop & recruit to grow that.  I simply do not have time until I leave my current Troop ... which I won't do until my son ages out.

But ... I agree, that is a lot to but on councils, so I fear we will simply watch this limp forward.  GSUSA's dominance of recruiting K-5th grade girls will limit girls in packs and that is the main feed for girls in Scouts BSA.  If you don't change that somehow, I'm not sure this will succeed.

[HashTagScouts]

1 hour ago, Eagle1993 said:

I think you make a good point and I agree, most councils struggle with their current responsibilities.  

I started the 1st girls den in my council and my daughter was the 1st registered girl in Cub Scouts in my council.  It started with ~10 girls or so across several different grades.  The biggest group came from a GSUSA troop that folded.  Over time, GSUSA did a better job in my school with retaining Troops and girls decided to stay in GSUSA.  My daughter ended up dropping out of Cub Scouts in 4th grade when there were no remaining girls in the Pack.  She is happy hanging out with the boys, but also wants some girls present.  We attempted recruiting, but every girl interested in scouts went to GSUSA (my daughter did as well).

Similar story with our girl's troop.  We started strong with some very active girls.  However, it never really rose above 7 girls.  They were adament, they wanted to remain linked to the boy's troop ... but over time, more and more dropped out.  Most dropped out as they are very active with sports, rock climbing, dance, etc. and just didn't have time for scouts.  Some had similar comments to boys who leave ... scouts is becoming boring (they don't want any meetings, just go out hiking, camping & canoeing).  Perhaps if we had a 20+ girl Troop and the girls all had friends they would have stayed.  We are now down to 3 girls (including my daughter).  If we don't get more, the Troop will fold.

I've talked through my council and many girl units have similar stories.  Initial surge, then this decline.  I am interested in a council by council breakdown of girls in scouts as the story may not be consistent nationwide.

Personally, I would welcome the council coming into my town and setting up a dedicated girl Troop.  Grab the 3 girls from the 3-4 different girl troops in the area to form a 10-12 member troop & recruit to grow that.  I simply do not have time until I leave my current Troop ... which I won't do until my son ages out.

But ... I agree, that is a lot to but on councils, so I fear we will simply watch this limp forward.  GSUSA's dominance of recruiting K-5th grade girls will limit girls in packs and that is the main feed for girls in Scouts BSA.  If you don't change that somehow, I'm not sure this will succeed.

Hope for the best for you. I hope for those units that have been successful to this point they have continued success. I really hope that Councils at the least have real, practical conversations with the units that are limping along (packs and troops) to engage in productive decisions on what is best for the youth they have to be successful, and we aren't just "keeping units around" for the sake of a few $'s in the Council/National pocket (which often translates to an awful amount of $ and energy spent by the unit/parents to keep something going until it hits critical mass).

[Eagle94-A1]

7 hours ago, HashTagScouts said:

I really hope that Councils at the least have real, practical conversations with the units that are limping along (packs and troops) to engage in productive decisions on what is best for the youth they have to be successful, and we aren't just "keeping units around" for the sake of a few $'s in the Council/National pocket (which often translates to an awful amount of $ and energy spent by the unit/parents to keep something going until it hits critical mass).

 I do not know about other councils, but in my council the perceived attitude is you are on your own. Not only is there no support helping existing units that are struggling, but there is no support for creating a needed second girls' troop in my district.  There is a lot of interest for a girls troop in one section of my district, but instead of the pros helping start the unit, instead they send them to a units 45+ minutes away one way. It doesn't work like that.

[HashTagScouts]

1 hour ago, Eagle94-A1 said:

 I do not know about other councils, but in my council the perceived attitude is you are on your own. Not only is there no support helping existing units that are struggling, but there is no support for creating a needed second girls' troop in my district.  There is a lot of interest for a girls troop in one section of my district, but instead of the pros helping start the unit, instead they send them to a units 45+ minutes away one way. It doesn't work like that.

Terrible. The struggle I find myself in with our units- people seem gung ho to try to move mountains to save the boys troop that has been around for 60+ years, but for the girls troop that doesn't have that longevity, its all shrugs.  

[qwazse]

13 minutes ago, HashTagScouts said:

Terrible. The struggle I find myself in with our units- people seem gung ho to try to move mountains to save the boys troop that has been around for 60+ years, but for the girls troop that doesn't have that longevity, its all shrugs.  

I'm not so sure why this is terrible. If you can't produce a program that girls enjoy and a CO loves to host, why should council bother?

Meanwhile, there are a lot of young (and young at heart) men who've benefited from that 60+ year-old troop. Some of them probably call their council to see what can be done to keep it from dissolving.

The bitter truth: it now rests squarely on the young women who've benefited from the program to promote it. If they conclude that they would have been better off with 100% of their time spent in GS/USA, their BSA4G troop will rightfully lose its foothold in the community.

[HashTagScouts]

59 minutes ago, qwazse said:

I'm not so sure why this is terrible. If you can't produce a program that girls enjoy and a CO loves to host, why should council bother?

Meanwhile, there are a lot of young (and young at heart) men who've benefited from that 60+ year-old troop. Some of them probably call their council to see what can be done to keep it from dissolving.

The bitter truth: it now rests squarely on the young women who've benefited from the program to promote it. If they conclude that they would have been better off with 100% of their time spent in GS/USA, their BSA4G troop will rightfully lose its foothold in the community.

Terrible if you have interest, and still cannot get anyone from your Council to make the effort to help. Sometimes it's just networking and finding someone who can assist with an intro to help to get a CO partnership. 

Edited January 19, 2023 by HashTagScouts

[Eagledad]

1 hour ago, qwazse said:

The bitter truth: it now rests squarely on the young women who've benefited from the program to promote it. If they conclude that they would have been better off with 100% of their time spent in GS/USA, their BSA4G troop will rightfully lose its foothold in the community.

I agree with qwazse, but I wonder how much of the enthusiasm was generated by passionate adults. I didn't get a comfortable feeling about the youth level of enthusiasm from this form. Of course this is an adult forum, but some of the adults seemed hell-bent and creating success stories. However, the Venturing Crews program does have some success with active girls.

Barry