Kids Doing "Adult" Jobs

[Beavah]

Yah, the original thread started a good discussion about how many adults is too many! ASM59 also raised an additional question that sounded like a great discussion as well.

 

It seems that there are some who advocate little or no Adult involvement. Where do you draw the line with adult involvement?

 

Do you really believe that all postions that BSA literature assigns to adults can or should be filled by the boys?

 

Perhaps that can be rephrased as "What tasks do yeh think can/should be handled by youth in a true youth-run unit (Troop, Team, Crew, Ship)?" Are there any yeh feel must be done by an adult alone?

 

I reckon we all agree that if we have a new unit, adults need to provide more support, eh? So in respondin', let's think about what a mature unit might do.(This message has been edited by Beavah)

[Gunny2862]

In a perfect world with well trained, age and rank diverse, committed Scouts(but WHO trained them) I suppose you could get by with Adults in the positions of: IH, COR, CC, and SM. And then the Scouts could be doing all of the rest of the committee jobs. Here one would then have to have one of the aforementioned adults at least as a signer on the banking account.

 

It wouldn't be any more possible to drop responsibilities than with some of the adults, but I would be leery of it until I saw(and knew) the Scouts in question.

 

If I tried it I would probably think of each Scout doing the job would have the outgoing Scout mentoring him in all phases of it, in a continuous cycle. So that there would always be the outgoing and incoming position holder working together, so one would actually have a double tenure in each position one undertook.

[frank10]

I'm sure the scouts could do the job of my entire committee Including me (I'm CC)... But why would I ask them to? We do paper work, transportation, banking, more paperwork. Not on of our meetings take place in the woods and even I would rather be doing the fun side of scouting than to be attending my committee meetings.

[Eagledad]

>>I reckon we all agree that if we have a new unit, adults need to provide more support, eh? So in respondin', let's think about what a mature unit might do.

[Beavah]

One thing I often hear is dat adults have to be responsible for safety. And of course, in the ultimate abstract, that's true, eh?

 

I was broken of that notion by a troop in a former council I used to work in. It's so easy to forget that a lad who has been active in the program for 5-6 years typically has a lot more field time and experience than the average adult. If they've been taught how to run safety through T-2-1 and merit badges and have had that long to build experience, they're usually really sharp. They're also more fit than most adults, eh?

 

That troop had kids who could work a swiftwater rescue or a lost hiker search as well as many pros. And when it came to supervisin' younger kids, the older boys were simply awesome. Alert, firm, friendly, funny.

 

I got broken of da kids-and-finance thing by one mid-sized troop where the adult treasurer was an accountant and a real scouting enthusiast, and also counseled Personal Management. The PLC developed a full budget, and the youth ran the money. IIRC, there was a "bookkeeper" POR and a "treasurer" POR, da first was sort of training for the second. Kids had check-writing authority and I think da SPL and QM were each issued low-limit credit cards. The special magic of adult association. I never kept up with 'em, but I'm willing to bet a few of those kids ended up in business or finance careers.

 

B

 

[Oak Tree]

In the end, it's hard to think of any particular troop job that has to be done by adult, assuming that we could train a kid to do the job. There is no reason that an adult has to be the treasurer or the advancement coordinator or the equipment coordinator. But in practice it can take a lot of adult work to get the kids into the position where they'd be successful at that job.

 

I've had a 17-year old with a credit card do complete trip planning, including the reservations.

 

In our troop, I think it's unlikely that we'd get a kid to do the advancement or the finances.

 

The jobs that I would never really ask a kid to do would be the ones where they have to be in charge of the adults. I wouldn't ask the SPL to recruit new ASMs. I'm not going to ask the boys to collect medical forms, or make decisions on which family gets financial aid (which would probably rule out the treasurer position, too). I'm not going to ask the boys to deal with any unhappy parents. I wouldn't ask them to attend Roundtable, nor to be responsible for making sure adults get the right training.

 

What we usually do is assign a boy to a job, and assign an adult coach. This might be for court-of-honor planning, or trip planning, or the QM/equipment coordinator, or Chaplain/Chaplain's Aide, or PL/patrol advisor. In each case, I ask the adult to only provide coaching as needed. Some boys are very capable and need little coaching. Other boys will sometimes almost abdicate their position and do nothing unless directly instructed. There's always a fine line between letting boys fail in their position and providing the help necessary for the troop to have a successful function. Some failures boys would learn from. Other failures would just frustrate people.

 

My rule of thumb is that I look to the adults to provide the framework, and for the Scouts to lead within that framework.

[Eagledad]

>> There's always a fine line between letting boys fail in their position and providing the help necessary for the troop to have a successful function.

[GaHillBilly]

"Ive always said that scout growth is only blocked by adult fears."

 

This is something I've griped about for years, primarily in a church youth group context. But, it took getting into Scouting to help me see how many ways I'd failed with my own oldest, in terms of helping him assume adult responsibilities as soon as he was ready.

 

 

"Eventually the scout develops to a point where the next step in his growth has to be an adult responsibility."

 

That's precisely what my hope and vision is, for any troop my son's in. To what degree I can help that happen, I don't know. But, I'm going to try as best I can.

 

 

"What we usually do is assign a boy to a job, and assign an adult coach."

 

The idea of adult Scouter as coach, rather than leader, has been missing in all the troops we visited, and in the two troops we've participated in. I don't think the adults in my son's current troop are necessarily opposed to that idea, but it's not what they've been thinking.

 

I should note that it appears that one of the problems leading to poor training of Scouts, is lack of real skills and preparation by adults. It's simply not possible to teach well what you haven't learned yourself. Not all adults find it easy to research a topic, gather information, and acquire a new skill on their own. I'm rapidly moving toward the conclusion that the long term success of a troop will require just as much effort in developing adults skills, as in developing youth skills. (Speaking strictly for myself, my personal knowledge of compass navigation and botany has increased 10-fold in the last year!)

 

"It's so easy to forget that a lad who has been active in the program for 5-6 years typically has a lot more field time and experience than the average adult."

 

Yes! Or, that's how it *should* be. I'm more and more convinced that some the older Scout / Eagle candidate inactivity I've seen is a direct result of the poor training they've received. They *know* they should be able to canoe, or do first aid, or whatever, but they can't because they only possess "merit badge college" skills!

 

Fortunately, we may be able resolve that issue, at least in my son's troop. A string of poor MB Colleges, along with some problems with unskilled Scouts in possession of summer camp MB's has brought things to a head. Two of the ASM's and I have tentatively agreed to come up with a list merit badges which may be earned at an MBC, including things like Fingerprinting, Pottery and Coin Collecting, and another list of of merit badges which should only be earned in-troop, including all the Eagle merit badges. We're also working on an annual 'curriculum' to teach these merit badges. The SM really doesn't have time to focus on the troop, but is very likely to not only go along with these changes, but to be enthusiastic about them.

 

 

. . . It is very, very encouraging to hear from some one like Eagledad, who appears to be succeeding in a troop that's doing things the right way. It helps keep me from thinking that a really good troop is simply impossible.

 

 

 

GaHillBilly

 

[acco40]

There are many "legal" things that require someone to be at least 18 years of age (i.e. a BSA adult). Other than that, as Scouters, we should strive to havethe boys do as much as they are capable of doing. I have in our troop a myriad a very capable and very lazy Scouts.

 

Ask a husband if he would prefer to have his wife do his laundry, cooking, cleaning, etc. or have himself do it. Ask a Scout if he would rather have a committee member plan out an activity or do it himself and guess what the answer will be?

 

As Scoutmaster, I try to set the bar high and have the expectation that the youth will meet it. I get very little resistance to that approach from the boys but plenty from the adults. The "you have to make it fun for them" mantra gets repeated to me ad nauseum. We shouldn't make everthing a chore but we are also not chartered to turn everything into pure entertainment for the Scouts. The challenge is finding the balance between the two.

[GaHillBilly]

"The *you have to make it fun for them* mantra gets repeated to me ad nauseum."

 

I think that for some Scout aged boys, this is true. It's certainly true for some church youth group attenders. But, it is absolutely NOT true for many of them, who want something 'real' to do. Some of them don't know that yet, but they know it when they experience it.

 

One problem I've seen -- not in Scouting, but in youth groups -- is that when you begin to get 'real', the kids who actually are in it only for the fun, fall or drop out. This rubs their parent's noses in tangible and visible evidence that their kids are not as great, as cool and as superior as they thought. I've seen parents sandbag effective youth programs apparently because these programs were 'exposing' their own kids.

 

I'm going to guess that some of the opposition from adults my originate in fears that if you 'get serious' their kids will be exposed in one way or another. In some cases, they will be pleasantly surprised. But in other cases, they won't, and hardly any parent likes to be faced with the facts of their child's failures and weaknesses.

 

GaHillBilly

[Gold Winger]

I'll be Mr. Negative here and say that the kids are capable of doing the jobs but how many would want to?

 

When I was a youngster, I was in a church youth group. We had an advisor but for the most part we ran ourselves. The treasurer took care of the money, we had an annual budget of a few thousand. We also took care of fundraising. About the only thing that I know that adults did was chartering the bus for our annual excursion.

 

In high school I was in the drama club. One year I was in charge of wardrobe. I had to call the costume houses to find out what we could rent.

 

There's no reason that the QM can't research tents and decide what the troop needs without adult intervention. There's no reason that a Scout can't do the treasurer's job. Or the outing coordinator's job. It's all good training for life.

 

Alas, too many parents today believe that kids can't do anything so they do everything with the result that those kids don't want to do anything.

[GaHillBilly]

I think that a lot of kids today don't know what they want. They aren't self-analytical enough to realize that what they think they want isn't what they want.

 

But, I've seen repeatedly that kids pushed in the right way complain loudly at first, but then adjust and come to expect that they'll continue to do whatever it is. You need to keep in mind that many kids today carry extremely heavy workloads in terms of school and sports. Having had a son who was an 'elite' swimmer, my wife and I have concluded that that's the extreme dedication required for sports success today is not the best way to spend money or time. But nevertheless those sports successes reflect the efforts of some kids who work very hard and like it.

 

I think Scouting potentially offers kids something real and meaningful.

 

Our culture today makes it impossible for kid to say, yeah, give me some more work to do. But, that doesn't necessarily mean they don't feel the same satisfaction and sense of purpose people did in the past, once they are in the middle of it all.

 

 

GaHillBilly

[John-in-KC]

One hard limit I've not seen here, and it's sort of stupid IMO, is driving.

 

We let Venturers drive themselves and others to meetings and activities.

 

We don't let Boy Scout youth program members drive themselves, let alone others, to anything.

 

B, in turn, I have a question for you:

 

I agree, I think our youth members could do most of the adult paperwork of a unit, including managing the records databases...

 

Now, what is the law, both Federal and your local jurisdiction, on privacy, and minors being responsible for maintaining privacy? What's their exposure if their PC gets hacked into and the database is copied out?

 

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I do like what wingnut said, though: The SM and the ASMs and the kids got to have the fun. A lot of my Scouting has been in front of PC, supporting their efforts, or running a business meeting.

 

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That leads to a broad question for the group: How much time exposure do we want to add to the Scouting experience by giving them increasing levels of the unit functions? With AP, dual credit, athletics, thespians, choir, bands, and clubs, what is the tipping point where the young man says "not fun?"

 

I can do scut work because I see the rewards for the downline generation. Granted, that's an attitude we want to cultivate in the youth, but where should the line be drawn???

[Beavah]

Now, what is the law, both Federal and your local jurisdiction, on privacy, and minors being responsible for maintaining privacy? What's their exposure if their PC gets hacked into and the database is copied out?

 

Far be it from me to offer a legal opinion on an internet forum, eh?

 

I'm havin' a hard time understandin' your question though. What privacy law do yeh think applies to Scouting at all, whether youth or adults? Besides, I reckon the kids are more likely to be computer-savvy and hack proof than the adults, eh?

 

As for how much responsibility to give to kids, I think we sometimes forget how much fun havin' adult responsibility is fun for 'em. And good for 'em.

 

Now, if there's too much "scut work" in Scoutin', I reckon we should try to reduce it, eh? Just as tough on adults usin' up their free time as it is on kids.

 

B(This message has been edited by Beavah)

[Sephrina]

Not sure if it would pertain or not, but in GS last year we had some issues raised regarding when we were trying to computerize some registration and health records regarding privacy and hippa laws.

 

Karen