Girls allowed to join Cub Scouts in Az

[moxieman]

Living on a border state and having interacted with Scouts Canada quite a bit, I have seen the coed program in action and it WORKS. The coed patrols work better together. For the past couple of years at the Moosehorn International Camporee outside of Calais, Maine, it's been a coed Canadian patrol that has netted top honors in the competitions.

 

Actually, last fall, they chose to compete against themselves in the patrol cooking contest--guys vs. the gals. They tied for first place.

[evmori]

Cub Scouts is part of Boy Scouts. For boys. Not a bad thing! Girl Scouts is for girls. Not a bad thing.

 

Yes life is coed. So what?

[moosetracker]

evmori I have no problem if it goes coed or not..

 

I do have a problem with people saying that allowing girls in will ruin the program.. Because everything boring, or organized is feminine, while everything fun and exciting is masculine.. And the addition of girls into boy scouts will mean the program will become more boring, organized and regimented with the addition of feminine activities such as baking cookies & sewing doilies...

 

If BSA never goes co-ed, or goes co-ed tomorrow, the program will continue as it always has, with changes still being made by National to lower the risk whether it be for the boys or the boys & the girls.. With some dens, Packs & troops as well as (Crews, teams & ships) being very exciting and adventurous in spite of Nationals changes and some being as boring as Hell, and others falling in the middle mostly due to the adult leadership, and some to the youth leadership if the adults truely give them power and the youth choose the lazy road of routine events.

 

The addition of girls or not, will not change the program..

 

 

 

[evmori]

Adding girls WILL change the program. Boys don't act the same with girls in the mix as they do when it's just boys. And the same goes for girls.

 

I will drop if the BSA goes coed and I would bet so would a lot of others.

 

 

[BadenP]

ED

 

Years ago I would have agreed with you, but after 9+ years as an advisor, now CC/COR of a coed Venturing crew I can only assure you that the energy and creativeness that these young women bring to the program is outstanding. I have never seen a pack or troop with a more cohesive, goal oriented, and enthusiastic attitude in its members than this crew.

 

Lets face it without their cookie and candy sales the public would not even be aware of the Girl Scouts or Campfires exsistence, so it is no wonder girls are flocking to Venturing, and would do the same to Cubs and Boy Scouts if allowed. So many troops have female leaders already, and packs have had female leaders for a long time so that the transistion would not be all that difficult.

[Eagle92]

EV,

 

Yep interactions are different and there can be challenges. Saw that with my coed Ship back in the day. So one of the things I talked about when I was in the UK was how does coed scouting work there from the youth's perspective. Challenges I've encountered and heard about don't take place overthere. However I do like their option of all male, all female (ran into one of each) and coed units.

[5yearscouter]

Well just talked to Joseph.

 

the unit wants to include girls and wanting girls to wear the cub/boy scout uniform. They don't have council's permission to do so.

 

Seems he's been in a few meetings trying to not get his head on a platter about the whole thing. oops! And the pack in question isn't even one of his units, he was just the guy who answered the phone when the newspaper called. It was a fairly short conversation before Joseph changed the subject to something more pleasant for him.

 

it seems like the pack in question contacted the newspaper to get more publicity and to add a bit of pressure to council to register the girls and allow them to wear the uniforms. newspaper called the council office, joseph answered the phone and gave his usual speel about girls are allowed in venturing units and the newspaper connected the dots incorrectly.

 

council said girls to be registered must be in learning for life or venturing--although there was some mention of sometimes units are/can register girls in the soccer for scouting program, but I'm not sure on that. I thought the soccer for scouting was gone, but seems there are a few units left here in the valley.

 

council is trying to straighten out the situation with the pack, and make sure just the boys are registered in the cubsthe pack is threatening bad publicity that BSA now wants to kick out the girls from the program.

[evmori]

BadenP & Eagle92,

 

You are talking about kids 14 & older. That's not Cubs.

[BadenP]

 

 

No Ed I am talking about Cubs through Venturing and eventually the BSA will join the majority of WOSM and have coed scouting. It is not so much a matter of IF anymore as it is WHEN.

[skeptic]

Certainly, should girls be part of the traditional program, they would likely dominate leadership, if what I see in upper elementary and middle school student leadership in indicative. Wednesday I subbed in a school with grades k-8, and they had an assembly for 5th through 7th to allow speeches from students for next year's school council. There were 10 running for 4 fifth grade rep positions, and only 3 boys were on the list. In all the other positions, only girls were running. At that level, few boys seem to have the interest or willingness to step forward. Not sure about high school, but it seems to me that there are more male leaders in those levels, though they too have more girls interested.

 

Have to agree though that it is only a matter of time.

[desertrat77]

I concur with BadenP, not if but when.

 

Also concur with Moosetracker's comments about the tone of discussion. Though I am pro-coed scouting, I acknowledge there are a bunch of ways to disagree with coed scouting, but painting girls with a negative brush isn't the least bit helpful or kind.

[nugent725]

Skeptic,

 

On that note, I wouldn't mind if girls in the program took on a good amount of PORs. If the boys at that age are genuinely disinterested in leadership, and the girls are, then why not have somebody take the job that wants it. If anyone tries to raise the argument of "Well then the boys won't be able to advance because the girls have all the leadership roles", it doesn't hold water because there are plenty of PORs to go around. How would that situation be any different than a large, all-boy troop? I think that girls in PORs is a good thing because it teaches young girls that they can do any job that a man can do. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that only girls/young women should be in leadership roles; I'm just saying that everything should be equal across the board. Speaking of equality, doesn't that tie in with Good Citizenship and Morality, which are 2/3 of the Aims of Scouting?

 

During the course of this thread, I have read people say things like "School and structured things are feminine", which doesn't make any sense to me. Structure is there in certain situations because it is necessary. In fact, the working/business world is structured, and is still considered a male dominated area of life. I'm not trying to sound like some kind of uber-women's lib, anti-male kind of guy...just someone who is interested in equality for all, which is a concept that we teach the Scouts - but don't practice ourselves as an organization. Also, I'm just being a realist that it's a matter of time before the rest of the program goes co-ed. Call me naive if you want, but I just fail to see a major downside to opening the program to more youth...and I feel it would breathe new life into the program.

 

YIS,

 

Ryan

[shortridge]

newspaper called the council office, joseph answered the phone and gave his usual speel about girls are allowed in venturing units and the newspaper connected the dots incorrectly.

 

Hopefully this will have been a learning experience. Don't open your mouth and talk to the press unless (a) you know exactly what's going on, (b) you can explain it in a simple enough way that a reporter with zero background knowledge can understand it, and © you know the three main points you want to impart, have them written down so you don't go off-message, and repeat them multiple times for emphasis.

 

When a Scouter or pro says "Scouting," they might mean everything from Tigers to Venturers. But to a reporter who's never encountered Scouts before, the distinction is a difficult one. And jargon such as Venturing, Cubs, Eagle Scouts, packs, troops, crews - it will generally go in one ear and out the other.

 

To anyone who may encounter a reporter, this reporter implores you - if you're not sure what to say, tell them you have to step out for just a minute, hang up, get your thoughts in order, scribble out some notes, find out the truth about this strange pack that's doing its own thing, and then call the reporter back. We'd much prefer to get the story right the first time than have to run a correction or a clarification.

[HerpetologyScout]

Boy Scouts should be for boys.

 

* Hygiene on a 50 miler is a lot easier when only 1 sex is present.

* That age is the age range where hormones rage, to have both sexes together complicates things because they are trying to impress each other, may be shy around the opposite sex, etc. - they deal with that every day at school, church, - scouting is an escape from that.

 

Cub Scouts I could potentially see as coed but cub scouts is suppose to lead into Boy Scouts, I think it would be unfair to let girls into cub scouts but deny them from advancing.

 

Aren't there brownie troops the young ladies can be involved in that lead into Girl Scouting?

 

One of the issues facing modern society is we have more and more of a need for both parents to work, so I can see the attractiveness of both boys and girls having their activities take place at the same time/place, maybe some cooperation with girl scouting would be beneficial to let that happen without needing for either to become coed.

[ScoutNut]

Sounds like this so-called "Pack" wants publicity for it's own program, and wants to force what it is doing on BSA so that it looks legit.

 

There were a lot of better ways for this group to have approached this. Any negative publicity will affect the reputation, and perceived honesty (or lack of it), of the the couple involved as well.

 

Will council trust this couple to charter a BSA unit any more? I doubt it.

 

Will these children and their parents trust Scouting again? I doubt that too.

 

Will this council trust it's staff to know what to say to reporters? Hopefully not with out putting them thru a little common sense publicity training!