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Re: Feeling dicouraged
Board: Scouts Honor
Reply to: #941898 by Uncorny Acorns
Feb 15, 2017 12:12am
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Sorry this reply is so long. (I started with brownies with lots of parents) When they moved to a junior girl scout troop, the girls started to slowly become the leaders and as they grew older, my co leaders and I became advisers. We got to this stage by showing them in brownies how to make decisions with only 1-2 choices. On all issues. Each year (even with new girls adding in) we increased their decision making and responsibility. We never had a lot of parent participation except for drivers and extra chaperons.

We started off each year (from brownies up) with large sheets of poster paper taped up around the room and spent the first meeting getting to know each other and then the girls would wander around the room and put up their wishes on the poster boards. We had one for field trips, one for badges, one for service unit activities (Juliette Low event, thinking day, bridging), one for service projects, one for council events. They could ask questions, and put whatever they wanted to see happen in their troop that year. Dream Big!

The next meeting we took two pages and they decided who would find out the cost per person of each activity they had listed. (Brownies had moms and dads to help them).They also looked up which badges listed and what was required to earn it, how many meetings or meeting time trips it would take to earn. The next meeting we would elect troop officers and then each girl would report what she learned. The troop scribe would note all the info down. Then we talked about how many cookies had to be sold to make the trips happen. We didn't focus on what each girl earned, but what the troop earned. Then the third meeting we tackled the others.

Disneyland always fell first as we were 8 hours away, then some of the bigger wilder things. For those, we had them look it up in safety wise to see if it was an allowable girl scout activity.But they would narrow this down to two or three. Camping was always one of them. The first year of juniors the leaders planned a mystery trip. It was such a hit, that they wanted this each year. (Each car had clues and a red herring trying to guess where we were going as we drove) The parents all knew where and not one ever let the girls know.

Then we brought out calendars and placed when these activities would happen. We tied as many badge activities as we could into each outing.We made calendar copies for the girls for their binders (they also kept records of badges, troop phone numbers, etc in this) The girls were responsible as Cadettes and Seniors in making all of the decisions and arrangements. Calling parents to drive, making sure they had insurance, mapping out the route, calling for reservations, etc. They made lists of what to bring, eat, etc. and who was in charge of doing this. they shopped(with a leader) and then pre-prepped the food, cooked, etc. I had different co leaders through out this time, but the main focus was on the girls doing this.

Sometimes things failed and we would discuss it and write down what they should have done and then they would make sure it didn't happen the next time. One year my senior/cadette troop decided they didn't want to work on any interest projects. By January they revised that. That same year they didn't like the way Thinking Day was presented. At the evaluation at the end, they got the paper and I had them go outside with us to fill it out. My co's and I told them we understood what they were saying, but the mom's that put on the event were mostly Brownie leaders and they had no idea the older girls would like to participate and not run all of the activities. So they could say this on the evaluation, but it had to be worded nicely and they had to keep in mind how much work the mom's put into the event. Then we walked away and let them hash out the wording. They did good. On the way home one of them suggested that they could put this event on themselves. So the next meeting they voted on it, elected an event director, an asst., a program manager, a promotion person and a registrar. The next leaders meeting, the event director went to the meeting with me and asked the service unit if they could put on the next year event and they were told yes. They all showed up the next year to do this. They learned a lot. And didn't volunteer for an event after that.

Most of the time my Cadette/Senior troop had 25 girls in it. Three were my daughters, They came from 3 high schools and 3 junior highs. They voted in a time at the end of the meeting to just visit. These girls played sports, were in student government, cheer leaders and band members. Some of the girls that joined the troop were new to girl scouts as teens. I also had two hearing impaired girls ( I am hearing impaired myself) and when one of the girls had to use the relayed call to fulfill her duties to her troop, she was elated. Luckily for us she read lips or one of the girls would write down what was said. She could speak well and that help her confidence a lot. One of them went on a wider op to England for a national jamboree. Several of those girls are leaders now with their own daughters, a service unit manager, a national delegate,some earned silver, some gold, some became council trainers. They are smarter than you think, if you just give them the opportunity and a guiding hand. And as they get older, they really don't want mom and dad there all the time. My girls didn't even call me mom, they called me by my name. it is hard being a leaders daughter...But it is awesome being a leader and watching what you and the girls do to grow! Good luck!
Re: Feeling dicouraged
Board: Scouts Honor
Reply to: #941898 by Uncorny Acorns
Feb 15, 2017 3:00pm
Thread (disabled) Board
How old are the girls? I ask because my personal experience (Brownie through Senior, Ambassadors were not yet established) was that parents were very involved at the Brownie and Junior levels but started to thin out at the Cadette level as a lot of girls were no longer interested in scouts. By the time the troop made it to the Senior level, there was only four or five of us left, and really only two of us were active participants. At that point, the only mom who was involved was the troop leader who became less involved unless she wanted to participate in a specific event or activity as we had become nearly self-sufficient in our scouting activities.

Scouting is hard to carry on, especially as the girls and parents lose interest but I was always grateful for the mom who stuck it out with us few who still wanted to be a part of scouts. If I lived near you, I would totally take up a volunteer role for the troop....maybe you can recruit some reliable friends who want to be volunteers with the troop?
Re: Feeling dicouraged
Board: Scouts Honor
Reply to: #941927 by Johnsosaurus
Feb 15, 2017 6:09pm
Thread (disabled) Board
They are Cadettes and Seniors, mostly 8th graders about to graduate. I fully expected the kids to start losing interest, what I wasn't expecting was to feel like the parents were sabotaging their interest. They show excitement at meetings and plan things, and then the parents email out cancellations. I've suggested NOT taking it on themselves to cancel an event that they can't attend, but it doesn't seem to get through.

I'm trying to figure out how to make next year better, if we have enough girls who want to continue. We still need active parents, but we need them to read their emails and be aware of what's coming up so they aren't changing the plans at the last minute or taking up half our planning time arguing about whether something is feasible after it's mostly been planned. I wonder if a larger group would help disperse the pressure by having more parents rotate driving and chaperoning and supporting the planning portions or if it would just be more headache?
Re: Feeling dicouraged
Board: Scouts Honor
Reply to: #941933 by Uncorny Acorns
Feb 17, 2017 8:20am
Thread (disabled) Board
Hmm. Is it the majority of the parents that are causing issues or just a few? If it's just a few, maybe assign them smaller things within an event and leave the bigger event/activities to parents who are a bit more reliable. Also, maybe they don't check their email often and you should try phone calls or texts. This sounds like quite the frustrating situation :(
Re: Feeling dicouraged
Board: Scouts Honor
Reply to: #941898 by Uncorny Acorns
Feb 17, 2017 5:28pm
Thread (disabled) Board
This started happening with my troop when we were senior scouts (late 90's, my mom was our leader). Parents were less and less able to even help carpool, although some would still drop the girls off. For us, my junior/cadette troop ended up split between 3 schools as we got older (some still in middle school, and the rest of us split into 2 high schools depending on our neighborhood)....all of us also had band, student council, 4H, orchestra, cheer leading, sports, etc etc so for us that had a lot to do with availability as well. In the end, my mom would seek opportunities for us and put them on a calendar to share- and whoever could come would come and earn whatever was there to be earned. Luckily my council was providing classes and opportunities for older girls to sign up for. Our camping trip was planned mostly by us during our meeting (although my parents did all the shopping) and the last camping trip we did as a troop we actually met with a sister troop our age- we all planned the same location and agreed to meet but essentially made our own food plans (more or less) each troop leader planned a few activities but both troops participated- so some of the duties were split in that way.

In the end, my senior year of high school it was mostly me doing stuff on my own with maybe one or two others and I found myself volunteering my time with younger troops rather than my troop doing something all together.

I don't think that was any advice, but did want to respond to say, you're not alone. :)