Announcing Move Forward: Save Scouting

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4 responses to “Announcing Move Forward: Save Scouting”

1. 

   April 23, 2025

   Doug Wilson

   I have been keeping data for many years on the local council as well as National. Having had a technical career in the chemical industry and being involved with SPC, I used my career skills to statistically analyze the Scouting data which I still somewhat do. In the summer of 2020, I sent a 60+ page PowerPoint to Roger Mosby with my statistical analysis of many parameters concerning the performance of National and my conclusions. I would like to send that to you. Please send an email address where I can send the presentation.

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   1. 

      April 23, 2025

      Aren Cambre

      aren@arencambre.com

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2. 

   July 3, 2025

   Thomas Ray

   You know, I’ve said it before—sometimes simple answers are the best. The inflection point (from https://scoutingmaverick.com/move-forward-save-scouting/) is a little tricky to read and understand… That type of particular graph is vague with numbers and especially years…

   To me, it seems like there are several ‘inflection’ points. Is that a dip in the 1970s or 1980s? I can’t quite tell… But it hovered around 3 million Scouts (is that 2008ish or so?) through 2017ish or so. Then a steep drop around 2020 (Covid-19 obviously).

   But radical changes in membership standards combined with Covid-19 have completley eradicated membership numbers.

   Now there are organizations that fill that gap that Boy Scouts has left (fraternal in nature and not the co-ed organization that Scouts America is now).

   With Scouting America taking away the Fraternal Nature of what Boy Scouts once was, they have lost two elements for business success.

   First, there is absolutley nothing that distinguishes Scouting America from 4-H. (https://hbr.org/1980/01/marketing-success-through-differentiation-of-anything)

   One organization’s goal is “empowering young people with the skills to go beyond the expected. ”

   Another organization’s goal, “aims to prepare young people for lives of impact and purpose. ”

   These are idential goals and not differentiated.
   (I paraphrased specific parts of the above quotes from the follwoing sites [https://4-h.org/about/] &[https://www.scouting.org/])

   You know what once made Scouts differentiated? It was a fraternal.

   Second, another aspect of a successful business is that a business must know their why. (https://www.fastcompany.com/90960741/to-lead-with-purpose-you-must-know-your-companys-why)

   Why is Scouting America better for my child than 4-H?

   I suppose you are challenging Scouting America to make several changes—some I agree with (Rover Scouts would be nice) but you need to be able to tell parents how Scouting is Different than other similar organizations that are co-ed and WHY Scouting is the better option.

   Prior to allowing girls into the core program (BSA) it was easy to say, “Boy Scouts is different because it is a fraternal organization where Boys can be Boys. The reason WHY you should enroll your child into the BSA is that the BSA is a place where Boys can learn to be men.”

   So, please entertain me and answer the following two questions.

   1. How is Scouting America different than 4-H?
   2. Why should I sign my child up with Scouting America as opposed to 4-H?

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   1. 

      July 4, 2025

      Aren Cambre

      Thank you for the feedback on the graph. I agree with you, it does a poor job of conveying the core point, that BSA’s demise could be just a few years away. I need to think of a better way of doing that.

      Just FYI, the 1970s dip seems to correlate to a boneheaded, strategic shift away from outdoors in Boypower ’76. That was corrected in the late ’70s. The 2000 inflection was BSA v. Dale, decided by SCOTUS in June 2000, affirming that private, membership organizations have a right to bigoted membership standards.

      It wasn’t the establishment of this right that caused BSA’s decline. Rather, it was BSA’s assertive, public association with bigotry, such as its aggressive litigation and hateful stances regarding society’s most vulnerable. This linked BSA to the wrong side of history. The SCOTUS case put a spotlight on BSA’s hate. Families responded poorly, evidenced by a shocking year-over-year decline with the fall 2000 recruitment season.

      On your 4H and BSA comparison, don’t confuse goals with methods. Many organizations have nominally similar goals to those. The methods are what differ. BSA’s main differentiation is emphasis on outdoor adventure. There are other differences, but that’s the key one that we need to double down on.

      I disagree with the value of a “fraternal organization” where “Boys can be Boys”. As a kid with only brothers, the lack of coed in Scouting shortchanged me valuable lessons in working with girls. As a parent of boys, and as a direct-contact leader (15 years and counting), I see firsthand the positive impact of adding girls. The hysteria is just pearl clutching. The “boys can be boys” part is partly a myth–some of it are things boys shouldn’t be doing anyway. Fraternal spaces are still plentiful as boys and girls naturally and dynamically congregate and separate throughout activities, as they do in real life.

      The core values and differentiations of BSA is not really this site’s key focus. It is rather how we improve our approach to assure our core values and differentiations survive in a meaningful, impactful, and large Scouting movement.

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