Social Networking

cjohnston

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Completed

After a Camporee this weekend we're trying to ride the wave of enthusiasm. I asked my youth staffers to take pictures and post them on their facebook pages. The more we take pictures of cool events and get them out there the more Scouting will get positive publicity. We need to be aware of all of our multimedia options and encourage our volunteers and Scouts to use them. Even if we select the top pictures and e-mail them out to Scoutmasters to send to the youth everyone wants to show off their weekend.

Does anyone have a Facebook group for their district? How about your camp staff or alumni? A facebook group allows youth to put up pictures from the event in a space that can be highly monitored. Scouts need to feel confident about showing off activities to their friends.

Idea # 48Technology

Moderator Comments

2/18/09
From: Michael Ramsey, Director of Brand Management

Check out the Scouting Community. It’s a new, growing platform just for members 13 years of age and up, volunteers and professionals. Use it to set up communities by council, district, unit…it’s a very nice tool. You can access it through your MyScouting account. See scouting.org for more information.

There are many Scouting communities in Facebook and other social networks. The National Council now has a Facebook page to reach more people with positive messages about Scouting. It can also help us redirect members, alumni and those interested in Scouting back to our Web sites.

Many social networking sites have age restrictions that prevent youth under a certain age to participate. As with all media, we urge parents, volunteers and youth not to post any personal information on these sites.

Comments

jglacken 1 year ago

I agree that networking tools are really great for the youth, but I have the hardest time promoting them with the leaders. Does anyone have success in getting adults to use these mediums?

Tony Vogl 1 year ago

All for social networking, although we ought to consider maximizing what is already working, rather than asking volunteers to move to a new system for scout purposes. Facebook and possibly MySpace, already offer great things that we can utilize.

Joshua Glacken 1 year ago

I'd love to use Facebook, too, as many Area and Regional Venturing Officers' Associations use this already. But, I think the intent in having a separate system was to have something that only registered Scouts and Scouters can access, thus protecting our youth from preditors.

pdillenb 1 year ago

We here currently have a Facebook group setup that's run by a couple of District Executives that post information regarding events and happenings within the council. We do have restrictions setup for membership through the standard Facebook approval process. I'm not quite sure how they're running it, but they're keeping a rather tight leash on who is and isn't allowed to join.

There are also groups set up and maintained for our OA lodge, Summer camp staff, a few districts, OA chapters, and even scout troops. They seem to be operating with a good deal of success. I know that within the summer camp staff group, we've got people joining and reconnecting that haven't been in touch for decades.

I think the idea of setting up a separate "Scouts Only" social network would require a vast amount of resources and take too much energy away from the organization. When services such as Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, etc. out there that already seem to have the formula right, why can't we just work with them? Plus, what are the chances that a Scout would join yet another social network when he's already on these other sites?

Just my two cents...

jturman 1 year ago

I'm a DE and the younger parents parents (under 50 years old) love the fact that I search for and befriend them through Facebook and then invite them to our district's group. They automatically have another way to get in touch with me as well as see my other interests. They feel more connected to me instead of me just being the guy that they hardly ever see.

The easiest way to find all your volunteers in Facebook? Have all your Scout emails automatically forwarded to a Gmail account. Set up Gmail so you can send emails from it that appear to be from your Scout mail account. You'll never have to log into a slow BSA webmail system again (except to turn on/off vacation alerts). Now all your work contacts will be automatically saved using Gmail. Then in Facebook find friends by importing your Gmail contacts list. See who's on Facebook. Plus now you can check your work emails on a blackberry without actually downloading each message hogging the 100 megabytes of space. Your Gmail account is just like visiting any other webpage and you can download attachments when necessary.

cshelley 1 year ago

I'm with Tony - let's not reinvent the wheel but create and migrate to a presence on Facebook.

Tony Vogl 1 year ago

What makes Facebook work (and I'm sure MySpace probably falls into the category too) is that it is self-regulating. If the content is not appropriate, someone will report it. This is what these sites do for a living. I refer to Facebook more because their reputation, IMHO, is better than MySpace. Perhaps they learned from MySpace's missteps.

alange 1 year ago

In my experience with facebook and Scouting, people get into more trouble than get helped. While the site is monitered for language and inappropriate materials, more often then not it can become a site where people can openly blast other leaders, the district or council, or even other youth. Some site like this with leaders being able to share ideas and info is a good idea but I don't feel that the BSA should sponser sites of this nature to show pics of recent local events. If the Scouts themselves want to do that on their oqwn pages...fine, but the unit district or council should not have an open site for this reason.

Tony Vogl 1 year ago

Who is going to police the BSA's online community? We're trying to streamline things, not add responsibilities. I'd rather work with something existing and tried, then get a whole new learning curve.

pcowan 1 year ago

What's Facebook? What's Myspace?

I've never been to these sites and I dare say 95% of our parents haven't either. Yes, we have to be in touch with the modern age and where kids hang out, but just as in promoting Roundtable, if we can't get past the gate keepers whether it is the unit leader or the parent, we'll never get our message to those that need it.

Scouting is about getting out from behind the electronics. Not burynig our kids in there deeper. We already know what works and entices them. We need to maximize what does work and not waste our time on arenas that take us away from delivering the program to our kids.

PS: Hi Tony, great to see you are here.

pdillenb 1 year ago

@pcowan

While you say that you haven't been to these sites and 95% of parents haven't been to them, they have probably at least heard of them. Whether it be an advertisement, a spot on TV, or their children talking about it, the buzz of social networking is spreading. In June of 2008, Facebook tracked 132.1 million unique visitors and showed 36 million registered users. Myspace had 117.6 million unique visitors and 73 million registered users. I don't think it's an issue of getting past unit leaders or parents. I just think we need to adapt the model to the changing times.

Yes, I completely agree that Scouting is about getting away from electronics and spending a weekend in the wild. But we're only really asking for an hour a week and a weekend a month. There are 167 more hours in each week, and 27 other days in the month where Scouts have access to TV, computers, video games, cellphones, etc. Like it or not, they're going to continue using this stuff. I think that if we were to completely ignore outlets like social networks, it would be bad news for Scouting. We'd be missing out on a great number of the 109 million registered users, all of whom we could advertise to.

pcowan 1 year ago

hummm,

of the 109 million users and 132 million unique visitors (seems alot of overlap there) how many of these are from USA and not the UK, Africa, China and other countries totalling our 5.6 billion world population. I don't think this number means much.

Just because USA is more technologically advanced and over whelmed with media coverage does not equate to OUR members being participants of these sites. yes, I know many probably are. But those that are members of these sites are probably not nor of the age to join or have children who will join. How many elementary age boys are really looking at these sites anyway?

I would be curious for someone to track the profiles of users and visitors to these sites. We might find they are NOT our target audience.

Social networking while it may have its place in the media arena does not stand up to boy on boy recruiting or an effective boy talk at a church or school. I fear some are looking for an easy way out of "reaching out and TOUCHING" someone and we as an organization will spend to much time and resources better utilized in the field.

Now please excuse me as I go to my next boy talk. That's called active recruitment; not passive recruitment.

cjohnston 1 year ago

PCowan,

You are living in 1993. Kids go to these sites. Having a Facebook Council Page does not take the place of active recruitment. According to your line of logic "We need to maximize what does work and not waste our time on arenas that take us away from delivering the program to our kids." We shouldn't have Council Webpages either.

I am not suggesting we don't do Boy Talks, that's our bread and butter. We need to advertise in every market available. By the way, you're really doing a boy talk right now?

richard.bourlon 1 year ago

Not facebook but a Scouting Social network. The Beta is already live. Come on in along with anyone with a MyScouting account. http://community.scouting.org/

Eldon Stahl 10 months ago

Yes, I agree, however, I prefer Meetup.com as a platform since it lends itself well to giving tips for grassroots organization and for getting together in the real world. My district does have a Meetup site, and it's ok, but trying to get the general membership of the district to use it has been a chore, but it has been useful for being able to plan an event or meeting for the district and have all that info in one place. Quite useful that way. Still trying to get the other members to see the light. Younger leaders seem more adept to communicating this way.

Judy Sizemore 8 months ago

Status Changed from Active to Complete.

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