Drop Age for Venturing

alange

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Throughout my district, in attempting to start Venture Crews, there is a large interest level for boys and girls who are in the 8th greade. Unfortunatley that is too young to join a crew. I suggest dropping the age requirement by one year to capitalize on this excitement and desire for them to join a crew. Also, statistically this is the age when girls lose interest in Girl Scouts and are looking for something different. Can't we accomidate them by allowing them to join a crew and get them involved before High School starts with its multitude of activities and opportunities that pull them away from Scouting.

Idea # 114Venturing,

Moderator Comments

8/10/09

Merril Davis, Innovation Coordinator

The Innovation Council in coordination with BSA volunteers, council representatives and various departments are currently studying the Venturing Program and upon review will communicate observations and recommendations to senior BSA management. Initial recommendations are anticipated to be completed by late 2009. Please direct further questions to Merril Davis of the Innovation Team.

Comments

kkaltenb 1 year ago

In addition, dropping the requirement to 8th grade is a great way to get youth to have 'grade school friend' crews, regardless of the many different high schools they eventually end up in. I did this with a crew for my little brother's grade school. he invited all his gradeschool friends who were looking for an oppertunity to hang out together, despite having hectic high school schedules. They were offered the oppertunity to go to Sea Base, and presto...NEW CREW. we also seem to be better as an organization at working with gradeschool and elementary schools than we are with working with high schools.

Joshua Glacken 1 year ago

I think this could hurt the current Venturing program, as high-school aged youth need to have their own program. I would be supportive, however of having a separate 6-8 grade Venturing program.

jjudd 1 year ago

There is a 6-8 grade Scouting Program. It's called Varsity Scouts. We just don't promote it very well (except to the LDS church).

tiwells 1 year ago

I disagree with lowering the age. I think it's age-appropriate now and should stay with the current limits. I also think it will hurt the program. High schoolers want to be out of middle school.

jschlak 1 year ago

Here Drop the grade requirement not the age.

Pack are a 6yrs 5yrs old thru 10yrs
Troops are 7yrs 11yrs thru 17
Crews are 7yrs 14yrs thru 21

There is already enough problems with teenages and young adults why add to it. Older Crew members don't respect the younger because maturity. It is amazing what one year does to a person.

agast 0 years ago

I believe the same arguement could be used for all programs: Cub Scout wanting to join Boy Scouts, and younger boys wanting to become Cub Scouts. This is a good thing! It creates anticipation and elevates the status.

The Venturing program works exceptionally well as designed, and the ages fit the program perfectly.

The solution is to develop a more solid recruiting plan for Venturing and market the program more publicly.

smcnutt 11 months ago

The correct word is Venturing Crew.
First sentence, Throughout my district ...

Whitney Riley 10 months ago

I see this as a "slippery slope". Why not just make the whole program co-ed? We can have boys AND girls learning the same things, enjoying the same program, together from first grade on up. Why not change the movement to just "Scouts of America" and include both boys and girls?

No? Well then, maybe we could develop a different program for young girls, starting at 6 years old. In order to avoid any accusations of it being a "separate but equal" kind of thing, however, we'd need twice the volunteers, twice the professional staff, twice the resources (money, space at camps, etc), as well as a VERY well-thought-out response to the droves of people who will oppose such a thing. A tall order, but not impossible...

FYI - the reputation for "poor quality" of the Girl Scout program is due to leaders and not the program. My girlfriend was a Girl Scout for many years and she was able to go camping, whitewater rafting, canoeing and even went on a trip to Mexico with her Troop. It's the same as in Boy Scouts - if the leaders are quality and well-trained, the program will reflect that.

One last point - if we want to get to kids (boys or girls) before they encounter the "multitude of activities and opportunities that pull them away from Scouting" we need to target them in pre-K. 4 year olds can sign up for soccer, t-ball, karate and a myriad of other things.

Joe Connole 8 months ago

I don't think that lowering the age is the solution to our problems. As was mentioned by jjudd, we have a program for that age bracket: Varsity Scouts. This program should be promoted more by the Councils and Districts if you have that many boys who are 11-14 years old wanting to join a crew.

As for the girls who begin to lose interest in the Girl Scouts around the time they reach 11 year old, why not create a Varsity type program for them? Create an all female program designed for girls who are at least 11 and not yet 14 that will help introduce them to Venturing and Exploring. They can be involved until their 14th birthday, at which time they will bridge into Venturing or Explorers. We could tap into far more females for our Venturing program if we introduce girls who are interested in our older scout programs to the skills that they will need for those programs.

Judy Sizemore 8 months ago

Status Changed from Active to Complete.

Judy Sizemore 5 months ago

Status Changed from Complete to In Progress.

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