Growth via retention....slow and steady for 25 yrs

Several contributors have noted the distinction between growth via recruitment and growth via retention - I'm all for both, but the second is more important, I think. When you retain someone, they're staying because their needs are being met; next comes loyalty and support.
When I got involved in 1986, our Troop consisted of 3 Leaders and 16 youths. We struggled and worked, and gradually built a solid group which now consists of 11 Leaders and 39 youths. We run an active involved program with 8 camps per year, several volunteer events, etc., as well as the occasional trip to a provincial jamboree - but our significant event each year is a week-long canoe trip for the eldest youths on the Spanish River in Northern Ontario.
The key to our success, however, is perhaps best realized by looking back. In 1997, the group consisted of about 8 Leaders and 24 youngsters. I realized that if I got hit by a truck or had a heart attack, my Leaders would show up at the next week's meeting and probably get things completed....they all had enthusiasm, interest and knowledge, but no one necessarily had the 'overall program' down pat. So I sat down and started jotting down subject headings - Patrol structure, food shopping, discipline, fundraising, etc. - so that everything that we did (and WHY we did it) was down on paper. Over the next year, this developed into what we call our "Troop Manual", and it has gone through annual revisions every year since. (One of the nicest things is that when I get a new Leader, much of their introduction is streamlined by simply going through the manual).
For our success, however, I point to three main aspects:
1) We structure our patrols 'horizontally' by age group, not 'vertically'; all the 11-yr-olds are in one patrol; all the 12-yr-olds are in another, etc. We found organizing our Troop vertically meant that we were continually separating the groups to work on badges. This way, the entire 11-yr-old patrol is together for 4 years; they work on the same badges, they camp together, they cook together, their interests are similar. (More detail and reasoning is in the text of the attached document).
2) We went to a four-year program. Running a 3-year program, we found it difficult to adequately complete the requirements for the Chief Scout's Award without being rushed, semi-completing projects, etc. Going to 4 years meant we could relax a bit and get things done more thoroughly. A side issue was that being in Scouts the 4th year meant that they were usually in Grade 9 - a HUGE change from Grade 8 with both the homework issues as well as peer pressure. What was interesting was that several years later we realized in conversations with 18-20-yr old former Scouts, they looked at Scouting as being inherent in their growing up and maturing process; however youths who had finished Scouts at the same time as Grade 8 always looked at Scouts as being associated with Public School....and therefore something to be "left behind".
3) We take our eldest Scouts on a week-long canoe trip at the end of their 4th year. Participation is earned, not a right - but they've had 4 years to get ready, both by their behaviour, knowledge, camping practices, etc. Yes, it is a bit of a "hook" that keeps them in there, but if it works.....

Anyway, I'm attaching my Troop Manual. Please feel free to print it off and use it as desired. If you have any questions or comments, fire away. I also realize that there are references in the manual to various sheets and recording pages - I'll see about getting these available as well sometime.

YIS.
John Barker
23rd St Bart's Scouts
Sarnia, ON

Wow great document. I just started a new troup last year so it was intersting to read about how an established group runs.

I look forward to seeing your other documents. The schedual of what badge requierments you do at each meeting is of paticular intrest.

Thanks,

As mentioned, here are our key documents. The first document is a copy of the badges that we work on (Blank Badge Template (new)). With patrol sizes of 6-10, I'd have Leader Bill with the group one week - but two of them might be absent. The next week Bill would be away so I'd put Leader Chris with them - but a different three would be absent. Several weeks later we go to present the badges and some have done all the requirements and some have missed some. I found this a good way to keep track of exactly what each youth had completed. Actually, once we've presented the material, if they've missed it they need to check in the book and arrange with a Leader to cover the material. Onus is on them to pursue.
The next is my Excel spreadsheet for meetings (Schedule - First Half) - this is for the first half of the season, from Sept - Dec. I build this prior to the meeting and then e-mail the individual page to all of my Leaders; that way, they show up at 7pm knowing what they are responsible for and I don't have to stop and chat with each one of them.
The root of our program is the (4yr schedule, generic) it shows the program, by night, for each of the four patrols for the entire 4 years. Essentially what happens is that when an 11-yr-old youth starts in September 2010, I know that they're going to be doing St John 1st Aid training in February of 2014. They're in a 'pipeline'. Sure makes planning easier.

YIS
John B.

Great effort! My only question is how does your Court of Honour or Patrol in Council contribute to the planning? What if they don't want to do First Aid in Feb. 2014? What if they don't want to work on badges? The pipeline concept can work but only if everyone wants to go with the flow. How do you handle this?

Garth

Thanks for the comments.
The youth want to do 1st Aid because they can see it's part of 'the path'. If they decided to do something else, that would be their choice, but they would be made aware that they would be sacrificing their CS Award.
'if they don't want to work on badges' - we try to avoid badge-chasing; we'll plan a camp, conduct various activities and then when we are together at the next meeting, they almost get the badge as an afterthought. I'm not degrading the importance of badges - I'm just saying that we run an outdoor program and the youth get badges as well. For instance, Pathfinder Outdoor #6 requirement is 'sleep outdoors overnight in a shelter they've built'. Our 4th Yrs always do this as part of their Winter Camp, so they see it as part of the regular program, not earning a badge...but then they get it later.
'If everyone wants to go with the flow' - an excellent point. The trick is to get a critical mass of each patrol that wants to get things done, and focus on them - and then help the others to keep up. Within a year or two, they usually come around. Admittedly - and regrettably - there are some youth who either can't or won't get involved, for various reasons. We try to help every youth, but we can't be everything to everybody.
My understanding of the Court of Honour is that there are two main aspects - program planning and issues of discipline. Technically, we don't have a formal CofH. However at the end of each year, we spend a meeting sitting with each patrol and seriously reviewing the year in detail - checking what they thought was of value (or not) and any recommendations they might have. From this feedback, we DO adjust our program. It also helps that 8 of my 11 Leaders are former Scouts (2 SIT's and the others between 18 and 39), so their input has a lot of weight as well.
For discipline, we have often sequestered a level-headed youth from each of the 4 patrols - thereby reflecting the entire Troop - presented them with the situation, and agreed that we will adhere to whatever judgement they decide. (Of interest is that they are usually far stricter than we would have been, so we do caution them a bit).

Please note that I'm not pushing you to try any of this stuff; I'm just saying this worked for us, and if you can glean anything here to help your program, please do. Scouts is the best youth organization in the world, and I'm passionate about it. I have seen it make incredible differences in many young lives.

YIS
John B.

With patrols divided by age, does this mean that most skill teaching is done by adults? We use vertical patrols, which results in almost all of the skill teaching being older Scouts teaching the younger.

The average Scout troop has about 10 Scouts, not enough for two patrols, so having one patrol per year isn't feasible in most troops.

I'm glad that it works for you. At 39 Scouts, you've got to be doing something right!

Greetings, Liam. We conversed some time ago with regards to your "Membership Retention in Scout Troops" thesis, which, to be blunt, we have taken as one of our structural documents. Well done.

"Is most skill teaching done by adults?" - to be fair, no. There are some requirements in the Pathfinder requirements for them to participate in teaching the younger Scouts, but I would say that 85% of our instruction is done by Leaders. Note that four of my 11 Leaders are 18 or younger.

Rather than blitz everyone with questions and comments - if anyone wishes to contact me directly, I'm at barfeld@xcelco.on.ca . I would be willing to share other spreadsheets, documents, and other stuff.

Take care.

John B.

I think that a lot of us would be interested in observing the Q&A. That way you don't get the same question over and over plus we will see questions that we may not think of. Anyone who is not interested can simply ignore this thread.

With so little traffic on this forum, we need all the posts we can get :) I think some marketing needs to be done for this forum. Maybe an email to every leader.

These brilliant documents bring up a couple of points:

• There is more than one way to skin a cat. We can't force a one size fits all solution. What works well for one leadership team may not work well for another. While John would be accused of heresy in one of the mailing lists for his patrol setup, as Liam said if it works for him all the more power to him. I would actually suggest that John's success is more related to the program he is delivering that his patrol setup. The weak troops I have seen all have a weak program. And while people like Liam, Dennis, etc all have very strong youth led troops, from my experience those are the exception rather than the rule.
• I think these detailed three year and meeting plans are a great resource for troops. They are a good companion to the Jumpstart packages. I think many troops, i.e. the under performing ones, would benefit from a complete step by step guide of everything to do in every meeting for three years.

Allan.

Having step by step directions would be great. Creating them would be a huge undertaking though. At minumun there would have to be four diffrent varriations.
1) Large urban group
2) Small urban group
3) Large rual group
4) small rual group

John`s documents work well with number 1 and provied general guidence for the others.

The bigest problem that I had with the jumpstarts is that most of the activities do not work for groups of less then 10.

There is, of course, a 5th category; problem is that NOBODY realises that their problems are not solvable in the same way as the other groups.
The International Scouts Canada groups; mostly made up of Youth whose parents are temporarily (3-4 years usually) posted to Canada's military bases around the world. The BIGGEST problem here is that you are losing your Scouters and Youth every three or 4 years, and so you have to try and get new Youth and Scouters, every time that new families are psoted in, to replace the ones who have been posted out. LUCKILY, we usually know 6 months to a year in advance who is leaving and we can then take steps to replace him/her because we also usually know who is coming in, All newly incoming personnel arrive about 5-6 months before their actual transfer for an orientation and house finding stay. That's when we try to apprach them.
So far we have been lucky and have shown 10-20% growth over the last three years, but this year we are losing a lot of those people who cam in three years ago and worked so hard.
HOPEFULLY; and that we shall see during the Family Information day on Sunday (22 Aug); how many new people we can get for our program.

I think many troops, i.e. the under performing ones, would benefit from a complete step by step guide of everything to do in every meeting for three years.

I don't think the lack of detailed week-by-week plans are the problem. That's the small stuff. Weak troops are missing the big stuff: not enough camping, Scouts not doing their own cooking, etc. If the big stuff is in place, you can play a lot of dodge ball and still have a great program overall.

Scouts Canada needs to get better at learning from itself: Even during four decades of decline there were successful troops. The leaders of those troops know how to make success, so they need to be the people running training courses and making decisions about programs, camp facilities, etc. Instead, they are often derided for "not doing things right" or "not being with the times".

Thanks for the ongoing comments. Good stuff.
I certainly agree with the post a couple previous that essentially stated that different things work for different groups.

Two comments that I'd like to make to add a bit of clarity...

Everywhere you look in modern times, society encourages us to want to be something else - specifically, age. When you're 6, you want to be 9; when you're 9, you want to be 13; when you're 13, you want to be 18. When you're 21 you want to be 27; when you're 40, you want to be 27 and so on. And each business then appears to have exactly the thing that will allow you to make that change.
With our 4-year group separated by years, it's interesting watching the 2nd yrs, for instance. They're looking at what the 1st Yrs are doing - but they did that last year and aren't interested in it any more. They look at the 3rd and 4th Yrs (who seem to be doing neat stuff), but they also realize that "that'll come in good time" - we're in 2nd Yr now and this is what we need to do. It's a bit like the Buddhist view - "be in the now". Focus on what needs to get done right now and be comfortable; enjoy this - this is where you are.

A second aspect had to do with us not having an official Patrol Leader. We have groups of anywhere from 4 to 14 youths, and the organization gets done much more by ad hoc - this week, Billy will arrange rides to camp while Chris and Toni set the menu; next week Barry can set things up with the City Hall visit, and so on. They are much on their own - with guidance and oversight by us Leaders - for the four years. They need to solve their own problems; for instance, if they've got one member that isn't pulling their weight (e.g., never does dishes), then they need to address that and handle it within their group. Needless to say, we do reassure them that if they try and still can't - or if the issue is bigger than they can handle - we will step in and assist, but they need to give it a legitimate try first. It's amazing how many of patrol issues they resolve before we hear about it.
Scouting has always placed a very high emphasis on 'Leadership', and this is good. However, I think as one goes through life there are far more times that a person needs to know how to act as a member of a group or a team than necessarily as a leader or boss. Getting used to working in a patrol with 'shared leadership' is a valuable tool - not only in the working world, but in family and volunteering as well.

More thoughts.

YIS
John Barker
23rd St Bart's Scouts
Sarnia ON