This posting from Mike Walton highlights some problems with the BSA organization and our image in the U.S. today, and offers ideas on how to improve the situation. Mike's long-time experience with scouting at all levels, from Cub Scout to volunteer to professional Scouter (O.K., Mike, para-professional) gives him a unique perspective on our program.
Date: Thu, 16 Nov 1995 00:44:56 -0600
From: "Settummanque the blackeagle (Mike Walton)"
<mwalton@ALPHA.COMSOURCE.NET>
Subject: Re: Scoutings Image (1/2) (long)
Terry Howerton (HEY! We've missed you here!) wrote:
>Would love to hear reports of what various units have done to help strengthen
>the image of Scouting in their communities. Or anyones thoughts on Scoutings
>image as a whole, and what needs to be done to improve our public relations plan
>as an organization.
This is a copy of what I sent Terry privately after reading the posting placed here last week:
(part one of two)
Hi Terry!
A while back, we over at Scouts-L addressed that very issue. I have the postings at home in a file and would be more than happy to share it with you and the readers of Scouters' Journal. If you would, if you agree to print them, please attach a tag to the top of the article explaining that this came from the Scouts-L youth program discussion list, and please add my new email address at the end or at the top or wherever!
My personal thoughts are the following (it may trail what I've wrote in the posting; if so, use the stuff in the posting rather than here...it makes more sense, I think.):
The "S-Word"
We're trying to keep the "S-Word" and everything it stands for, a secret. A secret which is only shared between those that wears the "secret pin", or whom share the "secret handshake" or the "secret word" with us. This needs to STOP.
Scouting is NOT a secret world, set aside from the rest of our society...but our national organization, our local organizations, and LOTS OF US VOLUNTEERS are "playing right along" and making it increasingly hard for kids to become Scouts, for adults to find out about Scouting, and for community agencies and resource groups to rally around us and utilize our experiences and energies instead of fighting, teasing and pushing us away from public view.
The REASONS why the BSA has such a massive PR problem can be rooted or traced back to three significant events in our recent history:
The first one, was the "Scouting/USA debacle", in which we attempted to redefine ourselves by the new "era" which we as a nation was moving in. We spent as a corporate body millions to try to "change our spots" only to have it backfire massively on us. That news conference announcing our "new communicative name" was one of the most-attended we've ever had and the print and broadcast outlets use "Scouting" and "Scouts" even today instead of "Boy Scouting" and "Boy Scouts". What was needed was not a *redefinition* but rather a *rededication* to what our program is all about. We didn't get that internally until Bill Hillcourt placed us all back on track via the ALL OUT FOR SCOUTING! program in the late 70s.
The PUBLIC has never received that rededication. The BSA was too busy taking people to court and in "defending it's name" with "we have no comment on this matter". To our public, we are STILL that new communicative name, "Scouting/USA" (what does it mean? Does it mean we let anyone in our program now? Does it mean that girls can be Boy Scouts or Cub Scouts now? What DOES it mean? The BSA could have saved millions of our program dollars by TELLING THE PUBLIC OF OUR REDEDICATION, in that way re-emphasizing what the Boy Scouts of America is all about TODAY.
The second was the firing/letting go of our internal PR Scouting executives and the hiring of an outside PR firm to "tell our story". Blake and his fiends down there have NO CLUE as to what really goes on in a typical Troop, Pack, Post, Ship or Team, and nor are they really interested. Yet, they try to reach the public with lame ads which while states that "Scouting is a good place to learn", negates the FACT that "Scouting is a place to have FUN!" and "Scouting is a GAME...a positive game which has positive results! "Only", it has been said many times about racial pride, "those that ARE can tell someone else what it's like to BE". Much of what we've had to endure, has come because the right image...the 60s Scouting image, of Scouts doing Scouting things...has been lost in trying to appeal to the parent instead of the child. Cereal manufacturers haven't lost that approach. When a new cereal is introduced, the emphasis is on how much fun the kid will have eating it, munching and crunching the berries, squares or "lifesaver holes" alone or with friends that like the same things (reference the series of ads promoting the Apple Jacks cereal..."...because we like it!". Only in referencing the relative value of having a complete breakfast and the vitamin and mineral content, do we get something that parents can hang onto when shopping. The bottom line in Scouting, in our approach to it with kids, with our approach to it to our chartering partners and potential chartering partners, should be that "Scouting is a fun, enjoyable game. Perhaps the most important game you will ever play." If we continue to treat Scouting like an educational institution, we will eventually only get those Scouts wanting an education.
That's what schools are for.
The third reason is because we have strayed from the realization that Scouting is supposed to be this magical game which kids play under adult supervision and at the same time, learn how to be good citizens, how to take care of themselves and others, and how to be a useful contributor to life on the planet. We have emphasized the negative aspects of being in Scouting: the clampdown on the rules, the requirement for additional adults to "protect our children", the desire to "be everything for every kid". Just like we are too fast to tell adults "Hey...Scouting may NOT be for you, and don't feel bad if it isn't", we are too fast to tell every kid we see that "you should be in Scouting...you're nothing if you're not!" Once we have them in the program, we don't let them lead...we want to either "relive our experiences through a new set of eyes" or we feel that "they can't handle leading 40 other kids and telling them what to do".
I only remind you that we have youth gangs all over this land, made up of 50 to 100 kids --kids-- being led by, influenced by, and being killed or maimed by -- kids. If a 15 year old gang leader can "influence action" upon his or her membership, then surely with some coaching, a 14 or 16 year old Scout can positively influence action upon the rest of the members of his or her unit!
We as Scouters have oversold, overrated, overkilled the "high adventure" quality of Scouting and many of us forget that first and foremost that Baden-Powell created Scouting as a GAME that kids can play at home, either by themselves or with other kids, and that we adults that are "playing the game" aren't really playing...we're there as I've stated many times over, to "keep kids from killing each other or themselves, to keep them from burning down the building or tearing up the room, and to watch them grow and help them, IF THEY ASK FOR IT, to grow along our Scouting tenets of character, citizenship and personal fitness." We have instead taken the Scouting program "underground", not even sharing with others in our OWN communities about what we are doing.
"They don't have a right to know what we're doing". "We'll tell them what we're doing when we want". Yet, each fall and spring, we ask and practically BEG our communities for money to support our local unit and our local Council.
How many times have you seen *adults* wearing their field uniform? Not many. But we want those Scouts of ours to wear them every chance they get. What an example!! During my college days...both undergraduate as well as during my graduate and post-grad days, I would wear a uniform shirt every Tuesday. No reason, just that of being able to put it on, walk across the campus and to BE ASSOCIATED WITH SOMETHING LARGER THAN JUST ME. I had lunch dates with the uniform on, would go to class, and even would go off-campus into the community.
People eventually recognized me on those *other* days as "the guy in Scouts", and would ask me about how to get involved, how to get their kids involved, and my personal opinions on various Scouting or youth-related issues. We tell our Scouts to wear their shirts...but when it comes to us "showing our colors", we would prefer to only wear it when we HAVE to...during a meeting (and there's many of us that don't even do it then!) or enroute to a campout or some other event.
How many times have you heard the word "Scouting" as it comes up in a conversation about what is done outside of work? It's like the word "Scouting" has, as I've written before, have replaced one of those seven "dirty words" that nowadays come up with alarming frequency from our media, from our fellow adults, and today, from our own children! We are well-versed in what we choose to tell other adults what we do to occupy our time when we are not with family or church or friends...but when it comes to the "S-word", we're not really ready to share that with many others.
How many times have you invited a school group, or a church group, or just the "kids on the block" to come out to the Scout camp and look around? To use the resources of the Council for their environmental project, or from their biology class, or for their PE or health and safety class? It's like we're trying to keep others from knowing about our camping and outdoor facilities, that we don't want them to use them "because they are ours", a really selfish act to take.
It's like we all belong to a secret, private club that nobody else has the right to know, or we should even "humor them" with telling about what we do and how great it really is! Scouting is NOT secret, nor private, and instead of self-promoting ourselves, we need to tell EVERYBODY what we are all about and what we are doing TODAY.
> ...
(this is the second part of the posting I sent Terry Howerton privately concerning the BSA's PR efforts...)
So what can we do about this from the National level on downward? Here's my suggestions...are you listening Resource Support Group, BSA?
Nationally, we should FIRE the PR firm that has been mishandling our account for the past fifteen years, promote field professionals with public relations backgrounds or experience -- along with volunteers from our Councils that have had successful limited PR campaigns -- and re-create the Public Relations Service of the BSA. Keep the Internal Communications folk...they have done a SUPER job in telling all of us about our programs and the changes that have come around...but their job was just that: to tell US, not the outside public, about our programs. We need a voice that KNOWS the program intimately, KNOWS the reasons why we need to "tell the Scouting story" and those that can TELL the story effectively and personally. We need voices that are just as comfortable with Rikki Lake and Geraldo as well as Bernard Shaw and Tom Brokaw. Or their handlers. We need voices that will state the BSA's side on the issues, and if that's their jobs, defend it as it if their jobs depended upon it.
Because their jobs do depend upon it. The BSA, to them is NOT "another client".
Its OUR program we're talking about.
Public Relations should be integrated again into EVERY professional training course, and not held out until NEI III or during a "All Hands Meeting" to do. Every Council should also have one professional with the additional job (or primary role, in our top 25 Councils) of being the "professional staff member for Public and Community Relations" and this professionals' Critical Achievements goal sheet should include those PR tasks geared to get Scouting (not necessarily the local Council, but that S-word) back out into the public.
The BSA should utilize volunteers like myself to go back to local Councils to share the Scouting story with as many potential audiences as they can think of.
They should use the power of the mass media to create "infomercials" whereby Scouts, Scouters and yes, even the Chief Scout Executive, can tell the Scouting story in an elongated, specially tailored, format for urban, rural, suburban and special populations.
That "toll-free number" used by our Supply Division should be expanded to be used to allow any person to find the closest BSA Council to where they live. It's a shame that you have to have to find "the Scouting person" in a community to tell you where the nearest Troop or Pack meets. Your local Council is REQUIRED to have the location of where each and every unit in their Council meets. It's a part of the chartering process. Since we're not creating yet another new database, the same one that is used to verify membership can be used to locate units by state, Council or community. After I had talked with my local Council here upon moving, it took me THREE WEEKS to find out that a Troop meets three blocks from my home! Three blocks.
My Council didn't know...they knew that "we have Scouting units there, but I'll have to get you in touch with the DE for that area". I waited a week for the "DE to get in touch with me" or my answering machine. The Chamber of Commerce had no idea. Neither did the schools, whom were polite enough to tell me "We have them, I just don't know who you would call for them". A business that sold Scouting merchandise did give me the name of a Scouter...but he is no longer active and couldn't tell me who was or how I can find out except to call the Council office.
I found out by asking...a Scout.
The suspension or removal of many of the BSA's "risk management policies" should be advocated and done. When we "sell" the idea of self-reliance and self-motivation, yet it takes three pieces of paper, two adults and local approval for even a Patrol campout or hike, you can see how kids don't "want to be bothered" with the BSA anymore.
Especially after one kids' terrifying experience of not participating, but just planning for and seeking the approvals of everyone except the Almighty to just pitch tents and sleep in Ralph's backyard over the weekend. YES, by all means necessary, let's ALL protect our children from the rouges out there that "call themselves Scouters" and from other adults that want to use our children as sex toys; but let's NOT stifle our youth from experiencing "real adventure" just because they chose to do it by themselves without some adult "advising them" along the way. Most parents today understand that "kids get hurt". That's why we have insurance and safety guidance for our children. Kids today understand the need to inform and update adults on where they are going. They know this. We know this. Let's give our Scouts credit for becoming Scouts and allow them to participate in overnight events and day hikes without the red tape of "risk management".
At the same time, let's take a REAL look -- at the local Council level -- at why we have so many "new policies and procedures". While the financial stability of our local Councils should be a important concern to all of us in Scouting, we wouldn't have a Council without the kids, which make up the dens, patrols, crews and squads, which make up our units, and which in turn, provide us with the means to go out and ask for moneys to maintain and extend our programs. Each local Council should have the authority to implement all, parts of or none of the "risk management" policies presently in place by action of the National Executive Board. In this way, each Council, based upon its OWN risk analysis and NOT that just of the National Staff, can tailor their own successful youth experiences in their own territories.
Local Councils should use whatever local means they have to insure that at least once a week, the word "Scouting" or "Boy Scouting" be positively heard through their print, broadcast and electronic medium. Yes, I did say electronic. Although according to a recent _Time_ survey that stated that only close to a fifth of all American household own a personal computer...we are NOT using this new medium to our major advantage! It's not the families we are really after, remember.. it's the kids, who use a personal computer at school for research at least 6 times a school week. By each local Council using the power of the World Wide Web to create a special "home page" for their members --and those visiting (like potential new Scouts, Scouters and most importantly, new chartered partners), the story of the "local angle to Scouting" can be made and each person allowed to "go where it leads them..." We hope it leads them to the front door of a unit.
Councils should invest some money into insuring that every phone book within their territory has their telephone number. Let's look at this from a practical standpoint: Most parents, let along citizens, have NO CLUE as to which "Council" they reside in or where the lines break between one Council and the next. To them, all they know is what they see (or in this case, don't see): Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts (don't even get me started about Exploring! *broad smile*)
As a nonprofit organization, the Council can arrange to have it's number(s) placed in every phone book along with the names and numbers of all other nonprofits for a small fee. Let's do it. We need to have the ability of any person interested in our program to call our professional staff and ask them how they can be involved or how they can help!!
Local Councils also have another important way that they can "get Scouting back out in the open": their own Scouts and Explorers! Back in the 70s, I participated with several members of my Council's professional staff, in speeches to various civic and church groups. The professional was on hand to answer the more technical questions of "who can charter and who cannot" and "why things are the way they are". But it was MY story of how much fun Scouting is, MY impressions on why Scouting needs the financial support it needs, and MY comments on how great summer camp is and how great it is to be able to get information from our Council office with a single call that convinced them, not the words of a bureaucrat. We need to continue to use our senior Scouts and Explorers, those that have enjoyed the "game of Scouting" and not those that "look great in a uniform", to tell the story of our local Council's implementation of Scouting to whomever we can get to listen.
Units can do a lot to help the positive image, and it starts with the unit leader and his or her advisor. Our youth leaders NEED TO BE OUT FRONT AND IN CHARGE. Of all of the things I've discussed here, the fact that our youth leaders are in a lot of places, life-sized "Muppets" of our adult advisors, is the most destructive reason why we haven't grown. I am sure that some of you remember the first time you heard that a group of Scouts went "camping down at" or "did so-and-so" at some place. You wanted to be there, and some of us joined for that exact reason. But it wasn't "Mr. Jones" or "Mr. Walton took us"...it was "John", "Pat", or "Joan showed us"....our peers, not some adult. Our youth leaders need to be "Large and In Charge" and they need to be promoted as THE PERSON IN CHARGE whenever we talk to anyone about supporting our unit or conducting a project using Scout help.
Both youth and adult leadership should take a more active charge in "showing our colors"...wearing our uniform the right way, the smart way, and the way in which it will promote our unit, ourselves and the BSA as a whole. We should give our Scouts more chances in which to wear their uniforms. This doesn't mean making a media event from each and every Troop or Pack meeting. This means that those that have a uniform, should wear one. Those that don't should be given the chance to earn one or to get one. The patches and insignia, Commissioners, should be in the right place and in the right combinations. The unit should once a year, take a group photo and display that photo in the lobby of the school where most of the members go to as well as in the lobby of the chartering partner organization. The unit should also arrange for more "nontraditional unit meetings or activities" each month. For instance, in my Troops overseas, the second Tuesday night of each month was "bowling and video game meeting night", IN UNIFORM. After a short opening AT THE BOWLING ALLEY, some business matters, and the collection of dues, the rest of the meeting was spent playing video games and bowling against the adults, the other Scouts in their Patrol and Troop, and against VISITORS and friends of the Troop members. The Scout saw this too, as a part of "the game of Scouting", the visitors got to see a part of Scouting in an environment not so wrapped up with ceremony and pomp, and we adults get to do what we're supposed to do: watch them grow, keep them from tearing up the place or injuring themselves or others, and talk with each other while drinking coffee or having a soft drink and a sandwich!
In typical Mike Walton fashion, I've gone too far with what I see is a critical problem with our program. I've been doing my part, by spending what little time and money I have to visit with and talk with as many Scouts and Scouters I can to explain to them that "all is not lost" in our present program and that they hold the key in Keeping the Promises Alive to our youth. Those of us that go to community groups, churches, schools and to our fellow Scouters cannot do it alone: we need MORE of us volunteers to go out and tell this story to everyone.
Our professional staff don't need to do this; we need them to "carry our weight" as substitute "players" when we cannot "play Scouting" due to our "real jobs" and family obligations.
WE NEED TO DO THIS OURSELVES AS VOLUNTEERS...and we need to dispel the "S-word" as something spoken only in whispers, only around our "own kind" and only around those that somehow may have a clue as to what we are all about. Let's NOT wait around for "national" or our local Council to do these things... we'll be waiting a long time for it to become "policy". We need to start today, not next month or with the start of the new program year, if we are to have any impact on our communities or cities.
The word "Scouting" has a proud lineage to it, a nice ring to it, and a great explanation associated with it. Let's not keep it to ourselves...let's go out and share what it is that we do for our youth, share the excitement and the love of our nation and community through this program, and let's all make Scouting something that once again can be something talked about openly with pride and with a high head and strong voice.
I'm "doing my best" to uphold my end of this "great Obligation". Are you?
Settummanque!
(MAJ) Mike L. Walton (Settummanque, the blackeagle) (
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Last edited: February 22, 2004
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