GS are just cookie dealers that sometimes go camping. Between my two kids each being one or both programs the GS spend 70% of their meetings and time together talking about and planning cookie sales. The Scouts go on twice as many camping trips and only fund raise around Christmas. But one kid whom is in the more camp group is in the richer areas troop meanwhile the GS is in the lower income area so they tend to just try to make money.
My point in GS is for the kids you want to someday be in sales and the Scouts are for the kids who want to experience the outdoors.
I was attending the informational sessions from both GirlScouts and Scouts while trying to make the call for our daughter and the tone shift was jarring, where GirlScouts it was all “we’re going to sell cookies and learn important things you need to know as a girl” and became honestly kinda sexist and just tried to badmouth Scouts when I asked how it compares. Meanwhile Scouts it was just “look we’re going to go hiking and camping and make a race car to race and have fun!” (and had the exact same answer when I asked how Scouts compares to GirlScouts)
So yeah we ultimately went with the more inclusive option that didn’t recoil at the idea of her wanting her brother who she adores to join and didn’t turn to badmouthing the alternative when asked how they compare. And guess what, she’s having a blast and it feels weird that it was ever a gendered thing in the first place!
A big part of the problem with girl scouts, in my opinion, is that a lot of the time the troops are kind of temporary.
Usually group of girls and their parents (usually moms, who may or may not have any scouting experience of their own) start up a troop, more-or-less from scratch when the girls are brownie or daisy-aged, and then that’s pretty much it, they don’t really do any ongoing recruitment, it stays just those same girls until they all either quit or age out of the program and then the troop dissolves.
Meanwhile, the (boy scout) troop I came up through is going to be celebrating its 100 year anniversary in a year or two. They have a garage full of troop gear, money in the bank, and decades of institutional knowledge of how to be a scout and how to run a scout program. We had one or two kids whose or father and I think even grandfather had earned their eagle from the same troop, the current scoutmaster was in the troop a couple years before me and his kids are in it now, the one before him was already scoutmaster when I started before his kid was old enough to join and stayed on for a few years after his son aged out, and every year we got a new batch of kids joining, some years more than others sure, but there was always new blood coming in
So there’s a lot more continuity and something like generational wealth going on with the BSA. Girl scouts generally need to hit the cookies and fundraising hard because they’re often kind of starting from 0 (not that there isn’t some valid criticism about how the cookie sales work and how the money is distributed and used, but I don’t know enough about that to really go into it)
And as far as recruitment, boy scouts made it really easy to find a troop, there’s a website you can go on and find all of the ones near you, so if your kid just suddenly wanted to join, or if you moved and needed to find a new one it was dead simple to look that up. At least at the time when I was in, girl scouts didn’t really have anything similar, unless you were already in the know about when and where the existing troops met you were kind of SOL if you wanted to join one. I remember one of our leaders talking about some sort of community event they were trying to put together, they had some representatives from a couple other local organizations and other scout troops and such coming, and they wanted to see if any of the local girl scout troops would want to take part, but he just couldn’t get in touch with any of them, couldn’t find contact info, when he reached out to their local council they basically stonewalled him
And unfortunately just by the nature of it usually being the moms who are the involved parents with girl scouts as opposed to usually the dads, with boy scouts there’s often a bit less outdoorsy knowledge to build on (some of my best hiking/camping/fishing buddies are women, but until I was the one who started inviting them out, a lot of them had never done much that kind of thing, and unfortunately that’s not a terribly uncommon situation, whereas guys tend to be more likely to grow up doing that sort of thing with their dads)
All that said, I’ve known a decent amount of girl scouts, and while a lot of them got stuck with shitty programs, there were a handful that actually probably went harder than we did in boy scouts. The odds aren’t exactly in your favor of ending up in one of those girl scout troops, but with the right parents, kids, and resources they actually can put on a really good outdoor program (and their campgrounds are usually really nice as well) they just don’t have the systems in place to make sure that all of their troops are able to do that to the same extent boy scouts can.
By allowing transgender scouts, the organization now joins the Girl Scouts of America, an unaffiliated scouting group, in its policies toward gender identity. In 2015, Girl Scouts USA confirmed that it indeed welcomes transgender scouts—a position that was challenged openly when a donor pledged $100,000 with the stipulation that it not support transgender girls. The organization turned down the donation, set up a campaign called “Girl Scouts Is For Every Girl,” and then raised more than $338,000 from donors supportive of transgender girl scouts. Girl Scouts USA’s official policy is that, though troop placement depends on the best interests of the child, kids who are recognized by their family and live in a community as a girl can enroll as Girl Scouts.
Scouts = boyscouts. Girls scouts is far worse and they’re not associated.
GS are just cookie dealers that sometimes go camping. Between my two kids each being one or both programs the GS spend 70% of their meetings and time together talking about and planning cookie sales. The Scouts go on twice as many camping trips and only fund raise around Christmas. But one kid whom is in the more camp group is in the richer areas troop meanwhile the GS is in the lower income area so they tend to just try to make money.
My point in GS is for the kids you want to someday be in sales and the Scouts are for the kids who want to experience the outdoors.
I was attending the informational sessions from both GirlScouts and Scouts while trying to make the call for our daughter and the tone shift was jarring, where GirlScouts it was all “we’re going to sell cookies and learn important things you need to know as a girl” and became honestly kinda sexist and just tried to badmouth Scouts when I asked how it compares. Meanwhile Scouts it was just “look we’re going to go hiking and camping and make a race car to race and have fun!” (and had the exact same answer when I asked how Scouts compares to GirlScouts)
So yeah we ultimately went with the more inclusive option that didn’t recoil at the idea of her wanting her brother who she adores to join and didn’t turn to badmouthing the alternative when asked how they compare. And guess what, she’s having a blast and it feels weird that it was ever a gendered thing in the first place!
Girl Scouts is terfy af, too.
A big part of the problem with girl scouts, in my opinion, is that a lot of the time the troops are kind of temporary.
Usually group of girls and their parents (usually moms, who may or may not have any scouting experience of their own) start up a troop, more-or-less from scratch when the girls are brownie or daisy-aged, and then that’s pretty much it, they don’t really do any ongoing recruitment, it stays just those same girls until they all either quit or age out of the program and then the troop dissolves.
Meanwhile, the (boy scout) troop I came up through is going to be celebrating its 100 year anniversary in a year or two. They have a garage full of troop gear, money in the bank, and decades of institutional knowledge of how to be a scout and how to run a scout program. We had one or two kids whose or father and I think even grandfather had earned their eagle from the same troop, the current scoutmaster was in the troop a couple years before me and his kids are in it now, the one before him was already scoutmaster when I started before his kid was old enough to join and stayed on for a few years after his son aged out, and every year we got a new batch of kids joining, some years more than others sure, but there was always new blood coming in
So there’s a lot more continuity and something like generational wealth going on with the BSA. Girl scouts generally need to hit the cookies and fundraising hard because they’re often kind of starting from 0 (not that there isn’t some valid criticism about how the cookie sales work and how the money is distributed and used, but I don’t know enough about that to really go into it)
And as far as recruitment, boy scouts made it really easy to find a troop, there’s a website you can go on and find all of the ones near you, so if your kid just suddenly wanted to join, or if you moved and needed to find a new one it was dead simple to look that up. At least at the time when I was in, girl scouts didn’t really have anything similar, unless you were already in the know about when and where the existing troops met you were kind of SOL if you wanted to join one. I remember one of our leaders talking about some sort of community event they were trying to put together, they had some representatives from a couple other local organizations and other scout troops and such coming, and they wanted to see if any of the local girl scout troops would want to take part, but he just couldn’t get in touch with any of them, couldn’t find contact info, when he reached out to their local council they basically stonewalled him
And unfortunately just by the nature of it usually being the moms who are the involved parents with girl scouts as opposed to usually the dads, with boy scouts there’s often a bit less outdoorsy knowledge to build on (some of my best hiking/camping/fishing buddies are women, but until I was the one who started inviting them out, a lot of them had never done much that kind of thing, and unfortunately that’s not a terribly uncommon situation, whereas guys tend to be more likely to grow up doing that sort of thing with their dads)
All that said, I’ve known a decent amount of girl scouts, and while a lot of them got stuck with shitty programs, there were a handful that actually probably went harder than we did in boy scouts. The odds aren’t exactly in your favor of ending up in one of those girl scout troops, but with the right parents, kids, and resources they actually can put on a really good outdoor program (and their campgrounds are usually really nice as well) they just don’t have the systems in place to make sure that all of their troops are able to do that to the same extent boy scouts can.
This is an extremely well thought-out comment. As someone with experience in both camps (literally), you hit the nail on the head here.
Scouting America teaches kids how to be soldiers. Girl Scouts teaches girls how to be ruthless boardroom headhunters.
So really, the difference is minimal.
Girl Scouts is much more troop driven than boy scouts. It kind of sounds like your girl’s troop leader just isn’t very motivated.
Heh, then I guess Cub Scouts are popcorn dealers that sometimes go camping. :)
GS are trans inclusive. So.
You sure?
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/boy-scouts-will-allow-transgender-children-180961982/
I do agree GS has far better messaging and consistency on it though.
Well . . . Yeah. In the article it says