<p>I wasn’t a Girl Scout - Camp Fire was more popular where I lived. Blue Birds through 12th grade. We did lots and lots of camping, hiking, skiing, etc. Our leader’s standard of excellence was “can you build a one-match fire in the wind and the rain?”
We probably did some crafts at some point.
Loved the summer camp (despite water so cold it was dangerous to stay in long).</p>
<p>My daughters spent time in GS so I was a leader and have a membership card somewhere.</p>
<p>Plus I joined a co-ed group of Boy Scouts in HS. They were cute and had sailboats!</p>
<p>I am a Girl Scout…I was as a girl, I am as an adult. I volunteer with our Council for Product Sales, in the Service Uni and in D’s troop. D has earned her Bronze, Silver and Gold Awards. I don’t agree with everything (hate the annual training for Cookie Sales–really separate the returning from new Cookie Mgrs), but overall it’s a great program for girls. My D has earned all the money for her Scout events in Product sales…cross country trip for 6 days (airfare, hotel, theatre, etc), white water rafting, horseback trail rides, camping etc. I’m really proud of her. Both D and I are/will be lifetime members as of October 1 (her current membership expires then). </p>
<p>FYI few Councils still require annual Leader training. And a lot of training is now online.</p>
<p>My D’s didn’t do Girl Scout summer camp. Where we live Camp Fire Camp is more popular.
My youngest had attended & or worked at camp fire camp for ten years, and received her ten yr plaque a few years ago. Her sister who had been riding staff came up from Oregon to speak which was pretty cool.</p>
<p>They both were very sad when they no longer could afford to work at camp summers, because they wanted to increase their earnings for college.
Still a great place though- many memories.</p>
<p>monthly leader meetings in this day of email? our Service Unit has 2-3 meetings/year - one in Sept/Oct with dessert & coffee to discuss the year; one possibly in January to get together and a thank-you dinner in June (with wine!). Besides trainings, all other info is communicated by email. </p>
<p>My troop had also banked nearly $1000/girl through cookies sales & concession stands and we did a year-end trip. </p>
<p>I haven’t read the Kathy Cloninger book yet, as I met her at the 2008 convention and had some cross words with her about some governance issues at National…</p>
<p>One cool thing about GS, is that it can be almost anything you want it to be… at least that’s how it was in D’s first troop. It was coop style, and we took any requirements (I’m guessing there are some?) pretty lightly. But it did get us to try camping, and a few other more exotic activities (dancing at Carnival, sampling flying). But we left that troop partly because I didn’t have the time or energy, and D joined a more traditional troop. This leader actually needed the income from GS activities (especially cookies) for her D to go to camp and such (where the other troop was more of an excuse to SPEND money). So there were some service activities and many crafts, but it was a bit boring. D is still friends with most of those girls though, and the whole thing was completely worthwhile.</p>
<p>^^ We were definitely a laissez-faire troop, where the girls decided on all the activities and the type of troop we would be. That meant less camping as they matured (boo!) and more cooking and horseback riding…</p>
<p>We had fifty girlsnin pur troop…yup…it was awesome…yes we sacrificed some things, but made up with such a varietybof girls…we marched in parades, met the mayor, did flag ceremony for a major international education convention, </p>
<p>For some girls it was thebonly out of school activity, for others it only chance putnof school to be with other women, as their moms were not there for a variety of reasons, for some it their only exercise beyond school, we did the cookies, we did visits to veterans hositals, we worked at the food bank, we didn’t emphasize uniforms or badges</p>
<p>It was such a great experience</p>
<p>I grew up as a girl scout, and my girls did it till high school</p>
<p>I was the most incompetent Girl Scout leader ever. In my first year as a leader, our troop managed to earn ONE badge, and even then I had to do some serious data fudging for certain girls to qualify. I hung in there for 10 years, 7 of them with two troops (one each for my two youngest ds). I can’t imagine why I did it now, because there was a LOT more aggravation than enjoyment. I was close friends with my co-leaders and some of the other women in our service unit, so it wasn’t completely miserable. But the irritation of dealing with other people’s kids was extreme at times, and it gave me a whole new level of appreciation for teachers, who do that every day. I realize now that a lot of girls with behavioral issues and, possibly, Aspergers and similar conditions were in my troops, but it took me a long time to figure out that not every kid can focus and follow rules.</p>
<p>It was through Girl Scouts that I learned that Mean Girls start early. If I could do it all over again, I wouldn’t.</p>
<p>Not to say that it isn’t a worthwhile organization, because of course it is. I think the cookies are a racket, though, and that the organization should rely less on funds generated by very young kids.</p>
<p>I was a Girl Scout from second grade through high school. Thru the Wider Opportunity program I was able to go across the country to attend an arts conference at the age of 15 or 16 and meet girls from all over the country.</p>
<p>My daughter was a Scout until 10th grade when her troop fell apart after they all attended a jamboree of Girl Scouts, Girl Guides, and BOY Scouts in England – over 4,000 teenagers! They spent two years raising money and preparing for the trip. Her troop was originally girls from Daisy level through Senior Scouts, and they all met on the same Saturdays in different rooms in the building. The older ones mentored the younger ones. My daughter’s group was inspired to go to the WINGGS jamboree because the girls just older than she had gone to the one four years earlier, and a few were returning as Campus Scouts.</p>
<p>Girl Scouts USA is a great organization. I have grumbled many times about Scouts’ gazillion rules, but they are designed to keep the girls safe. Some non-Scout came to our DOOR BY HERSELF to sell cookies for her cousin, and my daughter really chewed her out, as that is 100% against the rules. We could have been child molesters, gang bangers, or pimps for all she knew. </p>
<p>In DD’s and my experience, Girl Scouts is also a safe and supportive place where non-straight identified girls and women can be members and staff. Agenda? No. But sexual orientation was never an issue.</p>
<p>Both my daughter and I lasted until the middle of elementary school. As a kid, I thought it was a bore, and then our troop folded for who knows what reason. </p>
<p>My daughter’s troop was unfortunately located just close enough to Washington DC for the love of overly complicated processes to have rubbed off on the leadership. Our Grand Poobah Local Leaders LOVED the paperwork, the adult training, the adult meetings… It took a congressional order and someone certified in leadership and first aid just to take a girl to the bathroom around here.</p>
<p>Our original troop leaders decided to step down when our daughters were midway through elementary school. The rest of us declined to take over, and that was the end of it. </p>
<p>The troop that had the most fun and lasted the longest at our school was the one whose troop leader ignored the rules from above. It was spoken about in hushed tones at the adult leader meetings as “That” troop.</p>
<p>Which is not a reflection of scouting in general. Good organization, just a few overly tense leaders in my neck of the woods.</p>
<p>The Leader makes a huge difference is the Girl Scout experience. I’ve done the job–both for my D’s troop (up until 8th grade, then she joined the local Senior troop–it’s been around for 30+ years), and for a group of Daisys no one would lead. It’s much easier when your D isn’t in the troop.<br>
D’s troop Leader has no girls in the troop, her daughters have both graduated college. It cuts down the drama significantly. I’m not saying it’s perfect, but it’s good. They have several events they do each year (I think more girl choice should go into that), and generally the girls are happy. They have the opportunity to learn a lot–Travel, budgets (troop runs on a ledger system), leadership, etc. Who the Leader is makes a big difference. And that can be a plus or a minus.</p>
<p>Mom2M, you’re made of better stuff than I am. It would never have occurred to me to lead a troop without one of my own ds in it. I first became a leader when the troop coordinator told me that the only way to get my oldest d into a troop was to start one for her, since all existing troops were full. Oldest d thought she desperately wanted to be a Girl Scout, so I caved. </p>
<p>My own ds were never a problem for me in scouting. (At home, all the time.) They caused none of the drama during meetings, trips, service days, etc. (At home, all the time.) The hard part for me was knowing how to manage kids who didn’t do what they were expected to do. If you don’t want to do a flag ceremony, say the Girl Scout promise, do the activities required for the badge you said you wanted to earn, what are you doing here? This is a Girl Scout meeting, not a playdate for 15 kids. Why rebel against me? I’m not your mother, not your teacher, not your babysitter. I’m someone else’s mom, making it possible for you to do something you supposedly want to do. It just got way too frustrating for me.</p>
<p>Wait a minute - were you in my service unit, too? Some of the other leaders in my cluster made me feel like a total Girl Scout loser slacker. All I wanted was to give “my troop” a chance to do what THEY wanted to do in an environment that fostered their own desires and ambitions. Often, what the girls wanted to do was nothing like what those other leaders thought we should do.</p>
<p>Guess we were “that” troop. On the plus side, I am still friends with most of my girls, four years after the troop dissolved. The biggest thrill of Scout leadership was watching those girls mature into confident young women…</p>
<p>Camp Fire as a girl, Girl Scouts with my daughter. Really, really overdid the involvement in Girl Scouts (you name it at the council, I did it). But the troop was a blast, and they were together from kindergarten through 12th grade. Took them on the pilgrimage to Savannah in junior high. Lots of camping trips. Not much crafts - these girls were seriously craft-challenged!</p>
<p>But I do want to say something about offering a safe environment for girls to discuss things. One girl, who was 16 at the time, stated that if you use a tampon, you’re not a virgin any more. There’s a lot of nonsense being passed around, and having this safe environment can help the girls sort things out. I didn’t initiate conversations like this, but did take advantage of “teachable moments”.</p>
<p>I was a brownie and scout and 4H member. It was fun and I loved the camp in the Sierras. We did projects, got badges and sold cookies. I remember lessons in 4H. I went to church also, sang in the choir but that didn’t have anything to do with scouting or 4H. I never rode my horse to church! I had to dress up. Nope, I knew how to separate all those things back then. I still do. My son was in scouts. They made him feel bad in the end. He had to swear allegiance to god. He didn’t like that. He liked the hikes though and playing with his friends. Pity.</p>
<p>With a computer, GS paperwork is really a non-issue…create your troop roster in excel w the standing emergency contacts, have the troop trip forms in word with the standard stuff filled out, then just update for the specific trip, email to your service unit manager and your are done. Same thing for permission slips…they are more a CYA and give you permission to get kids medical treatment, as well as inform the parent when to drop off & pick up. (I was a trainer for 8+ years, so I tried to talk everyone down from this myth). </p>
<p>My biggest issue with my troop was the brain dead parents, the ones that never dropped off, nor picked up on time and the ones that never did a dam thing for the troop. One year our cookie pick up was the Saturday morning of our February break and both leaders & cookie mom were busy, so I asked the mom who’s little darling had been in the troop 5+ years if she could do it (she had a minivan) and we would get them from her Sunday night. Nope…too stressful & too much responsibility for her.</p>
<p>Parents can be the most stressful part of Girl Scouts. </p>
<p>Having the Daisy troop (without my D in the troop) was fun. I like the little kids. And I only dealt with the parents in the troop setting, they were not parents of D’s friends or classmates (D was much older0. So I ran the troop like a business…emailed permission slips, kept the deadlines, etc. Really much easier than leading a troop that includes a bunch of your D’s friends, and their parents. And at that time, Daisy Girl Scouts did not sell cookies.</p>
<p>nj2011, that reminds me of my worst moment as a troup leader. A mom had volunteered to be cookie mom, which was great…until she missed the meeting about how to order, ordered too many boxes ( this was back in the '80s), and to top it off when I went to get the money from her - she had opened all the girl’s envelopes at once and poured all the cash and checks into one pile…which came up short of course. Turns out she also had a “wee drinking problem”, which explains a lot.</p>
Yes, this got old for me, too.</p>