Run the World

A short opinion about the Boy Scouts of America decision to allow girls into the program.

If you're new to this story which broke a couple of days ago, the BSA Board of Directors have made a decision to allow girls first into the Cub Scouts starting next year and then, eventually (2019?), into the "Boy" Scouts so that they too can attain the BSA's highest award of Eagle Scout.  

Needless to say that the Girl Scouts of America is nonplussed.  

However, there are a couple of facts that needs to be considered:

The United Kingdom has had coed scouting since 1991.
The German Association of Guides and Scouts has groups of scouts that have been coed since 1976.
The Federation of French Scouting has groups of scouts that have been coed since 1971.

We are grossly late to the game.

Next, and I think that the Girl Scouts of America will agree, the two organizations offer completely different programs and attract parents and children for completely different reasons.  I believe that there is sufficient room for an all-girl Scouting experience as well as a co-educational Scouting experience.  

That said, the conversation through the years that I've overheard is one of: "I didn't do Girl Scouts because they sold cookies and I wanted to go camping."  Obviously, this is a matter of optics.  Girl Scouts and Brownies go hiking and camping.  Do they go with the frequency of the Cub Scouts?  I guess that depends on the troop leaders of both organizations.  However, you can't blame people for having that bias...on their own page for the Brownie Scouts, selling cookies is prominently featured:

"At Girl Scouts, she'll take that first hike in the great outdoors, visit a science museum, and band together as a mighty Brownie team to sell cookies (and use some of the money to help others). Life is good when you’re a Brownie!"

What kid wants to sell cookies?  Eat cookies, yes, but sell them?  I understand it's a means to an end, let's raise money to allow our organization to fund the other activities and give charitable donations.  But if service is your goal, remove selling cookies as your primary function!  Change your optics.  By contrast the Cub Scouts web site says:
"Some of the best things about Cub Scouting are the activities you get to do: camping, hiking, racing model cars, going on field trips, or doing projects that help your hometown and the people who live there. Cub Scouting means 'doing.'"

Yes, the Cub Scouts do sales as well, but those efforts aren't the focus of the boys responsibilities.

The long and the short of it is this, in my mind: if we integrate girls into Cub Scouting and then Scouting overall, it serves as an opportunity to get kids to recognize that both sexes at that early age and beyond can do everything the other does.  Boys, get used to it, girls are here to stay and they are just as strong and willing to do/accomplish everything you can do/accomplish.  I don't see this as a pilfering of girls who want to become part of the Girl Scouts of America, but more of an option for those girls turned off by the optics of a group whose focus is in fundraising and sedentary activities rather than hiking and camping.  That may not be the truth, but it is a common misconception.  
Instead of striking out at the Boy Scouts for a long overdue incorporation of girls, the Girl Scouts need to raise their game, change their optics and be proud of their program, a program that the Boy Scouts isn't looking to replicate or replace.