Not bashing thread, but concerned about belittling behaviour of some GG Leaders

Another thing that's very different between Scouts and Guides is how well resourced they are.
Many Scout units have property and permanent facilities. Their leaders are trained to deliver activities, like climbing and abseiling. Local to me are two seperate places, both with accomodation, and adventurous activities. A friend of mine was a parent helper for Scouts for a while and was amazed to find out that her son's unit had more than £100k in the bank as they've been fundraising for years to buy a field.
Guides on the other hand owns very little property indeed. Maybe 3 large activity centres across the England, not sure if they own or rent their London offices. Local units rent rooms to have meetings so often also have chronic storage problems.
My DD's unit does lots of outdoorsy and active things, but this usually means buying in someone with the relevant qualifications otherwise it's not insured. For units with little money this just isn't possible.
The infrastructure for Guides to be more like Scouts just isn't there.

I think a lot of it is down to individual section leaders, but there doesn't seem to be much oversight by area leaders or encouragement to do things differently. My DD went to the local guides for a while but, under the guise of being 'girl led' all they ever did most sessions was hang around chatting and have a walk to the local sweet shop (loosely labelled as exercise). They occasionally had 'pamper nights' (doing each other's make-up/face masks etc). The same leaders ran the only 2 groups in the area. A friend who is an experienced guider and wanted to do run a more active group was told that there was no section free for her to run and 'no call' for more outdoorsy activities in the current sections.

Unsurprisingly, loads of girls want to join the local scouts (who do loads of activities) so there is a long waiting list. Since those who have been in the group beavers/cubs get priority over places, and most of the girls want to be in rainbows/brownies when they are younger it means lots of girls miss out. I know that this has been raised with the local guiding leaders.

On Sunday I accompanied my son to his scout troop parade for remembrance. Several troops from around the wider area were there as well as sea cadets etc.However, there were no guides, brownies or rangers. A lot of girls were there though, as they're in the scouts, Cubs, beavers etc.

I noticed the same thing - we have been going for a number years as DS has worked his way up through beavers, cubs and now scouts. There have never been any Rainbows/Brownies/Guides at the rememberance parade. I know there is (or at least was) local Rainbows and Brownies. Is it GG policy that they don't attend?

GG is rubbish in my area (toomuch sit down craft / baking and the kids are over it. They aren’t toddlers!)

So the girls all join the Scouts.

So the Scouts has years long waiting lists and mostly biys don’t get in. 🤦‍♀️

I think it depends on the group. My son has had lots of opportunities to light fires, tie knots, make tents from basic things, paddle board, hike etc in the 6 months he's been there. Sadly a few activity days have been scuppered by Covid. The leaders are really adventurous and bouncy though. Also done a wide range of other community spirit things.

On Sunday I accompanied my son to his scout troop parade for remembrance. Several troops from around the wider area were there as well as sea cadets etc.

However, there were no guides, brownies or rangers. A lot of girls were there though, as they're in the scouts, Cubs, beavers etc.

Is this normal?

I loved brownies but got sick of guides which was very much as you describe in the op the very late 80's / early 90s in the area I was in. I don't think that was common though as a friend was in a different group and did much more, but I think she unofficially switched to scouts as her parents ran the scout troop. So she helped out. I can't remember if you could join scouts then as a girl or not.

Later joined venture scouts which was much more fun.

To be fair, I remember Brownies as a kid as being all about learning to make cups of tea for adults and doing crafts, so anything would be an improvement on that.

I’m disappointed with them at the moment, though. All of the leaders of DD’s pack suddenly stopped over lockdown and wouldn’t continue - nobody would say why, so I don’t know if they fell out or if they object to the trans stuff or whatever. It’s a shame, though; it was a full pack of girls who were really enjoying it. I know the leaders are volunteers - my mum was a Brown Owl for years - but you’d think that GG might do a bit to help in this situation: they haven’t even been in touch with parents to acknowledge the situation exists.

Girlguiding’s current programme has moved it into being an organisation for white middle-class children with strong adult support structures & engagement - oh & those adults will really need to be fluent in English as well for the younger sections.

Girlguiding were made aware of these issues during the renewal period. If any response was received, it was essentially “la la la WE CAN’T HEAR YOU”. Far worse than the endless ignoring of Volunteers having issues with the hideously clunky database they have to enter absurd amounts of information into & endlessly update.

No help with/interest in the fact that the timings on the - compulsory, to be clear - activities are frequently wildly wrong. Absolutely no guidance as to adapting them to meet the needs - whatever they may be - of individual Units…

Girlguiding has serious issues with institutional ableism & racism - to say nothing of a power structure that doesn’t just allow for but essentially encourages absolutely egregious behaviour by certain select volunteers.

My boys have had a similar experience at cubs. It's all about community spirit, which I can't exactly complain about, but it's really dull! Lots of weeding the planters on the high Street, and cleaning the church steps. No fires, or knots, or shelters, or anything that I was expecting really.

My DD used to go to Brownies. Then she had to come with me to Cubs one evening as I was on the Parent Rota for DS. She loved it and ditched Brownies. Cubs was much more running round and doing exciting things (this evening she did Air Rifle shooting). Brownies were all about crafts - how many bird feeders do you need?

OTOH my friend is a Guide leader and her daughter is a Guide and they seem to do really fun, active, outdoor stuff. So a lot does depend on the leaders.

Eggybrains in what way?

MrsJamin and the unit my DD goes to has done all of the adventurous stuff and continues to do so. But I'm not sure about the wider experience girls will be having across the country. I am well aware of some of the criticism GG has attracted and whilst some is warranted, most units are run by dedicated and thoughtful volunteers who do get training and support.

I can't tell you how disappointed I am about the car crash that is GG as an organisation now. Changed beyond recognition from what it was when we were children. Seems now to just be a money making exercise.

This is completely not the case regarding local grassroots volunteers who are often doing so much in trying circumstances. But Girlguiding as an organisation is awful. They don't seem to care at all about the girls in their care.

I believe their membership numbers have dropped from 535k in 2013 to 240k now (young members, not including adults/ volunteers). At that rate they don't have long left.

SOME Guide units were always like this, it does depend massively on the leaders IMO. The one I was in eventually folded due to a lack of leaders/helpers, but even before that had been limping along doing relatively unexciting activities and mostly confined to the hall (apart from a couple of camps that were good) - not sure how much was due to the personality of the leaders, and how much just down to not having enough help. Brownies before that was fairly twee too, lots of crafts and "games" that mostly involved very rigid songs and dances rather than running around. Meanwhile my brother was an Air Scout and got to go up in a plane, as well as doing more exciting routine activities, but they wouldn't let me in!

The Scout movement seems to have a lot of emphasis at the moment on getting members (kids) to help determine their direction, propose activities etc., but it sounds as though that maybe hasn't happened in Guiding?

My reply was to Babdoc

I don't think that's the case. But the types of activity a unit will do will depend on the Leader. There's been a lot of Leaders lost during Covid, but I suspect Scouts may have a similar issue.

I love the fact that my boys have always been pushed out of their comfort zones with scouting: taking risks, doing long hikes, cooking outside on fire from young, etc. No wonder young women have such trouble with mental health and hang ups about being perfect when they never risked anything when young and didn't do stuff wrong, made mistakes and learned from them. I feel so sad for girls who decide to stick to guiding, I must say.

I wonder if, now that girls can join cubs and scouts, the girl guides top brass think that all the outdoor sporty tomboy girls will have gone there instead, so they are tailoring guide activities to sedentary, gender stereotyped cooking/crafts/girly stuff?

my DD has said Scouts is more fun, they do more adventurous things there, but seems to me more to do with their leaders than the organisation

Scouts put a lot of effort into supporting and training leaders and there is a lot of organisation at a regional level. My (complete outsider) impression is that GG don't have that to the same extent.

A few years ago my daughter was excited to be picked to go to a regional brownie camp. It was at a site my son had been to with cubs. We knew it had climbing towers, assault courses, ropes course, streams to build rope bridges over, lots of varied space for wide games, large communal camp fire area etc. So we both had high expectations of a weekend of outdoor adventure. The weather was nice so nothing to stop them... They spent the whole time in a large marquee doing crafts. She came back so disappointed and switched to cubs.

I don’t know what the event you attended was, but wonder if the organisers are still in covid-fear risk-assessment mode? So many of the more adventurous activities were discouraged when I was doing my RA last term. This term I’ve branched out more and while we are limited by the venue and lack of adult volunteers I think it’s been a fun term. I do find that large scale events are always a bit more restricted tbh. And the paperwork element compared to Scouting is insane. As a result I don’t tend to do anything other than unit meetings, I just cannot find the time or inclination when it generally ends up being a bit rubbish.
If your girls are having fun at meetings and numbers are high, like mine are, then keep doing what you’re doing. All units will be influenced by the volunteers who run them and where their interests lie. I won’t ever take mine away overnight, it’s not something I can do, so yes maybe that is a shame but it’s weekly meetings or not at all.
I sometimes think people forget that Guiding and Scouting leaders are volunteers.

My DD’s guide unit encourages the girls to have a say on what activities they want - and they really listen to the girls
However my DD has said Scouts is more fun, they do more adventurous things there, but seems to me more to do with their leaders than the organisation - the scouts take them camping and the leaders also pitch a tent to sleep in, the guides, they take them glamping - since the leaders have confessed not being fans of proper camping