Scout groups not enough Volunteers

[girlfriend44]

Local Scout group has lots of children signed up but enough volunteers do in danger of closing.

Is this the same everywhere?
What stops people from volunteering?

Official age is 10.5 unless you have a good reason (eg leaders child). They can move up early, but it's generally discouraged at 10.

The problem with them going up as early as 10 is the younger kids mean the older ones tend to end up leaving sooner for various reasons. I genuinely don't think its helpful to put them up at age 10. The extra 6 months does make a difference at that age.

DS started Beavers and Cubs early and thats thrown things a bit for him as he is eldest in the year so is with the year above and older most of the time rather than with his friends in his own year who are some of the youngest. It ended up with him leaving Beavers after 2 years when some of his friends in his own year were just starting as they didn't get a space immediately on turning 6. It will work out in the end but the worry is that he will get bored before he hits 14.

I think we will probably try and hang on til 10.5 with cubs if we possibly can.

Oh and I do agree about the terminology being off putting. I got roundly criticised for not knowing correct names for a few levels. TBH I didn't care, other than making sure the minutes were correct, what with having my own paid job to worry about.

I've been a volunteer for nearly 10 years. First with Beavers, now with Scouts.

I'm autistic so sometimes find it hard. I try not to talk to parents, leave it to the other leaders. I don't like running meetings, so mainly go to stand around awkwardly and to make up leader numbers.

I love the admin (love doing OSM badge records) and planning though. So I come up with lots of ideas and then the other leaders do what I tell them. Mostly. They're not keen on the admin so it all works out well.

Our district lost around 100 volunteers over Covid, so many groups have had to join up to keep going. We have hardly any district team atm. With the lack of leaders for all sections opening Squirrels is not even an option.

I'm a single parent carer so don't work, and my children are older so I don't need someone else to look after my disabled son as his siblings are around to help. If I'd have been single when he was younger I wouldn't have been able to volunteer.

The eldest person involved in running our troop is 55. He doesn't lead weekly anymore. This was a deliberate strategy, that once your kids are done you can carry on helping around the edges and supporting but you don't take the lead. You have to develop parents coming through for a few years then hand over gradually. Where we've had a leader had to leave and dump on someone who hasn't had that support there's been problems.

The plan is simply to avoid being run by pensioners as it's inappropriate for most of the more physical stuff in scouting! Having seen people well into their 70s being sole leaders, im dead against it for a lot of reasons.

The second oldest guy in the group was the one who saved it from extinction due to it being run by pensioners. It just doesn't work for the kids. There been a plan in place for over 10 years now to make things work and bring back parents to the group.

I used to run our local Rainbows pack several years ago. I started as a volunteer helper so my oldest daughter could join and then ended up running it.

I quit for lots of reasons. No one would help. Parents thought that their £1 a week subs meant they were paying for childcare so it was perfectly fine to rock up to pick their little darlings up 15/20 minutes late.

My own children had long since left so it got to the point where I just got pissed off putting all this effort in running a group for the benefit other peoples’ kids when their own parents wouldn’t spend an hour and a half once a year helping out.

DH used to run a scout group and quit for much the same reasons as I did.

Just at the time where it said that more and more people are wanting to attend.

The more people in the team, the more the background load can be spread out so it's managable.

The real problem is when you're stuck in a survival cycle where someone steps up to save a unit from closing and has minimal support and it's often not sustainable for long before they burn out and the cycle repeats.

I joined one of my units many years ago. I'm the only leader currently not working but still carried on through the days when my young DCs were dropped off at 8am at childcare, a full day of work, pick DCs up, straight to unit and not home until past 8pm. Then parents would whinge that they couldn't possibly help in anyway because they were busy. Busy can be a matter of perspective.

Aside from busyness there is a split between those who volunteer and those who don't. When you get someone willing to help there normally is a background where they'll have form for helping out/ volunteering with other things. It's rare to pull in someone totally new to helping out. A lot of people just won't give their time for free and will just take what is offered. When too many people have that attitude the system breaks because you can't have more takers than givers.

Many also misinterpret the subs as being a salary for the volunteers and think their £2.50 per night is enough to pay 4+ people on top of room hire, resources and the census administration costs.

I've always given what I can spare because I realised as a teenager that my life was better because people gave up their time to create opportunities that enriched my life, and I continued that cycle to keep it working (and most of the time I enjoy it and am enriched by that)

Many volunteers get fed up dealing with pushy entitled parents who can't be arsed to pick their children up on time.

Same.
And the parents too.
Too many of them are selfish assholes that treat you with utter contempt.
(Most were lovely)

A friend's found it easier volunteering in a village community rather than a modern suburb. There is more sense of the village community working as its own little society that hasn't developed in the suburb.
The suburb has easier access to a range of accessible professional alternative activities too.

I no longer volunteer for stuff (was a school governor for best part of 10 years) because the obligations are now horrific, and responsibilities are more than I have to put up with in my paid job. I don't think it's a bad thing that more training is expected but at some point the hassle outweighs the benefits. Coupled with abuse from parents and the general thankless nature, I was extremely pleased to stop and won't be volunteering again for a long time.

I also had a flick through the Guide badge book and it left me cold for a reason I couldn't put my finger on - very "how to be a service human". My children aren't involved in scouting, despite me doing loads as a child and coming from a scouting family.

If you offer to help they will make 2 spaces for you - I guarantee.

Nope, they won't.
Tried that. Kids can't bypass the waiting list.

Our group would.

Ours would too.

Our group was in that situation.

One leader, drove the change. Now there is a completely different ethos. It took him being 'difficult' and an 'arsehole' to a couple of parents. He was more than reasonable in terms of how much he was putting in, in dictating to other parents that he wasn't their doormat or babysitter, though not all of them saw it like that!

I remember speaking to one unhappy parent, who didn't know I was friends with this leader. Her son got the boot because she never ever did anything to support the group. She was blathering on about how unreasonable he was and how she didn't have enough time to volunteer. She worked part time as a mid day assistant at primary school within 3 minutes walking distance. He worked full time (in the next town over) and was doing 2 or 3 nights a week just running scouting nights never mind the admin. It just doesn't wash as a reason. She simply couldn't be arsed. The leader, simply recognised that and acted accordingly. Its tough on the kids but otherwise its unsustainable for the whole group.

Once he got one other hard core volunteer they were able to build from that, by being completely uncompromising about parental help. Parents were TOLD, not asked what they would be doing if there were no immediate volunteers. It they didn't work it out then they were put on warning and eventually booted. It wasn't negotiable and he made a point of saying he was just a parent and if he was stepping up to do all this then they could do at least something. Now the group has a reputation for being run by parents, its putting off families who aren't up for doing something to support the group which makes it easier as parents have a much better attitude from the word go. They DO make exceptions for particularly vulnerable kids - but to be able to do that, they HAVE to have all the other parents pull their weight.

This is why I stress its NOT a lack of time. Its a question of attitude in almost all cases and this has to be made crystal clear to parents in an uncompromising way. Leader had to be utterly hard nosed and thick skinned about it to get to where we are now. There wasn't an alternative. If he gave an inch, parents would take a mile.

It CAN be turned around. But its hard to do.

Politics, responsibilities far outweighing those I have in my day job for no recognition.

Oh and in the case of Guides a complete lack of appropriate safeguarding of young girls - horrific. There is no way my daughter will ever be going through the Brownie/Guide system.

I volunteer where I feel comfortable, supported and not over-burdoned.

Yep. It’s so frustrating.

Rather than all the reasons why people don't volunteer it would be so much better to discuss why we do.

And more likely to encourage others to come forward.

I volunteer because

It's fun
I've made great friends with the other volunteers
It's great on my CV
I've had opportunities to do things I've never done before
It's really rewarding to see the children and young people learn new skills, have brilliant experiences and achieve things

Do you still have to have DC in scouting to volunteer or be a leader?
My DC loved being in scouts in their youth.

I'm a grandma who would love to do this.

Honestly thise thread has given me a real pang of regret.
I miss the kids, their happy tired little faces at the end of camp when they skipped out the door and said thank you.
I even miss the parents taking the piss out of me for turning up to the yearly cross country event with a hangover YET AGAIN.
Playing dodgeball, cooking for 40 on gas bottles in a field.
I used to always get something in my eye when they grew too big for cubs and left for scouts without a backwards glance.

But the commitment was huge. I may revisit it one day, but not now.

I'm the only leader in our Group who has children in the Group. Only requirement is passing DBS and completing stuff like your safeguarding training.

I'm not sure having one is compulsory, certainly not all our leaders have kids

I quit because of the parents.

We asked them to help at a maximum of one session a term (sometimes it would be once every two terms) and you'd see them pushing the kids in the door and running when it was their turn (I was with beavers and cubs) and I got fed up of waiting for the parents who picked up their kids an hour late.

Plus the attitude that they were paying for this so we were the paid help except we weren't paid and even if we were why would you treat people so rudely?

It’s definitely an issue elsewhere, our local scout group is always calling out for volunteers.

The issue with our local group however is most are put off after a recent ‘scandal’

by recent it happened a couple of years ago, but a parent made a quite serious unfounded accusation that ruined the reputation of two of the volunteers so no one (especially dads) has risked it since.