Rainbows and Brownies

[Yennah]

DD (6) has been going to Rainbows for just over a year. In the town where we live there are 4/5 units.

The unit we’ve been attending never takes part in the social stuff that the other groups do, which has included theatre trips, trips to a theme park, camping days etc. I get that it is all voluntary and I would be more than happy to help if our leader needed help to enable the group to go.

We were in town the other day and DD saw friends in Rainbows uniforms from other units all boarding a coach for yet another day trip which our unit wasn’t doing. I asked the Leader if our unit would be taking part in the next social outing and she just shrugged her shoulders and said probably not. I offered to help if extra hands were needed and she said no.

A few parents moved their daughters to other units. A new one opened just two mins from our house so I contacted the Leader to ask if we could transfer if not for Rainbows for Brownies. The Leader said she had a space and DD could start after half term.

DD has been really excited to be going to the new one, but yesterday I found out that the girl who had been physically bullying DD during reception and year 1 attends the new unit. I haven’t told DD and I don’t know what to do. Our school is two form and they are now in different classses which has stopped the bullying and DD has been much more confident in herself, but I’m worried it will all start again.

All I wanted was for DD to do the social bits as she’s an only child, but I’m really worrying now. I don’t feel I can backtrack on moving her as it is messing everyone around, but equally I don’t want DD to become a target again for this other girl.

Great. That's the unit closed down and the other volunteer run group I head up gone as well, then. Are you stepping in to take over?

I was a GG leader for five years so while I absolutely get where you're coming from, I know as well as you that it's not two hours a week. I don't think talking the OP like that is necessary.

OP, some leaders just find it difficult to do more on top of what's already needed usually because of life and the day job. I took my unit on one district trip and we did the yearly panto. My girls were happy with that. We never did a brownie holiday or sleepover. Every unit is different.

If you're concerned about the bullying in the new unit, speak to the leader

No because I already help out with a group. None of the leaders have anything close to the attitude you do, quite the opposite. Antsy parents are laughed about, it's supposed to be fun, it may be time for you to hand your groups over you're clearly burned out.

A 5 year old doesn’t put another 5 year in hospital leaving facial scars so I won’t “get a grip on that” or just forget. I’m sure if your child was hospitalised by another you wouldn’t just be thinking oh well the school has dealt with it! Onwards and upwards….!!

Move your daughter to scouting. They won't see each other at all other than maybe at remembrance parades.

In terms of trips, we had a rather inactive Rainbows groups fantastic Brownies group and now have a very active Guides unit.

It's so difficult as they are volunteers so it relies on the leaders having time and the inclination to do all these things. It is like having a second job, it's voluntary but there is still all the health and safely etc etc to be done.

At rainbows I actually ended up volunteering every week while my daughter went because they were short of adults and it kept things going. But I never would have got involved in an official, trip organising capacity - I was a parent helper making up the numbers and helping the kids sharpen pencils.

For the Brownies dilemma though - does your DD have a friend there already? If she does I'd give it a try, if she doesn't I'm inclined to say don't put your DD in front of the bully again.

It doesn't sound like you enjoy this voluntary role @stopbeingawalkoverandwalk

I'm not sure taking your frustrations out on the OP is fair. She's querying the bullying issue and pointing out differences in the units locally which are fair points.

@Yennah it sounds like the previous bullying was quite horrible and I wouldn't want my DC anywhere near that child. Is there another unit elsewhere that offers the social activities too?

Incidents at school do happen at that age.

If it was really that serious I would not be considering moving my child in an extra curricular with that child

My point is I didn’t know she went.

Im guessing you wouldn’t blink an eye then if your child physically attacked another child leaving them in hospital?

Ha ha ha. As I said, who am I handing them over to? Units are closing down, people don't volunteer, parents are full of excuses why their time can't be spent volunteering, but mine should spent be doing more for their children. "Helping out" is not the same as running something, training for something and taking on the responsibility.

Find another Rainbow group, not the one with the bully. If you move her now she's progress brownies with new friends.

Or as PP suggested trying beavers. Mix of boys and girls tends to mean less mean girls.

I would just leave her in the original unit if she's happy there. She'll be moving up to brownies soon anyway and presumably they will have different leaders and they may do more trips etc

Just sign her up for the new unit and if a place is offered speak to the leader about the issues between your daughter and the other girl. I admit I run a small rainbows unit (just 10 girls) but this is the sort of thing I would be all over and would deal with at the first sniff of trouble.

From her current leaders point of view though… I ran a trip just before we broke up for the summer. It was to a County organised trip, all we had to do was turn up. I hired a mini bus to get kids there, carried out umpteen risk assessments, gathered consent forms, organised our home contact for day then with one week to go the county cancelled the day with no explanation given. Bearing in mind we now had a minibus booked and paid for I scrambled and organised trip to the cinema instead. More risk assessments, changes to organised pick up and drop off times to fit with the screening, booking tickets and shopping for snacks etc. One trip left me almost £200 out of pocket because our unit bank account doesn’t have a debit card and no where accepts cheques. Perhaps the financial implications of being a leader are impacting your daughters current leader being able to run trips - even without having a trip to organise I claim at least £100 expenses every few months.

Why not volunteer again at the old pack to be a weekend leader? So current rainbow leader does regular meetings, you deal with everything else? We have one and she's great.

I'd imagine she might say no if she has no headspace to bring you in and train you up.

That is shocking!

I'm a rainbow and brownie leader. If I am not available on the day of a particular trip, every single parent could offer to help and it would not make a difference because you need to have someone there who is a DBS checked leader. The only thing that'd make a difference would be if one offered to become a leader and thus be able to lead the outing. My life is pretty busy outside of rainbows, I do what I can and I'm not perfect but I like to think on balance the girls have a good time when they're with me and that my best is still better than the unit being closed.

That said, if you want your daughter to take part in activities outside the meeting times you are well within your rights to move her. If the leaders there are any good they will listen to your concerns about this other child and structure activities so as to keep them apart.

While this post does sound quite aggressive, I can see where the poster is coming from. Parents can be quite demanding, and have absolutely no idea how much work is involved in organising a trip/extra activity on top of the week in/week out meetings

I'm a cub leader, and this term alone we have 12 evening meetings, one weekend camp, one museum trip, one night hike, and a swimming gala. That's a lot to organise! I'm constantly spinning plates to make it all happen, on top of two jobs, a family, and an elderly mum. Really, the only thing I ask is that parents get payments and paperwork returned to me on time. And yet at least half don't manage to do this, which then means I have to chase them up. I've started to get tougher about this, and now have (semi) inflexible deadlines. The parents know this. And yet one parent complained bitterly that their child will not be able to go on a trip, as they had missed the payment deadline by two weeks (I sent no less than 3 reminders) and I am not able to add their child to the trip now. They sent several emails to complain while I was on holiday (even though I told them I was away, and they should come and speak to me when I get back). Apparently it was my fault as they did not receive the emails (they did, I can see that the emails have been opened)

So, while on the whole I love my role as a cub leader, I can see that parents complaining that the leaders do not do enough can lead to leader upset and burnout.

I'm a rainbow's leader and I take our girls on two trips a year but the parents need to arrange the transport themselves. We don't have the funds for mini buses and I wouldn't be comfortable arranging appropriate car seats etc as some of the girls are very young. I only became leader as our old one stepped down and the unit was going to have to close. There is a tonne of admin that goes in to arranging trips and I have a full time job and two children so struggle enough to actively plan our meetings each week, which are mostly hall based as we only have an hour. There has also been a huge amount of training and courses I have had to do to be leader which is very time consuming - I do enjoy it but it's way more than giving up an hour a week. We have a number of children in our group with very serious allergies and ND issues which I'm responsible for so I'd prefer to keep trips to a minimum.

In your position OP I wouldn't move your daughter to the new unit as the bullying incident sounds quite serious.

I used to love doing Brownies but hated giving up my precious weekends to events. I didn’t have a family or partner and my weekends were for me. I did join in with all the district events. Some I felt were very expensive trips like legoland and I felt it put some parents under financial pressures. I used to say to them now you don’t have to go if your parents say it is expensive. There was muttering that not all my Brownies went, some in the district didn’t understand that not all parents were able to afford the outings. I was all for the cheaper outings. We had a very enthusiastic District Commissioner who wanted to do something every month luckily nothing came of it.

My partner is a leader and the amount of work and time she puts in for very little thanks is ridiculous, constantly having to chase parents up for cash etc. We both work FT and have a baby, I have no idea how/why she does it tbh

Beaver leader of 8y here. OP I'm sure that your DD would be welcome to try out your local Beavers and see how she gets on. We've had over 50% girls in our colony at times, sometimes the balance has tipped to be almost all boys. Shop around!

We have sleepovers, trips, hikes, county and district stuff and it would be a full time job if we did everything, and if we didn't have a great team across sections it would be hard to do much. I can see why Scouting is renaming people's roles to include the word volunteer. Some parents still don't realise it's unpaid and the planning, buying supplies, sitting doing risk assessments etc. is all done when we get home from work. As is all the mandatory training like first aid, safety and safeguarding. I expect Guiding is very similar!

I wouldn’t get hung up on the trips that other units do. If your dd enjoys her current brownie pack I’d keep her there. She’s being no less sociable in a village hall than she would be on a trip. I realise it was the 80s but I loved every minute of being a brownie, doing craft activities and games in the hall. The closest we ever came to a trip was a scavenger hunt on foot around the village. I wouldn’t move her to another one is there’s a girl who bullies her there.

Ex Guider here and now with a DD who has been through Rainbows and now in Brownies.

I had to stop being a Guider as the time commitment (at least two evenings a week - one meeting and one planning/organising/attending training) wasn't feasible with work and family life. Let alone weekend events. I now go as a parent helper which is a lot lot easier and without the responsibility!

DD was in one Rainbow unit that did a vast number of activities. Some organised by the unit, some the District. Some in school holidays. BUT the leader wasn't working and her own children were grown up so she had plenty of time to do it in!

The Brownie unit does one outside meeting nights activity per year because the leader has a full time job and family commitments.

Even if you offer to ‘help’ the leader still has to go and do all paperwork. It’s entirely voluntary. It’s a big ask to give up an extra evening or weekend on top of the weekly meetings and all the planning/paperwork. Lots of leaders work ft too or have caring responsibilities or young children.
Our brownie leader works (real paid job) weekends and can’t book off so her rainbows and brownies don’t go on some of the organised trips.
On top of my ft job I volunteer for gorlguiding one weekday evening. Since term started on top of weekly evenings I’ve done 1 in person evening event, 2 x zoom evening training sessions, one full Saturday trip 8-6 (had to pay dog care from own pocket) and got another 3 overnight trips, two full day trip before Xmas plus a compulsory all day first aid course.
I’m at a life space where I can do it but lots can’t.
We are desperate for volunteers so volunteer if you can.

If the bullying was as serious as you are saying, then why are you considering moving your DD to the unit where the other girl is, in effect to “prove a point” to the leaders of her current unit? Only move her if there is a third unit without this other girl.

At age 6, your DD will be old enough to join brownies in less than a year. Volunteer as a leader (not a helper) with a brownie unit now, or if the district is short of units, open a new unit and you'll then be able to organise all the trips you want.

It’s highly unlikely that you have less time available than many of the people currently volunteering as leaders, as they will also have jobs, children and caring responsibilities. There is a training programme to follow so you can learn how the programme is constructed, how to run meetings and other activities and how to deal with other aspects such as safeguarding, first aid, inclusion, risk assessments and accounts, so don’t let that stop you.