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

[espresso14]

I'm a GG Unit Leader (I won't say which section), the unit is doing well, very active, energetic, we've had a lot of new joiners from word of mouth recently, so must be doing something right.

Took the girls away to a GG Central organised trip and my jaw was on the floor! Volunteers who are far more experienced than me belittled the girls, the whole time there was a strict expectation to confirm to often rigid, sedentary activities that were pretty dry. No invitations or opportunity to the girls to speak up and influence the weekend to be more active, or dare I say it, fun! When they tried, they were told "no, that's not what we're going to do."

By the end I felt like Wednesday Addams at Camp America. I am shocked, I thought this organisation was about encouraging confidence, self belief and girl led. I saw a lot of controlling and "sit down, shut up" culture.

Is my experience common? I believe there are lots of great people at grass roots, I think we'll just do our own thing from now on. I'm fairly sure the organisers thought I was a PITA too, my "Wednesday Addams" attitude was all over my face by the end.

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.

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.

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.

@ViceLikeBlip

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.

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.

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. 🤦‍♀️

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?

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.

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.

DD is heavily invested in GG. Belongs to a unit, volunteers for other units. If I had things to do again I would have enrolled her in Scouts instead. She's been in a few units as we relocated due to DH's job. When she started out, they camped, they had sleepovers, lots of outdoor things. Now they bake, draw, put on plays, the only good thing they've done in a long while is collect for the food bank. Everything is so sedentary.
They also have a couple of less able members, one who won't cope with camping, there's no one to support her, so no one gets to camp.
Also get annoyed by the cost and quality of uniform, DDs top logo has peeled, the hoodie is bobbly (her old Guide one still looks new after years of wear) her badge holder was so feeble that the pin fell off it. The leaders hunted down some older senior section ones to replace them.

Your right Beamur, locally we can "buy in" Scout expertise. Guide unit leaders have to pay themselves for qualifications in adventurous things, but also even if you have that, you don't have the necessary kit for your unit.

@Runningupthecurtains

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?

Guides and Brownies were at our local parade but many fewer.

Another thing that's very different between Scouts and Guides is how well resourced they are.

Yes I've noticed this.

My brownies and guides borrowed a playgroup and school premises.

All the cub, scout and venture scout groups I've been to either myself or via my son have had a hut and then a larger joint local area activity centre with land and forest. There's a huge one in Gateshead too that you can hire for other things that has zip wires etc.

Similar issues in my country with Guides and Scouting. I think it reflects general trends with child related activities.

It's weirdly split, I find. My husband was involved for many years in scouts, and as a child, at 13, he and his friends hiked a 72 km trail alone, based on the experience they had camping in the scouting program. My kids in scouts and guides have never had anything like that level of experience. Even though we had quite good Guiding leaders they were increasingly limited in what they could do.

By conversly, the meetings and the bade system were very much changed in focus to be led by the kids. What this meant in practice is they tended to choose to do things like play dodge ball, there was little badge work and what was done didn't really get them to any kind of skill level or competence. And mainly this is because being young they didn't know what they could learn or what would be involved in learning it. So the leaders stepping back in this area was in reality quite disempowering for the kids.

It's very typical of schools and kids activities in general.

Also - I think that part of this is pushed by the culture of liability. There are so many things they can't do, so much training they have to have for each leader, etc. It becomes difficult for them to function. These and even some of the safeguarding rules often seem to be more about liability than any expectation that they make a difference.

Mine does both brownies and she is a beaver.

She was a rainbow too. Shes been going about 3 years now. There was a break dorncovid. Where they did the meetings online.
At brownies. Theres a lot of crafts. And they always meet at the same village church.

The beavers. We usually meet at an activity centre. Shes done fire lighting. Bulding a tent. Bush craft. Sometimes they ask us to drop her off somewhere different.
They went to a country park about 2 weeks ago- we missed that one.
They did the horse care badge. So the leaders arranged for someone to bring a pony and the week after a horse at the activity centre. They had a ride on a small cart being pulled by the horse and learned about the horse and fed the horse.

We also dropped her off in the late evening at an astronomy centre where they learned about the night sky.

I'm glad shes doing beavers.
With brownies she gets to spend some time with girls her age and so does enjoy it too. There hasnt been any trips only once I think a divisional meeting where lots of groups met up.
I know its difficult with volunteers to arrange. I'm going to see if they arrange a trip to a local pantomime or not. But in the next year or so, I'm going to have a drop one of her activities and may need to drop the GG group.

@Beamur

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.

@Beamur this isn’t entirely accurate. Girlguiding owns loads of property (or the Guide Association Trust), they just use it differently, I guess cos they have different priorities.

They own HQ on Buckingham palace road. They have a boutique hotel in Victoria, London. They have dozens of properties through the UK. They just choose to prioritise different things. Like money.

That's interesting. I didn't know that.
Subs are also being hiked up, the amount that units have to pay to HQ per member, quite substantially for the next 2 years. Something like an extra £7 this year and a further £10 next year. They definitely don't have the network of huts and fields/woods that Scouts do.

It's very typical of schools and kids activities in general.

And to be fair, there's huge variations in schools now, especially since the curriculum became looser in primary and free schools / academies etc came about.

But there's a clear distinction on the gg and scout twitter in terms of the sorts of things they're focusing on. Gg does seem more "community spirit / be kind" focussed, in my opinion.

@Beamur

Eggybrains in what way?

Do you mean the quality of the training? It’s truly terrible. The “safeguarding” online training could be completed by anyone with an ounce of common sense. I mean the MCQs could be completed by those people without actually having listened to the associated videos - like I did. Anyone who is a parent without their children having been taken in to care could answer those questions. It’s piss poor.

And we recently got an email locally saying it
Was “unsustainable” to check volunteers had actually completed training, so even the piss poor training isn’t completed.

If it wasn’t a single sex organisation until recently I’m confident there would have been loads of adverse events in the organisation.

@Beamur

That's interesting. I didn't know that. Subs are also being hiked up, the amount that units have to pay to HQ per member, quite substantially for the next 2 years. Something like an extra £7 this year and a further £10 next year. They definitely don't have the network of huts and fields/woods that Scouts do.

No they don’t have network of huts and fields as huts and fields directly benefit children and Girlguiding don’t appear interested in that

@WarriorN to a certain extent the lack of Brownies etc on parade is partly down to the parents of the girls. All are told about it, and here, very few come, and obviously they can't get there themselves.

@Runningupthecurtains

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?

We generally do the remembrance parade with rainbows and brownies. Generally get a good turn out - about 60/ 70% minutes of the group. We don't march though as their are too little (rainbows especially).

It does very much depend on the leaders as to the activities they do. I was very active when young so at my rainbows we do lots of different activities including den building and lots of sporty activities as well as crafts and of course a bit of colouring (I'm always amazed at how much 5 years olds love a bit of colouring). But I understand some groups can be a bit sedentary so it just depends on the leaders.

I'm loathed to say it, but I am quite critical of GG management and I've definitely seen the attitudes that the OP described. Luckily I love working with the girls and my fellow leaders so we adapt and have fun at our unit .

They own HQ on Buckingham palace road. They have a boutique hotel in Victoria, London. They have dozens of properties through the UK. They just choose to prioritise different things. Like money.

Again, like the inconsistency between troops, I think the structure is the key. Scout money is held by the scout group, then there is a district structure with its own independent governance. The national structure is held to account by 400ish commissioners from all the regions, who all work on the ground with leaders and often kids.

Scouts HQ couldn't spend a huge wodge of cash on an enormous London office even if they wanted to.

Thanks for the replies on Guiding and Rememberance. I know someone who is involved in arranging our local service/parade so I will check with them if the local guides are invited. It might be that they attend a different local service or decline to attend but it may be that they aren't invited. As it's not GG policy to not attend I'll make sure they know they can next year.