Endo wrote:
Where I grew up, the general reputation that BSA had with those outside of it, was that Boy Scouts was for nerds and geeks. Not cool at all. The outdated horrid dorky uniforms I'm sure play a large part in this.
Look, kids that age are very aware of appearance and looking cool. At a minimum, they don't want to be perceived geek or nerd by association and dress.
BSA needs to completely revamp their image in the eyes of the youth. Low hanging fruit to do this is their uniforms and other standard wear. Then work on the hard stuff, like actual image of the participants and what "they" do and are like. This is long term pretty long term though.
I accept that my perception on this may be out of kilter with the rest of the areas. Just my 2 cents from 30 years ago in Alabama where i grew up.
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My son's troop probably is on the geekier side, when I compare them to the sports teams my kids are on. Many of the scouts are in band, they are school clubs like robotics and chess. In general they seem to make good grades, from what I can tell. They do things that aren't cool, like pick up trash in parks, and spend weekends doing service projects like rebuilding an old bridge on a trail. During free time when they are at Boy Scout camp, they play card games like Exploding Kittens and Munchkins.
And I think all of this is great! I hope that Boy Scouts doesn't change just so more cool kids will join, which may result in higher numbers. We were backpacking it on a camping trip a couple of months ago, and a couple miles into it one of the boys started singing repeat after me songs. Completely uncool. But the boys had a blast even when they were wearing 30 lb packs over a few mile hike. Instead of Boy Scouts changing to fit the current stereotype of what is popular, maybe parents should help their kids understand that being cool isn't the only path.