Membership Growth

MEMBERSHIP

GROWTH

Leadership/Governance

Marketing/Communication

The Wizard can be found at ocbsa.info.

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Before we can put the values of Scouting in youth, we must first put youth into Scouting.

My first supervisor in Scouting shared with me a philosophy that I still follow today; “The Boy Scouts of America is a business to stay in business. And our business is to increase membership.” Young people joining the Scouting program, regardless of their background, gender and ethnicity, is essential for the entire operation of the council and the Scouting organization to be successful. With additional Scouts, everything improves including activities, advancement, and camping. In turn, parents and the community are pleased with our success and additional financial support can be realized. To grow membership, everyone involved from the board, volunteers, to unit leaders and staff, requires a growth mindset.

Throughout my career, I have had the pleasure of inspiring, coaching, and managing membership efforts to achieve growth. Executing well-developed plans, acting on leading indicators, leading fun-filled, energizing recruitment training, and creating fresh marketing collateral, has helped create an atmosphere that drives membership growth.

While our landscape has evolved as membership standards change and with negative messages, I have worked diligently to navigate and maintain enthusiasm with both volunteers and staff to ensure all efforts are made to give every youth the opportunity to join Scouting. Many of the changes began while I was a Scout Executive where I needed to keep our community focused on the importance of the Scout Oath and Law and the life changing impact Scouting has for all youth and families. Now, I worked tirelessly to retain chartered organizations and families to stay enrolled and help our membership teams execute the plans that are driven by the strategic plan. We must remain vigilant in our quest to increase membership inclusiveness in this movement. Regardless of the backdrop, it is paramount that a Council continuously drive to serve more youth with a quality program.

I will work with our volunteer and staff membership teams to identify where the council is experiencing losses and then work to develop a plan to address weaknesses found. Expanding Outreach, developing a strong family Scouting approach and opening new community partnerships will be needed.

Here are a few examples that show how the volunteer teams I have served with made innovative membership drives and new initiatives successful, and created environments where volunteers and staff can realize success.

As Deputy Scout Executive/COO of the Orange County Council

Finished 2019 with a gain in Lion Cubs, Scouts BSA, Outreach and Exploring. This was reflective of a robust growth plan for Scout BSA girl troops and the continued focus on family Scouting. We lead Area 4 in number of new youth recruited, 3,204 youth and 43 new units.

We organized 26 Scouts BSA Girl Troops, and have successfully launched girls into Scouting at all levels. We ended 2019 serving 775 girls who enjoying the adventures Scouting. Our first all-girl Camporee hosted 205 youth and leaders and was led by Scouts BSA boy troops.

In 2019, hired a new Director of Outreach and Alumni Relations who in the first two months has organized a new outreach committee and formed seven new partnership that will bring in over 600 outreach youth. We are partnering with Lighthouse Community Partners, Project Access Resource Centers, Boys & Girls Clubs of Central Orange Coast, Innovative Housing Opportunities, Abrazar, Boys & Girls Clubs of Huntington Valley, and Magnolia Science Academy. A brand new alumni committee has also been recruited that will complement our robust and active NESA committee.

Executed a growth plan that turned around a pattern of membership loses to post a 1% gain in 2016. Fresh marketing resources, tools, and training were developed to help post gains in outreach, Exploring and traditional programs. Membership gains were realized in all programs except Cubs Scout in 2017. In 2018, the announcement by the Church of Jesus Christ Latter-day Saints had a huge impact on our membership. Our approach to open new markets in diverse neighborhoods is attracting new families to Scouting.

Collaborated with the Vice Chairman for Membership, Council Commissioner and their teams to develop key strategies to help units grow and thrive. Developed a Pack Recruitment binder that includes plans and resources for Spring and Fall recruitment drives, resources materials, and a detailed worksheet to plan the unit recruitment efforts. Both our plan and materials have been adopted by other Councils throughout the nation.

Created from scratch a new online tool, called the Wizard, to track leading indicators that helps keep both volunteers and staff engaged in the growth process. The tool has expanded to include scorecards for finance, camping, commissioners, rechartering, popcorn and adventure card sales.

Authored a new marketing piece, "A Partner in Education," to showcase Scouting benefits to the education community. Our partnership with the Orange County Department of Education has provided significant improvements in school relations.

Authored a new Recharter guidebook for units and commissioner staff. As a result, the council has improved on time rechartering to over 95% and JTE scorecard submission to over 78%.

Through a direct and systematic approach to unit service, unit retention has grown from 85% in 2016 to over 95% in 2019, and youth retention has increased from 71% in to over 84%.

Launched the Lion program working through District Lion Cub Champions and using new marketing materials, the council lead the Area with over 400 Lions. The Lion program continues to grow with each new season of Kindergartners. Retention from Lions to Tigers has helped grow our Tiger program 10% in 2017.

Collaborated with the board to develop two new districts. One serves all Venture crews and the other is an outreach district in the city of Santa Ana. By subdividing these programs from other districts, we were able to concentrate staff and resources to help these programs grow. As a result, Venturing grew 8% from 2016 to 2017, and outreach has grown 33% from 2015 to 2019. Happy to re[port that the Outreach District has grown in program aides.

Orange County is the home to the first Explorer Post in the country. Founded here in 1959, Exploring continues to grow. In the last three years, Exploring has grown 11%. In 2019, Exploring grew 2.7%.

Another key strategy was to hire a Director of Strategic Alliances partnered with a Vice Chairmen of Strategic Alliances on the board. Together they have crafted 4 pillars to engaging and growing partnerships throughout the Council:
- Strengthen and fortify current chartered partners;
- Revise and expand denominational partner communities;
- New chartered partner development;
- Establish a strong Scouting alumni cultivation culture.

The Strategic Alliance committee has created quarterly Forums with guest speakers from local universities and other key partners; mails quarterly newsletters to all Institutional Heads, implemented a robust new unit blitz campaign, launched chartered partner representative training, promoted and trained religious emblem coordinators for units, and has fully re-imagined NESA and alumni cultivation events.

Partnered with our camp properties to create Homeschool AdventureFest, a new program to target homeschool families. As a result, the first all homeschool Pack was registered and there are more opportunities on the horizon.

Have hosted two Roman Catholic’s Bishop Luncheon drawing Priests and youth ministers from the 64 parishes. In 2019, Orange County hosted its first Roman Catholic encampment at Shoepe Scout Reservation at Lost Valley.

Hire the second Family Scouting Director in the nation to work with a new Family Scouting advisory committee to help develop resources, contacts and materials to introduce Family Scouting council-wide. Our trained District Family Scouting Champions help units implement the new program changes.

Working through key board members, we serve over 2,000 Vietnamese youth and assist them with programs to maintain their cultural heritage and introduce to the aims and methods of Scouting.

Partnered with the Vice Chairman of Membership to author a new training course called "Parent Involvement Workshop." This course teaches unit leaders how to recruit and retain adult volunteers. This course has become highly appreciated among our units.

As Scout Executive/CEO of the Southern Sierra Council

Strategically revitalized Bakersfield’ membership, program, and unit service to move membership retention from 51% to 74.5% in three years.

Built a new volunteer membership committee with new materials and recruitments plans to help focus units on membership growth. Achieved balance growth and an increase in units in 2011.

Was awarded a $100,000 grant to reach rural communities and expand Scouting in large Hispanic communities. By hiring a bilingual District Executive, we were able to grow membership and recruit Hispanic leaders to our board and district committees.

As Director of Field Services of the Golden Empire Council

Through a great membership team and equipped staff, we developed a comprehensive membership and marketing strategy that allows for year-round recruiting drives to target all programs of the Boy Scouts of America. The growth plan included:
- Fall Round-up Programs
- Spring Round-up Drives
- Explorer First Nighters
- Movie Nights
- New Unit Blitz Efforts
- Bring a Friend Program

As a result of our plan, we increased membership from 20,220 to 20,568 and units from 1,070 to 1,081 in three years, stopping a significant downhill trend in membership losses.

During my tenure as Director of Field Service, I gave staff leadership to develop an effective Membership and Unit Growth Plan that enabled our team to be recognized with the Centennial Quality Council Award.

An active Commissioner staff has helped increased retention youth from 72% to 74%.
We have seen a significant increase in our Venturing program. Since 2005, we have grown 17.6%, from 1,301 to 1,530 young people.

Partnered with the Sacramento Christian Organization of Parent Educators (SCOPE) to organize homeschool units. Provided Scout skill classes at their annual conference.

Organized an ethnically diverse Scoutreach committee consisting of high profile community leaders. The Council has networked representation from the Hispanic and African-American communities.

Operated after-school Scout programs for at-risk youth. The programs are run by Program Specialists employed by the Council to serve as Cubmasters and Scoutmasters for targeted at-risk youth. Grants and donated auto sales fund the Program Specialists positions and has allowed our Council to maintain a consistent program under the supervision of positive adult role models.

Partnered with the Butte County Office of Education to deliver a Scouting program to afterschool youth. Funded for 2007 and 2008, the BCOE program has increased from 180 youth in 14 sites to 320 in 16 sites.