8 September 2008
Latino Boy Scout Recruiting a Hard Sell
Posted by admin under: Uncategorized .
Joe Rodriguez writing in the San Jose Mercury news talks about the lack of success the Boy Scouts of America has in recruiting among Latinos. I’ve wondered about that myself because Boy Scout troops and Cub Scout packs need new families to be successful, including mine.
According to a recent census by the Boy Scouts of America, only 100,000 of the nation’s 3 million Scouts are Latino even as the group has become America’s largest minority group. Locally, the organization doesn’t have an accurate count of Latino Scouts or scoutmasters in Santa Clara County. And as far as Loredo can tell, there might be about 125 registered Cub Scouts or Boys Scouts left in East San Jose. Where they are is hard to know because there aren’t any active scouting troops left in the heavily Latino neighborhoods.
Some will point to the controversy surrounding Boy Scouts as the reason, but does anyone think disallowing atheists or gay leaders is a big turn-off to the largely Catholic Latino immigrants? From my perspective it seems mostly a cultural thing. The habits and procedures of the current membership of the BSA is not comfortable to them. The dads I’ve interacted with tend to be strong personalities in their families. Their focus is on their jobs and when it isn’t they are very specific about what they want to do to relax. In my area, fixing up their houses or cars, drinking beer with their friends, and professional sports or playing soccer tend to use up almost all their free time. I’m uncomfortable saying it because it may be taken as a derogatory comment, which it’s not, but that’s my observation. Moms are tasked with almost all of the activities involving the kids. So, having a male role-model organization that teaches mainly using leave-no-trace activities in the “wilderness” doesn’t appeal to the personal history of many immigrants.
I love what the majority of the BSA is about, but it’s important to remember that it was started more by the boys than the adults. Boys loved the activities that Baden-Powell had outlined in his scouting instruction book and as Baden-Powell developed it further the boys and adults who led them created a program that the boys enjoyed and the adults approved of. This same process isn’t happening with Latino immigrants. Most of them are in urban environments that are not immediately conducive to the outdoor activities that Scouting is based on and so they aren’t drawn into them. Without a push from the boys and without a tradition and spare time for it among the men the future of Scouting among Hispanics is slim. There are many of them, but as a percentage compared to Caucasians they are a small minority.
The BSA thinks that recreating the merge of a popular activity and Scouting principles might work so they started Soccer and Scouting. While this might become a popular group it obviously won’t be the same thing as the traditional BSA program. Good luck getting immigrants into the BSA. In my experience it usually takes a couple of generations before they’re ready and open to it.
- Another Clue on Hispanic Scout Recruitment
- Soccer and Scouting
- Intimations of Boy Scouts Changes
- Mischief in the Heart of Virgina
- More Hispanic Push in Florida
One Comment so far...
New Jersey Boys Summer Camp Says:
6 October 2008 at 12:03 pm.
I can honestly relate to what you’re saying here. The fact of the matter is that the derailment of bringing in new troops from the areas you mentioned would be a difficult task. First of all, latinos may be the highest minority group as far as numbers, but what is the percentage of them that have white-collar jobs? The reason why I’m mentioning this stems from the blue-collar sector. If a person works 12 hours/day, 6 days/week, how much time would he have to be involved in a troop let alone decide to give up the little free time for friends and family? I know what I’m saying isn’t fair, but when is anything fair? I think if there a true work-study program for people who wants to get into more white-collar jobs, the possibility of them having more spare time and creating more troops for local boys in these neighborhoods would increase. It all comes down to earning power + spare time available for the boys.
