Alternative to the Boy Scouts? - Page 2

[zeldamomma]

Originally Posted by Ceili

I think it depends on where you live. We're in a suburban area here and while some kids do some animal raising activities, the groups also do camping, community volunteering, and other scouting type things.

I had a really great experience with the girl scouts (in fact I'm a life member) and I'm sad that the boy scouts is what it is. I hope ds never asks to join or that he much older when the subject comes up.

As far as I can tell, you can do just about ANYTHING as a 4H project. Anything from the traditional animal raising and sewing, to musical performances, art projects, science projects, photography...

Go to your county fair and walk through the 4H building-- it's just amazing. And around here it's a really nicely run program too.

[GoestoShow]

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[Katielady]

I'm looking for a scouting alternative for my kids. Spiral Scouts seems to be a bit too rooted in paganism for my family- as a quasi-pagan myself I'd love it, but I'm not sure how comfy my husband would be with it. I think I'd rather something that was completely removed from any religion.

Earth Scouts looks good, if a bit serious. Does anyone belong to a group? What do you actually do at meetings? I like the idea of teaching earth stewardship, but while my kids are young I'd like that to remain a positive and light message (let's take care of mother earth by picking up this trash and planting some seeds!) than getting into heavier political topics (global warming is killing the polar bears!). What's the dealio?

[SweetSilver]

Originally Posted by NightOwlwithowlet 

OP here, thanks I'll check out the Y, 4H, and Spiral scouts. I was thinking the 4H was more along the line of raising cows (grew up in the country).

4-H covers just about everything, but not every group focuses on everything.  Some groups do just focus on livestock, horses or dogs, others are non-animal.  Our 4-H is an open, community group, but even still don't have leaders for every subject.  You can do the work on your own.  In fact, you can start a 4-H group yourself, or be enrolled as a family group.  Not exactly the experience you might be looking for do it that way, though.  

I went through this thought process, wanting a boy-scout-like experience for my girls.  I did find (not a scout group) but wilderness classes we can take as a family.  And I am still interested in doing a homeschool coop (well, and schooled friends, too) that focuses on scouting, camping, and hiking skills.  

[alicewyf]

I have my issues with both the Boy Scouts and Girl Scout organizations, but I would like to say that I was a female Boy Scout. I was part of the Boy Scout Explorers (for kids who might want to get into law enforcement) program in High School (also, don't believe the hype about this program. My training involved basic BASIC cop training stuff. We never even held firearms, real or otherwise). I did Girl Scouts from preschool to 9th grade (my mom was a leader). From my experience, the political aspects of the organizations are pretty invisible to the average participant. I had no idea Boy Scouts was a Christian organization.

I'm still undecided about scouting for my own kids. 4H sounds like a good compromise. I did FFA in high school and really enjoyed it.

[Wolfcat]

Originally Posted by Katielady 

I'm looking for a scouting alternative for my kids. Spiral Scouts seems to be a bit too rooted in paganism for my family- as a quasi-pagan myself I'd love it, but I'm not sure how comfy my husband would be with it. I think I'd rather something that was completely removed from any religion.

Earth Scouts looks good, if a bit serious. Does anyone belong to a group? What do you actually do at meetings? I like the idea of teaching earth stewardship, but while my kids are young I'd like that to remain a positive and light message (let's take care of mother earth by picking up this trash and planting some seeds!) than getting into heavier political topics (global warming is killing the polar bears!). What's the dealio?

We are starting a Spiral Scouts Hearth for our kids. We chose it because, even though it is created by a Wiccan church (we are Pagans, but NOT Wiccan), it doesn't focus on the religious aspects of that beginning at all. It divides some of the activities into the elements, but it is logical (Gardening is earth) and flexible (they encourage you to create your own badges). If you look at the activities for the badges, there are a lot of choices for what each child can do to earn the same badge AND it is up to the local leaders to determine if the badge has been earned. So you can make up what works for your family.

We also like that it is not gender-specific/conformist in it's activities.

The Earth Scouts looks like a good group, too, but as you said, too serious. And it seems to be better suited to older kids (mine are 2 & 6).

The alternative is to create your own type of group. The format for a scouting group is pretty basic and can be used to build a group of your own creation.

[JudiAU]

I am proud to say that not only we won't let our son join the scouts, but we successfully stopped a chapter from forming at our charter school. Bigtory and religous discrimination have no place in our lives. Although I will be going to my newphew's Eagle Scout ceremony this weekend.

And as far this not being an issue in more liberal/urban parts of the country, IT IS: http://parenting.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/26/dear-boy-scouts-let-a-gay-mom-lead-the-pack/ Scouts just hounded out a lesbian den mother.

[jtbuko]

After much thought my husband and I decided to let our son do cub scouts. We enjoy our local pack, but do have issues with the organization as a whole so we try to match any money we put into scouts with an equal donation to PFLAG or the HRC. Kind of like driving a car even though it produces emissions and then buying a carbon offset... (not perfect analogy since discrimination is much more personal than global warming, but not a perfect system either).