Scoutmaster Podcast 370

And now to you, Scoutmaster. So today, in a little bit, we're going to be talking about older Scouts.

I have a story that I think is really funny. A number of years ago I had a couple of older Scouts who were fascinated with the television show Beavis and Butthead. If you're not familiar with Beavis and Butthead, don't waste your time.

It was kind of a cool show, okay, But they just embodied being Beavis and Butthead 24 hours a day, seven days a week, it seemed, And you know, on a weekend camping trip, and then another weekend camping trip and then a week at summer camp. That can get pretty old. I stumbled on a way of getting them to stop without asking them to, And that was when myself and another one of the adult leaders within their hearing started repeating all of the things that they were imitating, and not doing it in a cynical or mean way or anything like that, just doing it and enjoying it along the same lines that they did.

And I can remember the look that I got from one of them when they discovered that we were doing this. And you know what, Once they discovered that we were enjoying that and having a lot of fun with it, they never did it again. It worked like a charm. It was amazing.

Hey, this is podcast number 370.. Welcome back to the Scoutmaster Podcast. This is Clarke Green. A very brief few words of introduction today. Last week's podcast about patrols and planning, where I answered email questions, received several very nice comments over on Facebook. Thank you, Larry Jennings, Pete Parris and John Mello.

Thanks also to Heath, who got in touch through the website. Thank you for your kind words And thank you to everyone else who has been in touch via email this week. You can get in touch with me at Clark at scoutmastercgcom. I'll tell you more about that when we get towards the end of the podcast, But today we're going to be talking about older Scouts.

So let's get started, shall we?

Let's talk about older Scouts Now. To begin with, when I'm talking about older Scouts, I am talking about Scouts that have left intermediate or middle school and moved into high school. Most of the time, that means they're around 14 years of age, One of the first things to notice.

In the United States, our children move from elementary school to a middle or intermediate school And then from that school into high school. So you got to ask yourself what's going on there. Why is that happening. There are developmental things going on in young people's lives that make this a good idea.

Now, good, bad or indifferent whether you like the way that this is done or not, this is the way it happens. Now, if we go and look at the Scouting program that the BSA offers, we have Scouts from 11 to the age of 18.. In a Scout Troop, which is really unusual if you compare it with the rest of the world of Scouting, Because the last time I checked the oldest age that a young person could remain in a Scout Troop as a Scout was in Germany and that was the age of 16.

And there was some kind of special circumstance there. That we keep Scouts in a Troop until they reach their 18th birthday is an anomaly. It's kind of unusual.

So in the BSA we have this interesting conundrum to work with. We have younger Scouts who are 10 and a half, 11,, 12, 13 years old, and we have older Scouts who are 14,, 15,, 16,, 17 years old.

What happens a lot of times is you volunteer, you become a Scoutmaster and there may be older Scouts involved with the Troop. There may not, but at some point you understand you've got some young people who are very different developmentally and have a different set of concerns and interests than your younger Scouts, And this sets up several things that can be a conflict. It sets up things that can be problems, and I hear about them pretty regularly.

And then we act as though we're the first people to discover this thing and we've got to come up with a solution for it, because our older Scouts don't seem to be as interested and engaged as they used to be. I'll give you a really good example of this. When I directed our summer camp and served on our summer camp staff, there was always some kind of drive to create an older Scout program, Thinking that the reason that these Scouts aren't coming back is because they've already done most of the stuff that we offer in a program.

So we should have some cool stuff just for the older Scouts to do. And that makes a lot of sense, doesn't it?

But you know what? It basically never put a dent in the numbers, because amping up the wow factor of the program or trying to appeal to older Scouts with special activities and things like that is what I call the bread and circuses approach, And if you're not familiar with the metaphor, bread and circuses means that you're placating real concerns with superficial means of appeasement and diversions and distractions, without really getting at the heart of the matter.

So let's talk about the heart of the matter. If simply turning up the wow factor doesn't keep older Scouts engaged, what really keeps them interested and engaged, what keeps them around?

So before we try to answer that question, let's really observe the situation that we find ourselves in when it comes to working with older Scouts And let's ask ourselves what do they want to get out of the program? They want to become Eagle Scouts as one standard response. They're kind of in it for getting the Eagle and all that that involves. And some Scouts become discouraged by that drive because it seems like it's a means to an end and they just want to get it over with.

And as positive as that drive can be for them, it can also lead to some cynicism about being involved in everything and I'm just kind of holding on because I want to become an Eagle Scout. So let's set that whole part of it aside. Let's realize that that is a thing, but it's not the thing.

So what do these Scouts, these 14 to 17 year old Scouts, what are they looking for and what do they really want? In the simplest of terms, I think they want what everybody wants and that is kind of to hang out with their friends and associate with people their own age, You know. As I mentioned, they want to pay attention to their own advancement and progress. They want to have increasing levels of independence and freedom to discover and explore without people looking over their shoulder, and they have this desire to be considered an adult. They're in those years where childhood is being left behind and they start looking forward to life as an adult and they're pushed and pulled in many different ways and, like everybody else on the face of the planet, they have a desire to be useful and appreciated.

Now let's look at what we Scouters want from our older Scouts As far as association goes. We think it's really really important that they associate with younger Scouts and we come up with all kinds of schemes to make that happen. With older Scouts we're happy to have them pay attention to their own individual progress and advancement, but we really want them to pay attention to younger Scouts advancement and progress. In those two things we're kind of working counter a little bit to what they want.

We have a set of expectations that they may not share and then, where the expectations align a little bit more is we want them to develop a sense of responsibility for others as well as themselves. We want them to return what they have received in positions of responsibility and we want to begin to trust and count on them as we would an adult.

Some of the expectations an older Scout has and a Scouter has are kind of in alignment and some of them are a little bit opposite, Especially in the idea that we want them to associate with younger Scouts on an ongoing basis and take responsibility for them and their advancement and things like that. That's normally where kind of the point of friction comes in. Next, I would like to point out that you should always be having a challenge working with older Scouts. You're always going to have that challenge. It's never going to be solved and your results are going to be all over the map. And that's fine, because that's the way that this works.

Give it a little bit of time, a little bit of experience and practice. You will get better at it. But we are dealing with people in a particularly mercurial time of their lives, right, Where they are looking for identities and they're seeking things out, trying to figure out what they're going to do.

They're pushed and pulled in all kinds of directions by all kinds of forces and we can choose to be one of those pushers and pullers or we can choose to be a bit of a refuge from all of those pressures. So to become more successful in working with older Scouts, we need to recognize that most of us have a few blind spots.

One of the first big blind spots is we have a program and we present the program like we present a well-prepared dinner, you know, and we lay it out there and we're very disappointed when our Scouts turn their nose up at it. And if that's happening on a regular basis, we've got to stop driving the program.

Rather than working with individual Scouts, We have to balance the interest of the individual against the interest of the group, and that is a process that never stops and it's the way that we occupy a lot of our time as Scouts. One of the other things we tend to do is we complicate the simple and simplify the complex.

So when you're dealing with a challenge with older Scouts- and younger Scouts too, you know the most obvious answer is probably the right answer, but not necessarily 100% of the time, When we listen carefully to what individual Scouts are telling us. We will be better armed to divine between the complex and the simple. The way Scouts behave, older or younger, is an expression of a number of complex causes and motivations. They will act in ways that are a little confusing. They do silly, stupid things on occasion because they are working out how you become an adult and they're not necessarily interested in listening to what you think about how they ought to become an adult. You were not very interested in listening to the adults around you during this time of your life.

I would guess You were much more interested in finding your own way and you made a number of mistakes and you made a number of bad choices. Who do you need to be in response to what is going on in their lives?

Well, the last thing you need to be is their friend. Now I have enjoyed a pretty good friendship with a lot of my older Scouts, but that friendship has to kind of be at arm's length, because I have more important work to do for them and I have more of a responsibility for them than just being their pal. I also have to be an authority figure at a time in their lives where they're liable to make some bad choices and I have to have the authority to deal with those things, and friendship can kind of dilute that authority. There is a razor's edge of a balance When I'm talking about having some authority and everything like that. That doesn't mean you're unapproachable, you're unpleasant, you're gruff, you're mean. It means that you accept the idea that you are going to make unpopular decisions or take unpopular actions every once in a while and you don't let it keep you up at night, because this is your role.

You're an adult, they are children, Your sense of responsibility and judgment is a little more honed and attuned and you have the benefit of more experience than they do, and sometimes you will have to impose that upon them In response to who they are and their time of life. What else do we need to be?

Well, we need to be very good observers and listeners and in my experience, you cannot simultaneously listen to or observe what other people are doing and judge them at the same time. So there needs to be a part of your attention as an observer and as a listener that is free of coming to judgment as you observe and listen.

Do you understand what I'm saying? You have to occupy a much more neutral territory before you decide that you're going to make some kind of a judgment about the propriety or the advisability of a certain course of action. And this is why it's good to have a little bit of a remove from being invested in winning the friendship of older Scouts, because you need to exercise a whole lot of patience and if we allow our emotions to take over and we feel slighted or disrespected, then we're going to run into problems.

So the basic answer to the question of who do you need to be when it comes to working with older Scouts and responding to what they need is: you need to be an adult, You need to be kind, courteous, considerate, loyal, fair and you need to have some empathy. You need to be approachable and friendly, of course, but you need to differentiate between the idea of the responsibilities you have for young people and the idea that you're going to be their friend, So seeing misbehavior or problems as a personal affront from somebody who's supposed to be your friend, rather than just the general process that young people are going through- making poor choices, trying things out- your sense of fairness is going to come from objectivity, and our own desire to be liked and appreciated and respected will sometimes prevent us from being what we need to be, and that is decisive and directional.

Now, when it comes to working with older Scouts in positions of responsibility, I'm going to reiterate my often made plea to not become their boss or their drill sergeant or their teacher, but that you are a partner with them in this work. And while their position of responsibility has some practical outcome, we need to also realize it's really part of the game, because it's their opportunity to learn skills and to develop character that's going to help them for the rest of their lives.

Now, if you think you can teach them or think you can imbue them with character, you're going to be disappointed, because the nature of people at this age is to try things out, to experiment and to do things for themselves. So partner with them as they go through this evolution of discovery and talk to them about it, not substituting your judgment for theirs, but asking them how they've judged a given situation or how they see the outcome of a certain action. And I've found over time this is the most fascinating, the most satisfying aspect of my work as a scouter is to be able to have a dialogue with them about what they're thinking, the decision making processes they're going through and how they're judging different situations. I can't do that if I'm going to be their boss, their drill sergeant or their teacher. I am much more interested in their judgment, in their actions, than I am telling them how they should think, how they should feel, how they should judge given situations. If you open up a dialogue about those things, you'll get to express your opinion at some point.

But your opinion isn't the most important part of this. Discovering what they're up to and what they're thinking is much more important.

While we're on the subject of working with older scouts, let's talk about the dark side of the moon, and no, I'm not talking about Pink Floyd, although you might want to revisit that. If you haven't done that in a while, it'll put you back into that mindset a little bit.

If you remember the NASA lunar missions, there was a point which the spacecraft was on the dark side of the moon and out of radio contact with Earth and, if I remember correctly, it lasted about 30 minutes or so and I can recall this being broadcast on television, everybody kind of biting their nails for 30 minutes, desperate to hear back from the spacecraft. While working with younger people having a son or a daughter. There's going to be at least some period of their lives where they are on the dark side of the moon. They're out of radio contact. You really can't tell what's going on in there, just like the NASA missions. You're kind of biting your nails, wondering if you're going to get back in contact.

You will. You won't be able to see what's going on, you won't be able to hear what's going on and very little information is going to be shared with you. But you will get back into contact. Another good thing to talk about is the way that most young people need to express their own rugged individualism.

Now, it's kind of interesting that over 30 years of being a scoutmaster, working with scouts, that that rugged individualism is really not very individual at all. It's pretty predictable.

You know a certain kind of way of wearing your clothes or doing your hair. Patterns of speech and attitudes come up and everybody who wants to be a rugged individual follows those particular paradigms right. It's kind of amusing to watch that happen. And think back for a moment.

When you were that age, what things were you doing that were driving your parents right up a wall? Was it what you were wearing, the way you kept your hair, the things that you listen to, the things that you read, the general attitude that you assumed with them.

It's very likely that you did something and now take that experience and build it into your experience of working with older scouts. They're going to do something that's just going to drive you crazy and if you want it to be repeated often, let them know that you don't like it. Some things are worth going to the mat over and battling for, and these things are always big things. Save your energy for the big things and let the little things alone. Sometimes I've had older scouts go up with purple hair or they fall in love with a hat or some element of costume that they have to wear 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. A lot of times they will fall out of love with their scout uniform or they will take a cynical approach to something I consider to be sacrosanct and sacred.

Well, I'm going to save my powder for things that really matter and do my best to do nothing but raise an eyebrow at the other things. And the uniform thing is something to talk about for a moment, because I think it drives a lot of people crazy. I know it drove me crazy.

A lot of times my older scouts would show up no uniform or their uniform would be very sloppy and kind of slapdash, and I wrestled and fought with that for a while and then I just kind of decided that I had more important things to do than to worry about this and so stopped paying all that much attention to it. That might raise your eyebrows.

I would just encourage you to put your energy where it really matters, and that's the development of character and assuring everyone's safety and well being. The other thing that I believe is important is not fighting against the idea. Older scouts want to hang out together and are not necessarily interested in just kind of hanging out and spending time with scouts who are several years younger.

Now just like uniforms. If you want to pay attention to that and you want to spend a whole lot of energy on that, then you can advise against it. In last week's podcast I was dealing with a question that came from there was a problem with patrols because all the older scouts would leave their patrol assignments and just go hang out together.

Well, that means that they ought to be in their same patrol. You know the answer that comes back to that is: well, if they're not in patrols with younger scouts?

What will the younger scouts do? And my answer is: the younger scouts will be fine, they'll be in a patrol, they'll elect their patrol leader and then the older scouts will help them find to being in their patrol on a permanent basis. Because if you're looking at it from a purely logistical and management perspective, it makes perfect sense. But when it comes to scouting, it doesn't necessarily make a whole lot of sense because you're not managing employees, you're dealing with people at a very murcury age and you are working against what is happening in the rest of their lives.

Well, I've got to say, have absolutely zero problem with getting older scouts to work with younger scouts to instruct them, to help them with their advancement, to help them on camping trips and backpacking trips. It's not a problem. It would be much more of a problem if I was to require them to be in the same patrol with those younger scouts. Let's break this down by reviewing what we've been talking about. If you are running into challenges and difficulties working with older scouts or you have a sense that they're not really buying into what's going on and you can't trust them or depend on them, I would not be surprised that that's happening, because that is what is generally going to happen. Don't be dismayed.

You have lots of company. If you'd like to smooth out these challenges and difficulties, then consider what older scouts want. Consider how that may correspond with what you want. Consider who you need to be in response to who they are in their lives at the moment, and begin watching and listening and see what needs to change. If you will take my advice and remain eternally optimistic- always see that glasses half full and look for positive things rather than negative things- the whole thing will begin to get better, because there's a lot of positive there. Spend your energy on looking for that and cultivating that.

If you spend your energy resisting things that you don't like, to build on the things that you do like. So I hope that's helpful. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this. You can get in touch with me pretty easily and I'm going to tell you how to do that in just a moment.