Wednesday 24 December 2014

Forgotten Again

A joint event was being held for all the sections in the area.  The organisers had put a lot of work into organising a range of activities for the girls, and everyone in the area was invited.  Only £5 per girl too.
 
Trust me to put a spanner in the works by asking the nasty question.  You know the one.  The one that should be perfectly innocent, but so often makes you sound like a troublemaker.  “What’s been organised for the Senior Section, I see some of the Rangers have booked to come?”

Yes, that question.  It received it’s usual response.  A bit of silence, followed by a ‘well, I suppose they can help out at some of the activities or join in with the Guides.’

And sure, I don’t doubt they could.  I’m going to assume that the response was not thought through, and that she wasn’t really proposing that Senior Section members who had paid £5 like everyone else would actually be paying for the privilege of spending all day being odd-job helpers, when they had applied and paid to attend as participants, or doing activities which would likely be fairly babyish to all but the youngest of them - she was probably just scrabbling for an answer because the truth would have been that nothing had been organised and nothing was going to be.  Again.

Well, we’ve got 12 months to sort it.  For in 2016 it will be the turn of Senior Section to have their 100th birthday celebrations.  It gives those of us in the sections who have already had birthday celebrations a year to plan what activities we will make available to them, to plan our offers of help to their Leaders to help them make it a big year.  To return the thanks for the work they did during the Centenary and the Big Brownie Birthday when so often they had to smile through gritted teeth when turning up to events as participants to find that they were expected to either join in with the 10-year-olds, or spend the whole day working at odd jobs.

So next time you’re planning a training or a multi-section event – why not plan the Senior Section activities first for a change?

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