Commitment to a Common Standard?

In the modern Guiding programme, there are 5 essentials.  And one of them is, “Commitment to a Common Standard”.  So what does that mean?

 

Well, to my mind, what it means is that we should all be pulling in the same direction.  Striving for the same aim.  Working to achieve the same result.  Laying aside personal opinions and preferences in order to be part of a unified movement.  It doesn’t have to mean agreeing with everything that’s said – for of course we won’t all agree 100% with all the policies in such a large movement with such a diverse range of members, so there always has to be scope for us to make representations to Headquarters about any issues we feel strongly about, or to advise them of local circumstances they may not have been aware of and thus able to take into account when making their decision.  But it means that once we’ve made our appeal and received a response to it, whatever that response may be, we accept the majority decision and whether we like or lump it, we don’t keep grumbling away, or ignore the rule just because it doesn’t suit us.  A Guide is honest and can be trusted.

 

Yet, if you visit different units, all of them considered to be ‘well-run’, and all reckoned to be fully committed to those common standards, you will see some significant differences in style and content between them.  How can that be?  How can they simultaneously be committed to a common standard, and yet be so different in what they do and how they do it?

 

The thing about the common standard is that even if we all have the same aim or standard, we still have a choice of different paths to take in order to reach that aim.  So long as the core values are the same, then the little details around the edges can vary to suit our own circumstances.  The core values are laid down for us by the Promise, Law, Section Programme, Guiding Manual contents, and the guidance issued from headquarters.  So those things are non-negotiable, and each individual should be encouraged to do the work to prepare herself to be ready to commit to and take on the challenge of making and keeping the Promise, each individual should have the opportunity to earn the appropriate progress badges for her section provided she attends and participates regularly in her unit’s activities, each individual should be encouraged to (wittingly or unwittingly) pick up on the educational and moral ethos which lies behind the fun activities she gets to do as a member of a uniformed club (the founder’s original idea of ‘learning through games’), and Leaders should be both providing the means, and encouraging the progress, within the rules and programme laid down.  Whether they are 100% in agreement or somewhere short of 100%.

 

But, if we are meant to be committed to a common standard, and yet all these variations are permitted, then how can we square that?  How can it be okay to ‘follow different paths’ towards the aim?  It’s because the ethos of each unit depends, more than anything else, on it’s Leaders.  Yes, the members have a large input, but it is the Leaders who will decide whether a unit’s ethos is fun, serious, silly, challenging, outdoorsy, arts-based, campaigning, strict, informal, or (ideally) combinations thereof.  Though they should collect the input of the unit members to a relevant extent for the age group in question (10% Rainbow, 25% Brownie, 50% Guide, 75% Senior Section), and the members’ personalities and tastes will have strong input too - the Leaders have the final decision on the unit’s programme, they decide how the programme ideas which have been chosen will be implemented, they choose what extras they are able to run in the way of outings, residential events, international opportunities, fundraising etc.  It is they who apply the imagination to the basic ideas, and find new ways of presenting and running the regular parts of the programme.  They choose how much responsibility and independence the girls get and how much is directly led by the adults.  It is the Leaders who interpret the Promise and Law, the Section Programme, the Manual contents and Headquarters guidance for their units, consciously or otherwise giving their own take on it.  And it is the Leader’s personality which decides quite how she will do things – whether she is serious or whether she has a sense of humour, whether she is tense or relaxed, whether she is enthusiastic or reserved, hearty or gentle, strict or easy-going – or a combination of these depending on circumstances.

 

And these interpretations, and these personality styles, and these skills, talents and preferences - will vary from unit to unit, both in what they choose to do, and how they choose to do it.  Depending on the Leaders’ talents, skills and tastes, as well as the talents, skills and tastes of the members.  And it is the variety thus generated that creates the differences between units, and these differences are what creates variety and choice in Guiding – so that within a locality a girl then has the option of finding the unit which best suits her tastes.  We’re still committed to a common standard, and in a well-run unit that common standard is visible through everything like a ‘golden thread’ – you can see at the core of what is done, despite the variations in approach, that determination to ensure the girls follow the current programme, they learn the self-reliance, they respect and follow the rules and guidance – they look and feel and act like a Guiding unit, not a bunch of individuals in fancy dress who gather weekly for a games session.  The Leaders will set the standards and expectations, and that old saw about being able to judge a unit by it’s Leaders - is more true than we may care to admit!

 

Oh yes, it is true.  As Leaders, whether it sits comfortably with us or not, each one of us is ‘an example’ the girls in the unit look up to – and sometimes the parents too.  We are Girlguiding UK’s representatives in our local community.  The public will (and do) judge the whole movement by what they see of us.  Whether we are wearing the official uniform with pride or are clad in some other garb (be it neat or scruffy), whether we are friendly or gruff, whether we are cheerful or stressed out, whether we are helpful or obstructionist, etc.  They will judge the whole movement by any single short encounters they have with any individual member of the movement – of any age - and will remember any perceived errors of courtesy far longer than the many times we did the right thing.  They will also remember what we say – whether we are telling people the movement has high standards, is well managed and offers great opportunities – or whether we tell people anything will do, it’s poorly run and nothing much happens.  So it’s up to us to do what we can to set an example – to keep trying our best to be good representatives of the Guiding ‘brand’.  To commit ourselves to supporting the common standard, the policies, the guidance, the Manual, even if that means putting it’s rules before our personal feelings at times.  It’s the challenge we accepted when we said “I Promise that I will do my best . . .”.  The common standard is that end point we all aim for.  And that’s how it can be squared.

Copyright

I have a friend who is a writer.  Writing is her profession, and her main income comes from selling her work.  Even a comparatively short newspaper or magazine article is the result of several hours’ work in researching and fact checking, followed by more hours of initial drafting, plus the time spent thereafter honing the prose, with each word and phrase carefully chosen and placed to be as effective as possible in setting the tone, and providing smooth readability.  A short story or book can take weeks or months of drafting, editing and re-drafting.  It’s the same with all experts who manufacture handmade one-off items for a living – the income comes from selling what you have made, and what puts you in the bracket to earn a living from your talent - is being able to make something of a better quality than most people could.  And each thing any professional craftsperson makes - has to bring in enough money in comparison to the cost of the materials and the number of hours spent on creating it, to make a viable profit.

 

I know there are a lot of Leaders within Guiding who find copyright and performing rights laws an inconvenience, a barrier to what they want to do, or feel they should only apply to professionals and not to amateurs like them, or charities such as their units.  Or who don’t understand them, or don’t realise that they apply to everyone no matter at what scale.  It can be easy to imagine that ‘big business’ can afford to give away it’s produce cheaply or free, and therefore shouldn’t be charging fees to the small-scale users of their wares – what’s a children’s performance at the village hall, or a few dozen photocopies of a script, or showing a video at the Brownie sleepover, or photocopying a resource, to them?

 

The initial difficulty which writers and composers face is similar to the one the chair-maker has – that once they first sell the item they have painstakingly made, that item can then be sold on repeatedly over the coming years, possibly for a higher amount than the maker was paid for it.  But until recently the chair-maker has at least had the assurance that her chair can only be used by one owner at a time, and that if people want more chairs to exactly match the original, then they have to hire her services as no-one else would be able to make an exact match – however for writers, that safeguard does not exist.  Photocopy machines and scanners mean that it is easy for a handcrafted piece of writing to be copied hundreds of times, in seconds, and circulated far and wide without the creator knowing, far less benefiting.  If people ignore copyright laws, then the writer does not get their share.

 

Also, the reason a handcrafted chair can be sold for a price which reflects the quality of materials and number of hours it took to make, is because people appreciate and respect the skill of the carpenter, sure that they could not possibly make anything as good themselves.  Yet writers and composers often don’t get the same respect for the skill of their craft – lots of people fondly imagine they could write a novel if they only had the time – they assume that time is their only barrier, that the original idea and the talent to write that idea up well would both follow automatically.  Yes, anyone can fasten together a few planks and make something which could be termed a chair – though it may well lack the comfort, beauty or stability of a well-made chair.  And anyone can throw together a few sentences into paragraphs and make a story or article out of them, but it takes a craftsperson’s skill to add design, style, quality, artistry, beauty, clarity, polish, readability, atmosphere, tone . . . most of us do not have that talent.

 

‘The labourer is worthy of his hire’ – well, if you want to use a script or song someone else has written, then you are effectively hiring them and their skills.  And that is what you are paying for, when you pay a copyright fee on a script or piece of sheet music.  If you want to use an artist’s recording of a piece of music, for the girls to sing or dance to, or a writer’s play script for a pack performance, or an activity pack someone else has written for your unit programme or camp theme, then the same principle applies in terms of the performing rights.  You’re hiring both the original writer of the piece, the performing artists on the recording, and all the trades involved in the production of the recorded work - and it therefore seems only reasonable that you pay your share of the cost of all those people’s skills.  One look at the credits list of even a low-budget film will give an idea of how many people it takes, and who all has to make a living.

 

Within Guiding, there are some skilled amateur writers who produce resources for their own units.  Some of them are very generous, and offer to share their work with other Leaders and units, often entirely free.  All they ask in return is that they are given the credit for that hard creative work – so if someone has a copyright symbol © on a resource they have created, you should be careful to ensure that the symbol is never removed, and that you respect their right to claim the credit for their work.  And if someone hasn’t put a copyright symbol on, but you know them to definitely be the originator, you could add it, to ensure that credit goes where it’s due and isn’t mis-attributed.  (And of course, if you get have a gift of that sort, you wouldn’t pass it on to anyone else, or make extra copies beyond the number originally agreed, without getting fresh permission from the originator that she is happy for it to be shared further than she originally authorised.)

 

Others produce packs of ideas which come along with a badge to be bought, in which case their plan is that the money charged for the badges will help to cover the production costs of both pack and badges combined, often leaving a little over to be put towards a stated good cause.  Sadly, there are actually some people who will obtain and use several ideas from a resource pack but not buy even a token badge in return, with the result that instead of the originator covering their costs and raising some money for the good cause as planned, they actually raise far less than they ought have, and could even make a loss – which doesn’t seem very fair or Guide-like.  Other Leaders, who find themselves with spare badges left over after using the activity pack with their unit, will put the spares up for auction, make a profit on the leftover badges thus sold – but do they donate those profits to the cause the badge was being sold in aid of? Or do they pocket them?  I do hope they go to the cause which was intended, but I suspect the answer would be ‘only some do, most don’t’.

 

Yes, sometimes copyright can ‘get in the way’ of what I do in Guiding.  There are some songs which I don’t use for unit performances because I feel the fee is too high to justify for a small charity like mine.  I can’t always get hold of the copyright-free clipart I want, and I don’t currently have the time or skill to create my own.  And it can be tempting to take the easy option rather than do the right thing over copyright.  But by the same token, it means that some of the resources I’ve worked hard to produce have been protected, and it means I get fair acknowledgement for my time and effort in creating them.  Wouldn’t it be great if everyone in Guiding played fair over copyright, and respecting creative work?

Guiding History Myths

There are quite a few stories about the history of Guiding which have been published in the official Girl Guide Association history books, especially those written and published before 1978.  Problem is, if you do a little research and fact-checking, then you find that the history books contain quite a lot of what is quite clearly myth.  And a lot of people’s knowledge of Guiding history is based on what they were told when they were Guides, by Leaders who retold the stories from the official books, naturally assuming them to be accurate.  We can’t criticise them for telling us what was in the official books, but if we know the facts then we can work to get the truth out there – in many ways it’s a far more exciting story that the myth is! 

 

So, here are 6 common Guiding history myths, and the true answers . . . apologies in advance to anyone I upset . . .

 

Olave Baden-Powell founded Guiding, or, Robert and Olave Baden-Powell are ‘the founders’.

Two commonly-repeated myths, but both clearly wrong.  You can either say that Robert Baden-Powell founded Guiding, or you can say that Robert Baden-Powell and Agnes Baden-Powell together founded Guiding, depending on your interpretation.  But either way, what is 100% clear is that Olave did not have any role whatsoever in the founding of Guiding.  Robert had the original idea for Boy Scouts, Agnes used the idea as a basis to set up Girl Guides as a separate movement.  Olave had no connection or involvement with Scouting before 1912, or Guiding before 1915, as she states herself in her autobiography  – so that’s the whole of the Girl Scout era plus the first 5 years of Girl Guides, during which time both the Guide and Brownie sections were created and established, and many of the structures and programmes both created and refined.  So anything which happened in Guiding prior to Olave becoming a County Commissioner in 1916 was clearly done on Agnes’s watch, and under Agnes’s leadership.  And anyone who joins something five years after it started, no matter how large or lengthy their contribution thereafter, cannot be termed a founder.

 

There were a dozen girls at the Crystal Palace rally.

Well, yes. . . you could say there were a dozen girls at the Crystal Palace rally, given that there were actually over 1000 Girl Scouts there, most of which were there quite legitimately having applied for tickets in the approved way.  Oh yes, those who held tickets were welcomed in the gates regardless of gender, and at that early date over 1000 Girl Scouts made it to the Crystal Palace Rally on that Saturday and were amongst the 10,000 Scouts present – given that only those in London and the surrounding Counties could realistically have got there given public transport in those days, how many thousands of Girl Scouts must there have been spread around the UK and potentially beyond, by that time?  Especially given that a goodly number of Girl Scouts also attended the Scottish Rally at Scotstoun Stadium, earlier that year?

 

Robert Baden-Powell’s first encounter with Girl Scouts was at the Crystal Palace Rally, and he was surprised to discover that they existed.

Clearly not true on either count.  The Rally was held in September 1909, whereas Robert wrote about Girl Scouts in his personal column in “The Scout” magazine in January 1909 acknowledging the many Christmas Cards he had received from Girl Scouts – so there is no question that he knew they existed in significant numbers – and in that column he also praised their skills, so it would seem strange that people claim either he did not know they existed, or was in some way disapproving of them.  (Also, the column referred to Girl Scouts in initial capitals with no quote marks or other caveats.)  During the period 1907-1909 Robert Baden-Powell travelled around the UK speaking at public meetings about Scouting, and there are numerous accounts of both boys and girls approaching him after his speeches to enquire about how to start Scout troops, getting a positive reception, and being inspired to found both Boy and Girl Scout troops immediately thereafter.  That would suggest that he gave a positive reception to all who approached him as potential leaders in Scouting, regardless of gender of the Leader, or of the youngsters they proposed to recruit.

 

It was the girls who gate-crashed the rally demanding “Something for the girls” who forced the start of Guiding.

Perhaps they were one of the factors, but they were by no means the only factor.  It is likely that Miss Violet Markham was at least as significant.  Fact is that in that era, mixed activities (other than for nursery-age children) were considered totally inappropriate for boys and girls who were not siblings.  State schools still had separate entrances for boys and girls to go in, and where mixed classrooms existed, the class was segregated - private schools were invariably single-sex.  Although boys had a fair bit of freedom, the behaviour rules for girls were very strict, especially among the middle and upper classes.  Yet when “Scouting for Boys” was published, girls as well as boys were able to obtain copies, and some girls took up the ideas with enthusiasm and formed their own Patrols, whether with parental approval or not.  These Girl Scout Patrols were sometimes accepted into existing Scout Troops, with the Scoutmasters happy to assess tests and award badges, others met separately from the boys but were attached to a Scout Troop, with the Scoutmaster visiting the Patrol meeting to do badge testing, some again were independent.  In the autumn of 1909 a heated correspondence started up in “The Spectator” magazine, initiated by Violet Markham, who wrote of a local Scout troop where allegedly both boys and girls attended and took part in drill until a late hour of the evening.  She objected both to the mixed group and to the late hour the meetings ended.  Responses to this initial letter (and an editorial) deplored this and pleaded with Baden-Powell to confirm that he wholly disapproved of such mixed activities.  This negative publicity against mixed troops in Scouting is as likely to have been at least as strong a factor as was the misbehaviour of a small group of Girl Scouts who, having turned up at an all-ticket event both late and without tickets, chose to march through the gates in a literal gate-crashing ploy, all in clear breach of the Scout Law.

 

Girl Guiding was initially fairly unsuccessful, and it was only when Olave took over that it got going.

Well, once Agnes took the helm in 1910 and started both to organise the existing Girl Scouts and rapidly adapt Scouting into a group parents might approve, it grew more rapidly than Scouting was growing at that point, and in spite of the difficulties brought by the outbreak of the 1^st World War, it continued to grow rapidly throughout the 1910-1916 period.  Olave did do a lot of work from 1916 onward to develop the County structure which Agnes had started, but it is difficult to say how much of the growth post-1916 can be attributed to Olave’s input and how much would have been on-going from the work which Agnes had already done in travelling the country visiting units and making speeches at public meetings.  So it wouldn’t be fair to say that everything was hopeless before 1916 and wonderful after, or that everything positive was clearly Olave’s work . . .

 

Agnes was old-fashioned, and Olave brought in the energy that was needed to transform Guiding.

Certainly there was a significant age difference between them – when Olave became Chief in 1916 she was 27, and Agnes was 58 – but although Agnes might appear a product of her generation, even a brief look at the list of her hobbies would create a rather different impression from the prim Victorian lady the old photos might imply – metalwork, bicycle stunt riding, aviation with both balloons and aeroplanes, astronomy, first aid, radio communication, camping, nature study would all suggest that Agnes was clearly an up-to-date lady in tune with modern times, who did not lack for energy or range of experience and ideas, and Agnes did put a good bit of her time (and money) into Guiding . . . the difference between them lay more in their personalities, not their ages or attitudes.  Consideration also needs to be given to the fact that Agnes was a year younger than Robert, and no-one seems to have questioned whether he was too old-fashioned, or lacking in the drive to get the Scout movement going on a sound footing . . .

 

How do you tell her you think it's time . . .

There are still Leaders who will tell the girls that old fib that they have to wear uniform otherwise they won’t be covered by insurance, whilst knowing fine well it’s not true.  Because sometimes it is easier to deliberately lie, and to deflect arguments through untruth, rather than grasp the bull by the horns and be honest.  For as we know, grasping bulls by the horns (or anywhere else on their anatomy for that matter!) does risk upsetting the bull somewhat . . .


Until recently, Guiding has had an upper age limit for it’s Leadership roles.  At one time it was 81, for many years 65.  And all Leaders, regardless of what role they happened to hold when the big day came round, had to hang up their uniforms for the last time on their 65th birthday.  They could become Advisers, and/or join Trefoil Guild, but they could no longer wear uniform or be members of Guiding, even if they had been members for about as long as they could remember.  It was harsh, it can’t be denied, and caused some people a great deal of upset.  But – it applied across the board, and whatever each individual felt about it, all knew the day was coming when they must step aside from active Guiding and leave it to the next generations to take the movement forward.


Then a few years ago the rule was altered, so that although they could no longer be Leader in Charge at a unit, if the Commissioner felt the particular individual was capable they could be allowed to remain as Assistant Leader for a few more years – provided the individual was still contributing to the running of an up-to-date programme, still fit enough, still relating well to the girls etc.  Although it was positive for the individuals who benefitted and did mean some units continuing which would otherwise have closed, it did mean that instead of a straightforward blanket rule, the Commissioner was now landed with the difficult task of having to decide whether or not each individual in her area should have their appointment renewed for an extra period – and if the Commissioner had any doubts about the wisdom of appointing an individual who fully expected to have her paperwork rubber-stamped, she was placed in a horribly difficult position – how to break it to an experienced adult that the expected automatic renewal might not be automatic?  Of course, on paper Commissioners had the safety-net that appointment was only as an Assistant Leader, so the buck would still stop with the younger Leader in Charge of the unit, who would be the direct ‘line manager’ of the other Leaders in her team.  Sadly, in reality, there were cases where Leaders in Charge who reached 65 simply ‘changed the name over the door’ but carried on business as usual, with the person listed as being Leader in Charge having a nominal role, whilst the older Assistant retained the authority and autonomy which should have come with the job.  Now, that last Assistant-only restriction is being removed, and there is apparently to be no upper age limit on Leaders in charge of units.  It is assumed that the individual Leader will judge for herself when the time is right for her to retire from unit Guiding, either as Leader in Charge, or Assistant Leader, and will entirely lay aside her personal feelings in order to do what is best for the unit and act on that judgement.


For many Leaders approaching or in their sixties, the announcement has come as a cause for celebration.  And I can well understand that – I don’t doubt that when my time came, if I were still in active Guiding, it would be hard to accept that ‘yesterday I was considered perfectly capable but tomorrow I won’t be, for the date on my birth certificate and no other reason’.  After all, nowadays many people live far longer ‘active lives’ than they used to do, such that many Leaders in their mid-60s are still perfectly capable of running unit meetings and residential events - and an ageing population means that there are automatically many fewer under 65s who can take on the Leadership roles in Guiding than there were in past decades, something which will only increase as all the 1960s baby boomers collect their pensions . . .


For some older Leaders, however, it’s not such good news.  Surprising thought?  Well, for some people the fixed retirement age was actually a relief.  It gave them a guilt-free excuse for stepping back from the unit, regardless of whether others were available to keep that unit going or whether it would fold, leaving them time to take up other hobbies that had been sitting on the back burner for longer than they would have liked.  These Leaders had served their time, and the age limit meant they could walk away without any need to make excuses, give explanations, or be pressured to keep going ‘just a little bit longer’.  For no matter how keen you are on Guiding, there’s no doubt that the constant pressure to come up with new and exciting programme ideas, to plan the outings, residentials and other extras which the girls want, to take on a share of organising local events, and attending committee meetings, and tackling jobs such as Commissioner, or Adviser, or local representative – can become wearing to even the most dedicated of volunteers, and it is all too easy for the Guiding hobby to crowd out other much-loved hobbies and activities.  The chance to say ‘sorry no, I’m 65 next year’ at an age and stage where those other neglected hobbies could still be taken up again, was something that some people really valued.


Now, it is up to the individual to judge when the time is right for her to retire.  For some, that will be before reaching 65, for some it will be after, by whatever margin.  But the new ruling presupposes that the individual not only knows within herself just when the time is right to step aside – but will also act on that knowledge and make the arrangements to leave when that time comes, ignoring any pressures or personal feelings.  And I daresay a fair number, perhaps a majority, will know when the inspiration is running out, or energy levels are no longer what they were, or programme ideas are no longer appealing to the girls as they used to, or they are no longer as in touch with the girls’ personalities, tastes and lifestyles - and will act on it by either altering their role, or moving on – perhaps to take on another role in Guiding, perhaps not.  And, of course, it also presupposes that there won’t be undue pressure from other Leaders or Commissioners to stay on.  There is a fine line between encouragement and pressure . . .


What I fear is – that there will be a proportion of long-serving Leaders who either won’t realise that the time to make a move is fast approaching (or already arrived a while ago) – or who will sense it but not act upon it.  Who will turn a blind eye to the signs that their unit needs to enhance it’s programmes, to signs that they aren’t as fit as they used to be, to signs that the girls don’t seem to care as much for the activities that used to be so popular, to signs that they can no longer give the unit the time it ideally needs, or whatever indicators apply.  And there doesn’t seem to have been any information issued on what the procedure will be if the Leader who ‘probably could do with stepping aside’ doesn’t see it?  Are they going to replace the age limit with ‘something else’, such as a regular review (whether specifically for older Leaders, or for all Leaders)?  Will they introduce performance targets to meet, such as having to do a certain number of hours’ training, or will there be a need to update qualifications?  (after all, you can already have a situation where someone gained their camp or holiday licence 20 or 30 years ago, and as long as they continue to attend camps/holidays as a member of staff every few years, no-one questions whether they have modernised or are still carrying out the same programmes and following the same rules they learned at training in the 1970s).  Or is the idea that the DC will just be landed with the nasty task of having to approach ‘pillar of the community’ Ms A to say that perhaps the time has come to step aside from the village unit she has been running for over 40 years?  Unless something occurs to bring matters to a head, then there will be the temptation for Commissioner just to let things lie a little longer, even if it means landing her successor with the nasty task instead, rather than risk upsetting Ms A and finding herself the talk of the village shop and splashed across the front page of the local paper.  Sure, the same situation of ‘unsatisfactory performance’ can apply with younger Leaders, but there isn’t so much public pressure in those cases as there is when big local personalities are concerned . . .

'Poaching' girls

Sometimes, you can get a clearer view of a situation by looking ‘from the far side of the fence’.  So let’s consider the oft-raised question of Scouting ‘poaching girls’ from Guiding.

 

From shared original roots, over the following 80 or so years Scouting and Guiding grew into two entirely separate clubs.  Each followed it’s own path under their own leadership.  They existed happily alongside all the other clubs and hobbies for young people (including each other) some of which continued to thrive through the decades, and some of which died out, or amalgamated, or were reduced to a few scattered local clubs.  Although Guiding continued to maintain it’s general popularity right through to the present day, there came a point when Scouting could no longer claim it was doing likewise.  Their numbers were consistently dropping, in some areas to the extent that their viability was called into question.  And they were not attracting as wide a cross-section of boys as before.  Assorted recruitment efforts having failed to significantly alter this, they opted instead to take a much more radical step.  If they couldn’t attract enough boys to ensure on-going viability - then why only boys?  If they were to allow girls to become members of all sections, it would automatically more than double the pool of potential recruits!  Of course, it would do nothing to resolve the question of the un-reached boys, indeed it would likely significantly worsen it, but it would potentially shore up the numbers overall).  The announcement was made without warning, and caused surprise in many circles, including within Guiding (they had been in regular discussion with the Scouts about all sorts of common topics, yet had no inkling such an announcement was coming).

 

Once it became an option, some girls opted to leave Guiding in order to join the newly-‘open’ Scouts.  Some who hadn’t been Guides joined the Scouts.  Some chose to belong to both Guides and Scouts.  And some girls continued to join neither.  Whichever, there was sadness but limited acrimony from the Guides at the Scouts’ sudden decision to ‘go open’ once the initial shock had died down – sadness at the loss of some enthusiastic girl members, yes, but a determination to continue offering what still appeared to be attracting a consistently viable number of girls across a fair cross-section of communities around the country.  The view was taken that if Guiding could continue to keep it’s programmes attractive, then it could continue to attract a viable number of girls, in which case the losses need not make a critical dent in membership.  Actually, at the time, the change of policy seemed to cause more upset among Scouting than to anyone else.  But Scout headquarters made it clear that whatever individual members might feel about it, it was a done deal, and all parts of Scouting would soon have to welcome any girl applicants they received, and start to transition their units towards being fully-open, with a deadline set for achieving that status.

 

For some years, things then bumped along more or less amicably between the clubs, at least in public.  The Guides continued to recruit a similar proportion of the girls across the country as they had before.  The Scouts now had enough members to be viable.  Below the surface, however, in some localities there were claims of the Scouts ‘poaching girls’ from the Guides, and claims that in some Scout units the boys were ‘being swamped’ by the number of girls seeking to join.  It’s hard to judge how widespread or accurate either claim was, but each has been repeated at intervals since.

 

Some have asked the question of whether the two clubs should merge – after all, despite the many differences which exist, they still have some things in common, in pursuing an active outdoor programme of activities, similar customs and traditions, similar ways of working (although in the detail there are some significant differences which could be major barriers).  I would say not.  Each time I consider it, I come back to the fact that mergers only work if there is popular support for merger from the membership of both groups, and to date the Guides’ members have made it very clear that they continue to want a girl-only space – and membership numbers show that the girl-only group remains far more popular with girls than an open group like Scouts.  And now that Scouting is open, most Leaders don’t seem to feel the need to seek a merger.

 

From some of the Scouting forums it appears that, although the gender balance of the club membership changed a bit when they ‘went open’, real transition in attitudes, programmes and membership numbers from a boys club to a genuinely mixed group is, naturally, still some way from final fruition – many unit programmes are still much as they were before the change, with the only real concession to the fact that it is now meant to be a mixed club being the compulsory arrangements around changing areas/sleeping arrangements for girl members, not any significant change in the programme focus or ethos.  It appears that in many units girls are welcome provided they are comfortable in joining a club where the focus will be on the boys’ activity tastes and preferences - which some girls are, and some aren’t.  After all, what they were doing was enabling the girls to join a boy-focussed club, where the activities were designed to appeal to boys, and if they happened to appeal to girls too it was by accident not design.  So a gender split approaching 50/50 (or a girl majority) is still comparatively rare in Scouting units.  The extent to which they are a ‘mixed’ group (or whether their programmes should be altered to cater for a wider range of tastes and make them ‘more mixed’) is an interesting topic in itself, and is probably the next dilemma Scouting faces.

 

So is Guiding in competition with Scouting?  Yes, of course it is.  But neither more nor less so than with ballet class, swimming club, highland dancing, music lessons, drama club, Girls’ Brigade, mini rugby, tae kwon do, football, choir, and every other hobby or pastime available which the girls might choose to take up in their free time.  And I don’t see much sign of any of these clubs claiming ‘poaching’ from each other as an issue.  So I could equally ask, is the ballet class poaching girls from athletics club?  Do the Tuesday Brownies poach girls from the Friday Brownies?  Does the mini rugby team poach from the piano teacher?  It is rare for any club or class to actively target the members of another club or class – and rarely very successful.  Each hobby or club will and does attract a different selection of the children from the community, depending on each child’s tastes and talents - and each has to choose and agree with their folks which hobbies they would like to take up, how they can schedule them into their free time alongside homework and family commitments, and how the membership fees and other expenses will be afforded.  No-one could do them all even if they wanted to, there aren’t enough hours in the day, so some options must be rejected.  Do I try to poach girls from other clubs?  No.  My units offer the programme they offer, either that programme and the way it is delivered appeals to a particular girl or it doesn’t.  Any advertising I do simply states what my unit has to offer, it makes no comment on what other clubs there are in the locality, or what they might offer. 

 

So, the question is often asked, are Scouts ‘poaching girls’ from Guiding?  And if we’re asking that question, in order to be fair, shouldn’t we simultaneously ask ourselves the reverse question - is Guiding poaching girls from Scouts? 

The 'Package Holiday'

The purpose of camping in Guiding was to put into effect the skills which the Guides had learned in theory at meetings during the year.  So all that theoretical study and indoor practice on learning knots, nature study, campcraft, cookery etc. which units carried out for 51 weeks of the year - would be put to practical use in a 1-week camp where the girls would learn to be self-reliant, cooking their own meals, maintaining their own tents and learning about the countryside around them.  They made their own entertainment and tackled activities of their choice, and it was the ideal chance to pass some of the clauses in Second and First class.  Day hikes, wide games, swimming, signalling and tracking nature.  For many it was their first time away from their family, for some it was their first ever holiday, or first ever sight of the countryside or seaside.  And having saved up all year, they were able to travel by train, charabanc, or haul their trek cart to a field in the country.  The handbooks implied that every Guide would get the opportunity to go to camp every year.  And most did.

 

In due course indoor holidays were introduced for Brownies.  As we know, from it’s inception the entire purpose and aim of the Brownie section was – to prepare girls to become Guides.  In a similar way to Guide camp, Brownie holiday utilised the skills they had been learning all year as they helped to look after the house, and themselves.  And again, they were for a minimum of 5 days, but usually for a full week.  It was the culmination of the Brownie year, where the Brownies took over a house and did their own thing in it, doing as much as possible for themselves.  Besides this, there would be healthy outdoor games and picnics, and educational visits to places of interest – and always the chance to work on progress badges.  Of course there were some Leaders who claimed that Brownie Holidays ‘spoiled’ camping for Guides, but the evidence tended to be to the contrary – that the girl who had been on Brownie holiday looked forward to taking the next step.

 

As decades passed, so gradually more and more Leaders found it hard to run the traditional week-long camp or holiday.  At first because fewer had household staff, and so had to run the household and look after the children by themselves, then in due course many went out to work part-time or full-time, until it eventually reached a stage where week-long camps or holidays were impossible to staff for many units, and by the early 1980s the weekend residential was starting to become more common than the week.  Many of the same activities were attempted, they were simply crammed into the much-shorter time-frame as best they could.  Hence the girls tended to go home more tired than they arrived (unless the Leaders managed things very carefully), as everything was so tightly timetabled.  The thing that was lost was the time to “stand and stare”, go off on hikes, or appreciate nature.  Every minute spent had to be justifiable.

 

Soon more opportunities started to be opened up – for Guides to do weekend indoor holidays, for Brownies to do weekend camps, and for all sections to do sleepovers – and shorter events of this sort became commonplace, with the week-long camp tending to be found only at larger events such as international camps (other than for those lucky few units where Leaders could still muster enough annual leave to run longer events).  Nevertheless, despite the evidence, the claims that Rainbow and Brownie residentials would put girls off attending Guide residentials persisted.  Still with no more evidence than before.

 

Then commercial companies started to take a big interest in us.  Sure, there had been packaged international trips for many years, but in the last 10 years or so there have been an explosion of firms chasing the youth group market in the UK.  They had the holiday centres sitting under-used, and the staff who could run a range of ‘adventurous activities’ – and they could offer their standard-issue package holidays to groups just as easily as to individuals.  No longer would the busy Unit Leader need to plan menus, buy food, organise programmes of activities (or ideally, get her PLs to do most of it) – she could now get a professional company to do it all for her (for a price, natch). 

 

But the price wasn’t in significantly higher fees alone – for those who used these packaged holidays could select only from those activities the company chose to lay on, following the company’s choice of timetable.  There wasn’t the option of an impromptu hike, a wide game, or tackling badgework, even if that was what the girls really wanted to do.  Just going out into the woodland to light a fire and cook lunch wasn’t possible, you were to eat the food provided in the dining room between the set hours.  Midnight hikes or sunrise Promise ceremonies were impossible when you still had to report to the canoe pond at 9.30 sharp . . . and many of the activities were the same old ones the girls had already done several times over at school ‘outdoor ed’, the kids club at the holiday resort, etc, like canoeing, climbing wall, archery.  So although billed as ‘adventurous’, and perhaps assumed to be so by the Unit Leaders – in reality they weren’t adventurous after all, just the same thing over again.

 

I wonder if there will be a backlash?  I wonder if there will be a realisation in Guiding that these package holidays are offering the girls – little more than what a family holiday in many European resorts already offer?  Will there be a realisation that it isn’t really a ‘Guiding’ residential at all, the fact that the people attending happen to all be Guides is of no consequence to the organisers, as they have no interest in attempting to adjust their programmes in order to incorporate a Guiding ethos, or develop Guiding skills.  Will the Guides clamour for the chance to do shelter building, backwoods cooking, campfires, wide games, supper hikes and all the other unstructured fun which Guide camps normally have, but which these companies don’t normally offer, as things which would be genuinely adventurous?  The Guides can only clamour for them if they know that such adventure exists . . . otherwise they’ll do the beginner archery session again - for the umpteenth time.

 

Oh yes.  I do know how much work there is in planning and running camps and holidays in Guiding - I do it every year for both my units in amongst all my other commitments.  I can fully understand the temptation to say ‘hang the expense’ and use the professional companies, especially if it seems like it’s a that-or-nothing position.  But I have seen the difference between residential events where the Guide ethos is a built-in part of the programme, and ones where it only happens by accident if it happens at all.  At a traditional Guiding camp or indoor holiday the girls get the chance to do things they don’t get to do anywhere else, and which are thus really adventurous.  They get a genuine choice over the programme and activities they want to have, some of which are brand new and adventurous to them, not just a ‘pick 3 from 5’.  They learn skills that the package holiday doesn’t teach. 

 

I’m not saying ban-them-all.  But amongst the temptation to pay someone else to do all the organising rather than do your own thing, I think we should make our choices with an awareness of the cons, and try to make sure that package holidays are an occasional treat just for a change, not the default option.

Need we always put the 'in' in Guiding?

Need we always put the ‘in’ in Guiding?

 

Way back when Guiding started, most people did not have access to genuinely waterproof coats, and wellington boots were rare.  Nevertheless, the first handbook makes it clear that Guide meetings should be held outdoors unless the weather absolutely forbade – and there is the famous response from our founder when a unit asked her about fundraising to build a drill hall – Agnes asked why on earth they would want to do drill in a stuffy hall when they could equally well do their drill outdoors and get the benefit of the fresh air . . .

 

Although we do have to bear in mind that in those days most units met at weekends rather than weekday evenings, and so had the benefit of year-round daylight which many of us don’t, nevertheless any unit log book from those early days would be filled each week with outdoor games, picnic hikes, tracking, fire-lighting, shelter building, campfires, practicing first aid and rescue skills, long-distance signalling, wide games – and very little mention of handicrafts, citizenship discussions, or other indoor/sedentary activities.

 

And whenever we are preparing adverts about modern Guiding, we automatically look out our photographs of the camping, sailing, climbing and other outdoor adventures we’ve done – and tend to include very few pictures of the girls sitting around tables at the hall.  Even though that would be a more accurate reflection of the average unit meeting.

 

Are we being honest – with the public, and just as important, with ourselves?

 

I do try to get my unit outdoors as much as is reasonable.  Weather permitting we spend the greater part of the summer term outdoors.  But this year the summer term is only 10 meetings long for one of my units, and only 7 meetings long for the other due to Monday holidays.  On top of this there will be a couple of weeks at the start of the autumn term when we will have daylight.  During the winter we do try to arrange some outdoor activities in the dark, but generally we’ll be indoors most of the time.  I don’t suppose we’re unusual in that.  And I try to organise at least one weekend residential for each unit, which is as much as I can manage most years.  So the photos I pick out for the display will almost all tend to come from our once-a-year visit to the watersports centre, or the once-a-year camp or indoor holiday.  What we did at unit meetings on the other 34 weeks of the year we met will not get much mention, nor many photos.  So I guess my adverts and displays won’t be a very honest portrayal of the unit at all.

 

Need it be that way?

 

We nowadays have access to thermal clothing, effective waterproofs, affordable wellingtons.  So we can go outside on any week of the year without ill-effects.  Most units have access to a local park, farmland or common land, car parks/clearings, or other open areas (however small) which would enable them to get outside – or could borrow a back garden.  If the will was there.  The range of outdoor activities available to us is much wider than 100 years ago – as well as organised sports there is orienteering/geocaching, many towns have trails, streetlights allow us to do floodlit trails, many playparks and skate parks are open at night, bike trails and cycle lanes are being opened, many areas have countryside wardens, park keepers or nature clubs.  And the outdoor activities the early Guides did are still open to us, and still as adventurous as ever they were – indeed in many cases even more so.

 

I know about staffing.  I know about paperwork.  I know about worried parents.  I have all of those too.  But Guiding was a game designed to be played outdoors, and nowadays more than ever, Guiding has a role to play in improving the health of the girls.  The old health rhyme was “Always feed on wholesome fare, through your nostrils breathe fresh air, clean yourself both in and out, twist and turn and run about”.  Well, don’t we keep hearing about balanced diet, self-healthcare, hygiene and exercise?  The rhyme is as relevant and as necessary now as ever it was, when so many of the girls don’t have balanced diets, and rarely get exercise in the fresh air.  One of the big aims of Guiding was to give the girls healthy outdoor exercise.  I think it’s important that, whatever else the programme may bring, we keep that at the forefront.