Boy Scouts flagship to be ‘Scouts’ with girls
Remington Stewart of Elgin has longed to be a Scout since she was 3 years old.
Now 7, Remington has watched as her big brother participated in Cub Scouts. She always tagged along as an honorary member, participating in the activities but unable to compete. Now she will get her chance. The Boys Scouts of America in recent months allowed girls to join Scouting at the Cub Scouts level and then eventually at the Boy Scouts level.
For 108 years, the Boy Scouts of America’s flagship program has been known as the Boy Scouts. With girls soon entering the ranks, the Irving-based organization announced Wednesday a new name for its flagship program, changing Boy Scouts to Scouts BSA. The change for the 11- to 17-yearolds’ program will take effect in February.
“A lot of little sisters are honorary Scouts,” said Remington’s mom, Cathy Stewart, who will be the girl’s Bear den leader. “They’re always there and doing things with the boys, but they were not earning badges. I’m excited. And I think most packs are excited because now it opens it up to be a whole family thing, which is really nice. To have one thing the whole family can do together is just fantastic.”
Chief Scout Executive Mike Surbaugh said many possibilities were considered during lengthy and “incredibly fun” deliberations before the new name was chosen.
“We wanted to land on something that evokes the past but also conveys the inclusive nature of the program going forward,” he said. “We’re trying to find the right way to say we’re here for both young men and young women.”
Not everyone embraces the change, with a handful of critics voicing opposition to the new name to the organization’s Central Texas office.
“There has been some scattered folks here and there,” said Charles Mead, Capitol Area Council director of marketing and public relations for Boy Scouts of America. “I received one phone call this afternoon with someone who was upset about it . ... But I hope over time, when people have all the information, that will change. We’re not trying to minimize the boy part of this program and not saying there shouldn’t be an opportunity for boys to be only with other boys. We just want to make sure that if there is a young person out there who can benefit from what we offer, that they have a chance to do that.”
National Girl Scout leaders said they were blindsided by the move, and they are gearing up an aggressive campaign to recruit and retain girls as members. The Girl Scouts last fall criticized the Boy Scouts’ decision to add girls to its organization.
The Girl Scouts and the BSA are among several major youth organizations in the U.S. experiencing sharp drops in membership in recent years. Reasons include competition from sports leagues, a perception by some families that they are old-fashioned and busy family schedules.
The parent organization will remain the Boy Scouts of America, and the Cub Scouts — its program serving children from kindergarten through fifth grade — will keep its name, as well. But the name of the program changes for those in middle school and high school.
The organization already has started admitting girls into the Cub Scouts, and Scouts BSA begins accepting girls next year. So far, more than 3,000 girls have joined roughly 170 Cub Scout packs participating in the first phase of the new policy, and the pace will intensify this summer under a nationwide multimedia recruitment campaign titled “Scout Me In.”
The organization in recent years has significantly relaxed its membership requirements, prompting discord and debate among its leadership and members. The organization in 2013 changed its membership policy to allow gay boys into Scouting, and in 2015, it lifted its ban on gay Scout leaders.
“There is more outdoorsy things for us to do,” Stewart said. “(Remington) is just officially excited to be a Cub Scout now. It’s what her older brother does, and it’s what she wanted to do.”
Sam Brannon, the pastor at St. Peter’s Lutheran Church in Elgin, said the church sponsors Troop 182 that soon will be accepting girls. Brannon, who was a Boy Scout, said he traveled the world with his father, who was in the military, and noticed other countries had co-ed Scout troops in the 1980s. He also participated in the Explorers group, which also allowed girls, and said he preferred it.
“Our congregation supports the Boy Scouts and what they do and how they do it,” Brannon said. “This is a big change for them, but the world is a very different place” from when the group was founded in the United States. “Here is a way for families to be involved together in programming that promotes reverence,” he said.
The program for the older boys and girls will largely be divided along gender lines, with single-sex units pursuing the same types of activities, earning the same array of merit badges and potentially having the same pathway to the coveted Eagle Scout award.