Honest Assessment of Girl Scouts Time Commitment
Hi parents - thinking about Girl Scouts for my 5 year old next year. I have looked at the GS website and haven't seen anything detailed as regards time commitment for parent volunteers (please do send me a link if I've missed this on the official site!). What is the range for just a regular parent with a girl in GS, troop leader, and cookie sales leader? Please be honest with me! I may still do it, even if the numbers are high!
How many girls need to be in the troop to make it do-able/sustainable? (not just the official minimum, but enough parents to spread out the workload) Can one Daisy group have both 1st & K girls in it, or is it just one grade? How much is "God"/religion a feature of the official chants/activities? (I thought not at all, but a friend made an offhand comment to the religious traditions in GS.)
Thanks for any advice! Trying to go into it with both eyes open...
Parent Replies
My wife was in GS and was a troop leader for many years. Essentially she was a teacher, organizer, coordinator, accountant and "mom" to the girls in the troop. She had major help from two or three other women and could not have done it without their help. As a troop leader my wife would spend 5-15 hours per week. It's all going to come down to the other parents respecting you and your time. If the other parents are slow to respond, don't give you money when asked or volunteer and don't deliver guess who's problem it becomes. This happened a couple of times over the years with girls in my wife's group. You either need to ask the girl to leave the troop or or have the other parents fill in including financially and with the cookie sales. My wife struggled with this as she thought this wasn't fair to the other girls and parents in the troop and it was really adding to her time commitment. She was wasting so much time with the parents she decided keep the girls and pass the work/financial burden along to the other parents. (Not sure if that's acceptable under GS rules.)
Cookies.... It's a family affair to pickup, move and get all of the boxes distributed. It's you are a good organizer and have some bookkeeping experience it's only expect to spend 10-25 hours additional in cookie season. If ALL of the other parents in the troop have computers and are computer literate it will reduce the amount time.
Funny you should ask about God/religion in any of the GS. I know it is (or maybe was) a big deal with Boy Scouts but apparently not for GS. Good thing too, as a few of the girls in her troop were not of the Christian faith. God/religion was never mentioned and was never an issue.
I'm not sure how many girls are required per troop, but 7-12 is what I seem to recall. It all depends on other parent involvement. Your time commitment will decrease if other parents are involved. Like in day care you need about 1 parent really involved for every 3 - 5 girls in the troop. Not sure why you can't mix grades as long as they are not years apart.
Hope this helps and I hope you do it. My wife is glad she did it and my daughters and her friends have memories of the projects and camping trips they took together. As a troop leader it's a good way to bond with your daughter/s.
As a regular parent, my time has been very minimal. We've brought in some craft supplies and snacks this year. That's it. It will probably depend upon the troop.