The Southern Crescent District is in the Atlanta Area Council, serving Scouts, Leaders and Parents in Clayton County and South Fulton County. See the BeAScout website for location and contact information for Cub Scout Packs (Kindergarten through 5th Grade are Cub Scouts), Scouts BSA Troops (end of 5th Grade to age 18), and Venturing Crews.
And if you worry about Lions earning Bobcat, see this note about Lions and Bobcat. (Spoiler Alert: the general rule is if a Scout completed requirements, they earned the award, so let's recognize them!)
Those tips and resources for doing the Bobcat rank include different ways to do Bobcat, longer or shorter, plus extra game and fun ideas. Do what makes sense for your Pack and Den -- hopefully what makes sense is getting more parents to lead!
Almost every Pack in this District is smaller than the average Pack in the Atlanta Area Council. The average Atlanta Pack has about 25 Scouts and therefore averages about 4 Scouts per den -- which means those are not large enough to be fun, and less likely to have an engaged and able Den Leader emerge.
The traditional approach of the BSA to this is to tell that Pack to either (1) just recruit more kids until you have 48 (8 per den), which ignores the likelihood that while trying to get to 48 you're losing families who aren't getting good program, or (2) take whatever leader you have and let her juggle three Den Leader Guides/Handbooks in order to do the Adventures for three grade levels that are in those three Den Leader Guides and Handbooks (That's hard. Really hard.).
We can do better.
Mixed Den Adventure Plans Now Published Here. The Mixed Den resource page here at our website has nine sets of “Mixed Den” Adventure Plans and pages, for:
The Guide to Cub Scout Family Recruiting found in the Atlanta Area Council Recruiting Resources page describes steps for successful recruiting -- spoiler alert: Successful and Sustainable Recruiting Does Not Begin and End at School Sign Up Night! If families are fired up at a Sign Up Night but have no Pack to join and no leaders to deliver a program, where are the new youth going to do Cub Scouting? And do Packs with a handful of Leaders have the capacity to lead 50, 60 or more?
(1) Make a Calendar of Fun Activities that families like -- activities they want to do -- if you plan those activities, you will be the Pack they want to join (you want families who want to "do" activities, not just "drop off" kids for you to mind)
(3) Recruit More Leaders and Helpers -- yes, you need to do this throughout your recruiting process. We do "get it": recruiting is hard. But that page has many ideas about ways to approach leader recruiting so that your Pack can become an "Every Parent Helps" Pack,
all of that leads to (5) Sign-Up Events: not just the "School Sign-Up Night" scheduled by the Claude Gatlin (our District Executive) and run by both the District Professional and Pack Leaders, but also Fun Joining Events that you create for your own Pack and Dens! Any Fun Den or Pack Activity can be a Welcoming Joining Event for New Families -- let them "test drive" Cub Scouting!
Silver Comet District Stem & Nova Fair Who: All Cub Scouts and Scouts BSA Scouts When: Sunday, August 28th, 2022 from 1pm until 4pm. Where: Atlanta Area Council - 1800 Circle 75 Pkwy SE, Atlanta, Georgia 30339 Cost: $5.00 for All Scouts
Does your Scout love STEM? Are they curious about how (STEM) science, technology, engineering and mathematics affects their daily life? Join us for the Silver Comet District’s first ever STEM/Nova Fair. The STEM/Nova Fair will be open to both Cub Scouts and Scouts BSA around the council. Scouts will visit stations around the room to learn more about all the different Nova awards that the BSA Nova Programs have to offer. Stations include regatta boats, volcanoes, coding, and more. Does your Scout like a SUPER Challenge? Check out our Supernova Awards. Scouts will have the opportunity to work together to build a large-scale Rube-Goldburg machine that will be tested at the end of the STEM/Nova Fair LIVE on the Silver Comet District Facebook page. PLUS, the first 100 scout participants will receive a special Silver Comet STEM/Nova bag. Register here.
What Does it Mean when We See "Sign Up Night" Calendar Entries for our Pack Number???? It means that Claude has scheduled a School Sign Up Night for the school or schools noted in the Calendar Entry.
School Sign Up Nights need to be welcoming but rapid, informative but not overloading -- and you're recruiting the whole family, not just the youth, because Packs need Parent Leaders too. Schools want us "in and out" quickly ... most parents want to come in, get the details (this is where having a good one page/two sided flyer that is a "Pack Packet" of information is super helpful to you and them), sign up and get home!
But invite your Pack Families to attend and help "Welcome" new Families -- Peer to Peer and Parent to Parent persuasion is Powerful!
A Pack produced Welcoming Fun Event on a different day than the School Sign Up Night can be longer and a lot more fun, especially outdoors -- what fun you have is up to you, but see the Sign Up Events page for some ideas).
There can be more than one ... before and/or after a School Sign Up Night.
After a School Sign Up Night, you might include a Pack Parent Orientation on the side while the Cub Scouts do fun things -- maybe led by any Scouts BSA Troop you know.
For either type of big Sign Up Event, see the Sign Up Events page, including the plan and script ideas there -- the script works with a few engaged volunteers either as a presentation or a "station to station" event, and can be supported by District Professionals . You can download the script and tailor it to fit your Pack's program and policies.
But if Claude set up the Sign Up Night, doesn't that mean he will do everything? No! It's your Pack and so you should own the event and coordinate with the District Professionals -- let them know your fun activity calendar (easy to copy and edit flyers with activity lists are here), work with them on how you will tell the school families how your Pack operates -- you will know that better anyway.
Should we just have Leaders show up ... or other Parents and Families too? Invite your current families to attend -- dub them your "Welcome Team" or "New Member Coordinators" to welcome new families -- and to help with the "one on one" and "peer to peer" connections that will draw families into your Pack, especially to convey the concept of shared leadership, of Cub Scouting as a family program where Every Parent Leads. So get your current Scouts and Families out there -- they can "sell" the program better than anyone! -- and let Ramon know your plans, so that they can support you.
The Southern Crescent District is in the Atlanta Area Council, serving Scouts, Leaders and Parents in Clayton County and South Fulton County. See the BeAScout website for location and contact information for Cub Scout Packs (Kindergarten through 5th Grade are Cub Scouts), Scouts BSA Troops (end of 5th Grade to age 18), and Venturing Crews. 
