Issues with Troop Leaders at Camp

[Marzz]

Does your camp have a "Core Camp" or troop camping program where troops come to resident camp for a session with their leaders? Have you ever had a nightmare troop leader? What do you do when this happens? For example, the girls are fine doing whatever the program is, but the troop leader stops you at every turn that the program is not good or enough, or she wants to do it differently, or she doesn't like the cookout food and wants something else for her troop (but there are several other troops involved), or the songs are too silly and we should be singing more meaningful songs. etc. This is just an example, I'm looking for your troop leader horror stories and how you dealt with the problem.

I find this area particularly difficult and sensitive to deal with since the troop leaders are volunteers and parents and are often the hardest ones to please when it comes to programming.

What about Day Camp or one day programs? I did a one day program recently where a troop leader was unhappy with the program and before I had a chance to make adjustments, she took her troop and left without saying anything.

Bring it on!

[facade1138]

That only happens for us on parents weekend. A lot of the mother daughter pairs are leaders and daughters. They have a tendency to say some stuff to us, but we kindly tell them that the program is pre-scheduled so everyone has a chance to do many different things.

[Life_Saver]

Troop Camp is the worst at my Girl Scout Camp! Just like you said, the leaders think they can get special treatment. I think it is because they are so used to being the leader of their troop and when they come to camp their girl's tend to follow or listen to the camp staff more. One time we had a troop order pizza instread of eating in the Dining hall with the rest of camp. And the leaders were always making runs to the store for petty things they forgot. And the leaders think they need a cooler stocked with food in the units with them...

[Flukie]

As a troop leader, I hate camping with other troop leaders. Lol. I train troop camping - the best comment I got was, "Perhaps you are too young to quite understand this..." Look lady, you've never slept in a tent before! I have 10 years of girl experience and 5 of adult - I'm more than qualified! Lol.

That being said, I ran an event at the beginning of the month. There was an exerecise at the end (CHOSEN BY COUNCIL!!!) to talk about values. We had different questions and the girls stood up or sat down based on what they thought - no one was right or wrong, it was more to just get them talking. One of the last questions was about cheating - if you could cheat and NOT get caught, would you think about doing it? As you looked around the room, you saw some little Juniors hesitating. Finally, one of my CITs stood up and said, "You know, if I wouldn't get caught, yeah, I would think about it." Another stood and added, "If I was in need of the grade, I'd be more likely." A few of the Juniors also stood. I had a mother (of one of my campers!) go nuts. She said that the older girls were TERRIBLE influences and should have lied rather than told the truth. She also said that if these girls were the CITs at camp, her daughter would not be returning. I was shocked - she took it way beyond what it was. Other leaders praised the activity, saying it was going to be a great start to what to talk about in troop and defining values. So - as mad as I was (at myself, at the leader, at my girls) I came to the conclusion that you can't please anyone (leaders most of all!) and that I, as a leader, would rather have my older girls be honest than lie. But it still was very frustrating!

(Another leader also thought that the "actors" aka volunteer high school and college students should have had all their lines memorized and been actually in full costumes - it was a trial putting Gold E. Locks against the Three Bears. Sorry, we're volunteers and you paid $7 each girl to come - none of that money went to me for props and my volunteers didn't see the script - so cut them some slack.)

[Marzz]

I think another issue is that the girls don't know who to listen to at camp. Their troop leader is with them all the time, but their counselors are the professionals. Sometimes troop leaders don't know the camp rules, or don't agree with them and so they diregard them. This is sooooo frustrating.

[offkey]

The sister camps that I work at have multiple programs that have non staff adults in attendance. Troop Core Camp, Troop Camp Plus, Mother/Daughter Camp, Father/Daughter Camp and Family Camp. The result of this is that I have had more than my share of run ins with the adults in attendance but being slightly older (grandmother of 3) it is nothing compared to what my more youthful program specialists go through. To help lower the interferance from the adults for the younger staff I take the time to remind the parents at our all camp sign up for activities meeting that they are there to have fun also. I inform them that I understand that these kids are YOUR BABIES and though the staff may seem young, they are all adults and have all gone through specialized training resulting in certification. All they want to do is give you and your kids the best time possible in a safe positive learning environment. This usually cuts down on 98% of the problems, naturaly there is always going to be somebody who just dosen't get it but hey thats life in a GS camp. As for food in the units we let them know that it is okay as long as it is in sealed containers and not brought into the cabin (brings bugs and raccoons you know) thats what the unit shelter is for. I wouldn't dream of denying parents (at their expense) and endless supply of soda and junk food. If they want to order in a pizza or other food thats fine too but they don't get a refund for meals they didn't go to and they have to notify the cooks at the previous meal how many won't be at the next meal. We like to be flexible.

[Smudge]

We just finished a troop camp and luckily the leaders we had were great! They let us do our job without interfering and with little in the way of complaints.

But we do have occaisional nightmare leaders and we just have to be find a way to tell them to let us do our job!

[NightOwl]

This year was my camps first summer as a resident camp and the first time they did a "mom and me" type program.
Let me explain the setup a little before I tell you about the issues:

The way the program worked was that from Sunday night till Wednesday mornig we had one group of female adults who came with usually one or 2 girls. Same thing for the second halft of the week.

The families were assigned to units , based on age i think, and were assinged staff. Just like a "normal" week, we had a unit leader and 2-3 unit counselors. The staff had one of the cabins like normal as well in the unit.

At night and during FOB, the staff had to be in the unit and available to help. We were encouraged to engage. During the day however, there were 2 -3 hours blocks of time that the staff were assinged to a station and the families could individually float from one station to the next.

Most of the problems came with the parents thinking that there should be more options, more supplies available, station repeated (so they could do everything), and with staff "sitting around chatting".

Since this was our first summer and the program had never been done before, we were still trying to work out how to run the program. Yes, staff would sometimes be sitting and chatting, but only if there was no one at our station. Since some stations were near each other.... the parents saw that and ran with it.....

Also, in the units, parents wanted to be able to shower whenever and would FREAK out about the frogs and bugs.... it was funny at first, but then just got annoying....

I will say this.... the first group I had was challenging..... most those parents had never been camping and thought it would be something COMPLETELY different....

However, I loved my second group and really enjoyed spending time with them.... I would color or do other small crafts with the girls while holding a conversation with the parents..... they were all the troop leaders, but they treated me as an adult and respected my postion as a staff member.... we also had very enlightening discussions about raising children and their viewpoints on things such as music, television, and books.... I learned a lot from that group!

[ocean]

We have a 3 day family camp, and we also have troop camp for all the troops to come for 3 days, we always have these sessions held before our regular resident camp starts up.

We never usually have too many problems with the family camp, but with the troop camp its horrible because the troop leaders act like they know everything, while in reality they dont. If they dont get the right cabin or tent they wanted, a lot of complaints, if we ask them to do something and they dont like it, complaints. I hate troop camping, but sometimes we do get the good troops where you can just sit at the firering with them, have some smores, and talk, and make jokes.