Scouts push for membership increase

Mel Cooke, Sunday Gleaner Writer

As the Scouts movement marks its 100th year of activities in Jamaica, a renewed attempt is being made to revive and grow the organisation.

Among the centenary celebrations is a special banquet set for Saturday, February 26, at The Jamaica Pegasus hotel, New Kingston as part of the events in Scout Week 2011 - February 20-27. Other activities include a road march and annual public meeting to take place at King's House on Thursday, February 24, and a national founder's day service and parade at Kingston Parish Church to close the week on Sunday, February 27.

The first scouting troop - as the basic units are known - in Jamaica was formed in Brown's Town, St Ann, in 1910 by the Reverend Joseph William Graham. The first Kingston troop was formed at Wolmer's Boys' School a year later and in 1963 Jamaica became a member of the World Organisation of the Scout Movement.

Fewer members

However, Queen Scout (the highest level which a Scout can attain), and Jamaica's first Duke of Edinburgh awardee, Patrick Salter, says the number of persons involved in scouting has fallen dramatically from the halcyon days of the 1960s, when there were over 8,000 Scouts in Jamaica, to fewer than 2,000 at present.

The Scouts are organised into Cubs, up to 11 years old, the Scouts going up to 15 years old. The Ventures fall between 15 and 18 years old, and Service cover up to 25 years old.

Reverend Barrington Soares, chief commissioner, Scout Association of Jamaica, puts the number of registered Scouts in the country at just over 1,500, although there are just as many who are involved in the movement but are not up to date with their paperwork.

Salter also chairs the planning committee for the centenary banquet, at which United States ambassador to Jamaica, Pamela Bridgewater, herself a Girl Scout of Virginia Lifetime Achieve-ment awardee, will be the guest speaker. "Our objective is to raise a net of $2 million," Salter told The Sunday Gleaner. The profit will be turned over to the Scout association.

Two other Queen Scouts, Anthony Pickersgill and Earl Whyte, are on the planning committee, with a number of other persons involved in the process.

Soares outlines an organisational structure in which volunteerism plays a huge role, with a handful of paid staff at the Scout association Camp Road, St Andrew, headquarters. However, among the strategies to revive the Scout movement is the employment of a full-time executive commissioner to coordinate the volunteers' efforts.

The commissioner is looking to the high schools for the hoped-for increase in membership. He points out that there are many Cubs, moreso in the preparatory than the primary schools, but there is no transition to the Scouts in high school. "I think there are only two high schools, in Mandeville, that have troops and the leaders are from outside the school," Soares said.

He is banking the Scout association's hopes for increased membership mainly on the high schools. "We are thinking that if they start a troop of 28 members each in 100 schools, that is 2,800 members," Soares said. Then there is the interest in the communities, the churches having been fertile ground for the Scout association.

Observing that the Scouts, as well as Boys' Brigade, have a positive effect on boys' discipline and leadership skills, Soares says, "if we could get them back up and running, I think they would go a far way to having a positive effect on the boys".