Family Focus:  Sign-Up Events Should Target Families

For Cub Scout Packs, our goal is not just to sign up new youth. Our goal is to sign up new Families!

• The Cub Scout program is a family program, designed to make stronger connections between kids and adults, which will make parenting easier!
• Without parental involvement – adult leaders – those kids can’t have Cub Scouting.
• If your Pack program is fun, active, full of adventure, this is the kind of program that families should want to join, that kids will want to do, that parents will participate in.
• Cub Scouting is Fun, Family and Friends.

If you and your current leaders recruit just new youth, you may fail if you don’t already have more parent involvement than you need for current Scouts. If your Pack has a shortage of actively engaged leaders, recruit carefully: either be sure you’re lining up more active, engaged leaders, or only bring on the youth your leaders can handle – and let other Packs recruit those youth you cannot handle.

Downloadable Resource: Recruitment Event Sign-In Sheet, Plan, and Script

• Sign-In Sheet for a Recruitment Event
• Recruitment Event Plan and Script

Year-Round Sign-Up Events.

When can you have Joining Events? Any time of the year!

• Certainly if you want more families in your Den or Pack, recruit any time.
  • Any fun Den or Pack event can be a welcoming and joining event for new families.
  • Let them “test drive” your Den or Pack fun event, they will want to join.
• Spring and Summer are terrific times to welcome new families – especially to Fun, Simple, Easy activities that your families want to do.  Dens and Packs have the Power to do this.
  • In Winter and Spring, some worry “What about Rank advancement?  How will we ‘catch them up’ with the rest of the Den?”  And worry that this puts more work and pressure on a Den Leader.
  • Suggestion: Other than scheduled Den and Pack Adventures, don’t worry about it at all!
    • If a parent is super keen on their Scout completing the whole rank – even if they join in the late Spring – the parent has the power to do the remedial work at home through our Advancement Resources. 
    • Den Leaders don’t need to repeat the entire curriculum for those who sign up after the start of a program year.
• Back to School time, or “fall recruiting” Sign-Up Events, are also essential.  That’s the beginning of the “program year” for Scouts and families to work on their new Rank and Handbook Adventures.
  • Getting to know new families who join you for Spring and Summer activities will only help you with fall recruiting – they will already be “on board” with Scouting.
  • And you might have (should have) discerned how the parents can help the Den and Pack.

Two Types of Sign-Up Events: Fun Pack Joining Events and School Sign-Up Night

• Fun Pack Joining Events: Any Fun Den or Pack Activity can be a Welcoming and Joining Event if you have a plan for how new families can attend, be welcomed, do your activity, meet new families, and sign up.
  • Keep It Simple, Make It Fun, Make New Friends Who Join Your Pack.
• Pack-Run School Sign-Up Night: Once upon a time this was the only focus of “Fall Recruiting”, and it still remains a great tool – and is even stronger if it is coupled with Fun Pack Joining Events.
  • New in 2024:  No longer will District Professionals “run” School Sign-Up Nights. School Sign-Up Nights will now be run by local Pack Volunteers, with coaching, training and support from District Professionals and District Membership volunteers.
  • Your District Professional will work with Pack Leaders and your schools to help the Pack schedule a “School Sign-Up Night” at the school or schools in your Pack’s area.
  • Because these are in school at night (after normal hours), these must be super-efficient (quick) events.

• Use the Plan and Script – Edit As Needed For Your Pack.
  • FYI, just because a Fun Pack Joining Event can run longer, don’t put the extra time into “longer speeches”.
  • Put your extra time into “more fun” and letting families get to know each other.
• Use Your Current Families – Put Them On Your “Welcome Team”. Put some parents to work just welcoming new families and making sure they meet other families – and do “Peer to Peer” recruiting.
  • They can welcome returning families, and seek out new families and give them information about your Den and Pack, and how to sign up.
  • That frees up your Den and Pack Leaders to lead the fun event and have longer conversations where needed.
  • Scouts can help too – incentivize them with a “Recruiter” patch.
• Share Your Pack Packet for New Families.  Your “Welcome Team” can share your “Pack Packet” with key information they need to do Scouting in your Den and Pack.
  • You might hand out paper versions of key detail like calendar and leader contacts.
• Maybe a Welcome Package for New Scouts. If you want a more impactful welcome, have a “Welcome Package” for new Scouts – School Sign-Up Nights will have a slime toy and a Handbook for the kids who sign up. But Packs can personalize too.
  • See this Blog post that begins “For a new Cub Scout family, nothing says ‘we’re glad you’re here’ quite like a handcrafted kit containing some items you’ll need during your Scouting journey. Oh, and snacks help, too. A Cub Scout pack in Michigan welcomes new members with cleverly designed bags — made by the pack’s current Cub Scouts — that include a few Scouting essentials and an invitation to the pack’s next hike.”
  • There’s lots of different ways to pack those welcome bags – but it may be the homemade thought that counts the most.
  • Scouts can also use those in advance of a Fun Pack Joining Event, as an invitation to attend.

Fun Pack & Den Events as Welcoming Sign-Up Events

• You know what Cub Scouting is – but do the families at your School know?
• You will tell them what Scouting is – but will they really know after a School Sign-Up Night?
• Better idea: let the families “test drive” Cub Scouting at your Fun Pack or Den Event!

A great way – any time – to get families to join your Den and Pack is to host them at a Family Fun Joining Event.

• Having a fun event works to show old and new families the fun of Cub Scouting.
  • Keep it Simple, Make it Fun – Cub Scouting is Fun, Family and Friends.
  • It’s OK to have more than one fun event!
• You can do this at any time, but you definitely should do fun events shortly after any School Sign-Up Night, especially to give new families who couldn’t make School Sign-Up Event or who were undecided that night more chances to join.
  • And if your School Sign-Up Night isn’t early in August, do a Fun Pack Joining Event before School Sign-Up Night too.
  • You can advertise this with less “joining” pressure: sure, you’re putting on a “Fun Pack Joining Event” but you’ll advertise it as a “Fun Pack & Den Event”, like Back to School Picnic with Pack 1234, or End of Summer Swim Party with Pack 1234, or Cookout or Bike Ride or Field Day, etc.
• Advertise your Fun Pack Joining Event to new families at your school Open House / Meet the Teacher / Meet and Greet / Registration Day, and using other promotion channels.

Some ideas about a Fun Pack Joining Event are below (applies also to any Fun Den Joining Event):

• Key Concept One – Make Sure Current Families Attend.  Make this event fun first for current families – for a Fun Pack Joining Event to work, you need your current families attending.
  • Do Not Let Them Think: “aw, that’s not for us – we don’t go to that – that’s just for new families”.
  • Make it Fun For Current Families, and when they have fun they can make it Fun for Future Families.
• Key Concept Two – Let New Families “Test Drive” Fun Cub Scouting and Like It.  Many families will want to see and do Cub Scouting before they decide to register and pay the necessary joining fees.
  • If they have a hands-on experience, participate with other Den and Pack families, and see that their child likes it and wants to do more – they are more likely to join.
• What Fun to Do?  It’s Up To You!  Your Pack or Den will run your Fun Family Joining Events, so the program and schedule are up to you.  Do what you like to do!
  • It could be a Bike Ride (doesn’t need to be a full “rodeo”, just a ride), fishing, games, field sports, rocket launches, kites, maybe Pinewood Derby Track and cars and run for fun, or cook hot dogs and S’ Mores.
  • Do what your current families like to do – have all your current families invite new families to attend.
• Make It Fun Fun Fun! Not Complicated.  Make your Fun Family Joining Event as simple as possible.
  • Especially at “end of summer” or “back to school” time, take it Easy. Simple. Fun.
    • No need for “advancement” program or “requirements”.
    • The “agenda” is simple: here’s some games, there’s some food.
    • No need for uniforms that make new families feel like “we’re not part of the group”.
    • Just have fun activities for kids and families. And food!
    • Too much about Scouting is complicated – that can create a barrier to joining.
    • Make this all about “fun, family and friends”.
  • For more, see this On Scouting Blog about having Fun Joining Events in your unit to make new families feel welcomed. (The blog calls them “Normal Friend Activities”, but we share this Pro Tip: please never call something a “Normal Friend Activity” when you invite someone.  That sounds weird.)
    • Concept: do activities that your families like and that new families will like.
    • Empower your families to invite other families and friends. Keep it simple and make it fun.
    • That post describes “a hike, a picnic, an ice cream party, a service project, backyard movie nights and barbecues, a trip to a local sporting event or anything else you can dream up”.
    • Have Fun. Get to know each other.
  • Other tips included that the primary focus should be on kids and parents getting to know one another and doing the fun activities — not on high-pressure recruiting pitches.
    • But don’t read that as “no recruiting pitches”!
    • Read that as “no high pressure” pitches. This is no “timeshare sales pitch” event!
    • P.S. This idea for fun events for building relationships and “getting to know each other as people” is also a great activity for your current families, especially in the spring and summer.
• Lather, Rinse, Repeat.  You can and should do more than one Fun Family Den or Pack Joining Event – after all, you want to have a lot of fun family events on your Den and Pack calendar, so just be sure you have assigned parents to be welcoming New Member Coordinators at each event.
  • Can’t decide whether to do a swim party or a bike ride or a kickball day?
    • Go ahead and do all three!
    • Let the swimmers swim, the bikers bike and the kickballers kick!
    • Depending on your fun activity (and your promotion efforts), you might have fewer families attend a Fun Family Den or Pack Joining Event compared to a heavily promoted School Sign-Up Night.
      • Good News: you’ll be able to give better attention to those who do attend.
      • “One on one” discussions, or “peer to peer” persuasion, is most successful at getting new families to join.
    • Fun Den or Pack Joining Events are not just for “fall recruiting” time.
• Den Joining Events? Isn’t Recruiting Required to be Only Pack-Wide Events? Nope.
  • Not every Pack has even numbers at every grade level … not every grade level has the same appetite for more Scouts and maybe even more Dens!
  • If your Den has a greater appetite for (or need for) more families, go ahead and do your own Fun Den Joining Events. (Do share ideas with other Pack leaders, and they may follow your lead.)