quote:
My sister was a girl scout, she got the gold award. My mom was a leader. They camped just as much as we did in the Boy Scouts. The Girl Scouts in NOLA used to have two camps, Camp Covington and Camp Whispering Pines, they would to to each at least twice a year, plus places like Land O Pines and other campgrounds. They went to summer camp each year.

Now, today:

1) My kids joined girl scouts a few years ago when they were younger. They did it for a year. Met every two weeks on Saturdays and did arts and crafts. Sold cookies. DId a couple of field trips like to the zoo. They never went camping once. My oldest found out about a girl scout summer camp that was focused on horseback riding and she wanted to do that, and our troop leader basically tried to discourage her. She went anways. At one point I suggested a family camping trip, and I was told by the troop leader, and I quote "this is not the cub scouts, we don't do things like that."

2) A friend of mine has a daughter who is a girl scout in MS. They had to cancel a troop camping trip (it would have been the first one) because they found out at the last minute that it was required that at least one leader take a bunch of food safety classes. Apparently, you can't just cook over an open flame anymore.

My wife is also gold award. She was in a troop very much like the ones your kids are in and never did the camping thing when she was a kid, so not pushing camping was a thing back then too, troops can be run very differently. She hates camping.

My daughter is in a GS troop right now with my wife as leader. There is a leader in that troop that pushes camping for the girls in that troop, my wife will not tent camp with them. This leader was in the same wood badge course with me in the BSA and is the Scoutmaster for an all girls troop. She really pushes camping and high adventure for her scouts.

I will agree the cub scout and scout programs are much more focused on camping than GS will ever be though.

Find a different girl scout troop if the one your kids joined isn't pushing camping as an activity and you want them camping.

This post was edited on 5/7/24 at 1:57 pm