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 OA
Scoutreach: Tutoring OA Style
By Jeremy Scott, 2005 Section W-4C Vice Chief
Order of the Arrow Scoutreach Mentoring is one of the greatest programs in
the OA that nobody knows about. This year, you will hear the Regional and National
officers constantly promoting OA Scoutreach at your Conclaves and at the National
Jamboree, but what is it, and how can your lodge use it? Well, that is the question
on most lodge officers’ minds nowadays, and I have been tasked to help
you find the answer.
Let’s start by imagining that you are pulling a “D” in your
math class. You decide that you need to visit a tutor center at your high school
or college so you can try and earn a better grade. The math tutors at the center
are the perfect teachers; they know math like the back of their hand and since
they are about the same age as you—your peers—you can relate to
them. Having someone your age help you learn math is way better than asking
for help from your crusty, grumpy old math teacher. Next thing you know, you
got an “A” on your math final, and you passed the class! You jump
for joy and life is good!
Are you still with me? Good. Now let us rewrite that story with a lot more
scouting in it…
Imagine a bunch of scouts in a new start-up troop in your area. The average
age of the scouts in the troop is 13 and both the youths and the adults are
inexperienced in even the simplest scout skills; like campsite planning, orienteering,
camp cooking, or fire building. These troubled troops are struggling and they
need help—so they ask for it. And who better to tutor, or mentor, these
troops than the scouts who know these things the best: OA scouts! OA scouts
and advisers can go to these troops and help them. The youth can teach the young
scouts how to set up campsites and run a PLC while the advisers can teach the
adults how to be good scoutmasters. Next thing everyone knows, the mentors are
invited back for the SPL’s Eagle Court of Honor and everyone is jumping
for joy and life is good!
Order of the Arrow Scoutreach Mentoring, which from now on will just be called
OA Scoutreach, is exactly what I just described: tutoring OA style. If you grew
up in a troop that had a lot of experienced scouts, like most of us did, even
though you may not have known it, you were constantly being mentored by the
older, experienced scouts from your troop. They molded you into the model scout
you are today because of their mentorship. Where would you be had those guys
not been in your troop when you joined? Who knows, but your scouting career
probably would have been really different. So what about the troops without
any of the experienced older scouts to teach the young’ns, or the troops
without the old-salt scoutmasters to break-in the greenhorns?
OA Scoutreach exists to fill the need for experience and peer mentorship in
start-up, rural inner city, and urban scout troops. OA Scoutreach is an opportunity
for OA members young and old to pass on scouting knowledge to the troops that
need it the most. OA Scoutreach is an opportunity for scouts and adults to give
back to scouting and an opportunity to pay tribute to their mentors. Best of
all, OA Scoutreach is peer level mentorship. These scouts will listen to a youth
much more than they would listen to adults—not because they are disrespectful,
but because they can relate to a youth. This program promotes personal growth
for both the mentors and troops being mentored, and the impact a mentor can
have on the council program could be tremendous.
So, now you know what OA Scoutreach is and why it’s so awesome. If you
stick with me for a few more paragraphs, I’ll tell you how to get it started
in your Lodge, in four easy steps.
Step One: If not already set up, form an agreement between your council
and lodge that states your lodge’s intent to participate in OA Scoutreach
and that you need the council’s help in identifying troops that need mentorship.
Step Two: Assign a youth to chair an OA Scoutreach committee that will
head up the effort of finding mentors and matching them with local troops. This
committee will seek our volunteer mentors to assist in the program and use such
draws and the awesome scoutreach PATCHES to bring people in.
Step Three: The newly assigned youth and adult mentors should then have
a meeting with troops they were assigned to and, in that meeting, identify goals
that they will work on during the mentorship.
Step Four: Send the mentors out to work on fulfilling the goals of the
troop by teaching the scouts and leaders. The mentorship can last as long as
necessary, but should last no more than three months or so. The mentors should
make sure that they are teaching the skills to the scouts—not doing everything
for them—so they do not become dependent on the mentors. After all the
goals are met, the lodge should follow-up with the mentors, the troop, and the
council.
For more information, obtain an OA Scoutreach information DVD from your Section
Chief, contact your local Lodge Chief or Adviser, visit the National
OA Scoutreach Mentoring site, or visit the BSA
Scoutreach Division site.
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