Too Many Rules
Seeing The Forest For The Trees
Scouting is a game with pretty simple rules. A Scout does his best. He's always prepared. He's trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent. Beyond those simple rules there are more complicated rules outlined in such documents as the Guide to Safe Scouting. The simple rules are for the players of the game. The more complicated rules are for the coaches and referees.
Scouting is an active game, and the complicated rules are there to ensure safety and fairness. The simple rules are there to direct the efforts of the players. As anyone knows, the more rules a game has, the less fun it is to play. So, some may ask, why do we have all these rule books?
We have rule books like The Scoutmaster's Handbook, Troop Committee Guidebook, Health & Safety Guide, Guide to Safe Scouting, Uniform and Insignia Guide and many more to help the coaches and referees administer Scouting. The players of the game don't deal with these rule books. We deal with those rule books because it's our job to make sure the players get a proper and safe playing field.
A growing trend, however, is to design systems of rules over and above the simple rules. These additional systems are intended to "level the playing field," solve problems, and strictly require certain behaviors. In reality, all they manage to do is increase the complexity of the game. As an example, let's take a look at one particular area where additional rules are implemented.
Changing Course In Mid-Stream
In Scouting, advancement is one of the activities in the game. Advancement entails levels of accomplishment known as ranks, and a set of requirements to qualify for each level. Some requirements involve vague concepts like "active participation" and "show Scout spirit" with little indication of what constitutes "active" or "Scout spirit." The trend, therefore, is to create a set of rules that define these vague terms concretely.
In general, this isn't a bad thing as long as there's room for individual circumstances and the rules are fair and openly communicated. Unfortunately, this is not always the case. The rules are usually implemented not so much to clarify vague terms, but to penalize a particular practice or punish a certain behavior. The most common rule of this time involves "active participation."
The idea is to set some sort of attendance percentage that becomes the expected level of participation for advancement. Say, 75% of all meetings and activities. This doesn't sound too troublesome on the surface, but immediately several unintended consequences result. Imagine a Patrol of Scouts. The average age of these Scouts is 14 years old. Some are good scholars, some are good athletes, and some are average in both. From this Patrol, let's take a look at three individuals.
Too Busy To Be Active
First, there's Mark. Mark is a good student who is active in Scouting and participates in many extracurricular activities in school. Perhaps he's on the school newspaper staff, yearbook staff, and maybe the marching band. He's very motivated in both school and Scouting, and his experience in Scouting has helped him take on leadership responsibilities in his school activities at a relatively young age.
Mark, unfortunately has spread himself pretty thin and can't always make troop meetings. Being in the marching band, he rarely travels to campouts with the troop, and sometimes simply can't make the campout at all. Still, he manages to be an effective troop leader and does a good job making sure his duties are covered when he isn't around.
Mark, of course is nearly ready to advance to Life rank, but over the last couple months since his Star board of review he's been very busy with school and band activities. As he prepares for his Life board of review he looks at his attendance and suddenly realizes he's only at 70%. He won't be able to advance because the troop has a 75% attendance rule.
Strictly enforced, the rule will keep a good Scout from advancing. Make no mistake; Mark is a good Scout. He's an effective leader in the troop and he does the best he can to accommodate everything he wants to do in his schedule. If the attendance rule didn't exist, he would be able to advance.
Too Active To Be Busy
Now, we turn to John. John is a good athlete who is active in Scouting and participates in three sports in school. Perhaps he plays football, baseball, and soccer. He, too, is a motivated Scout and works hard to maintain a good average in school. He also works hard to excel in his three sports. John's experiences as a leader in his troop have helped him earn the respect of his teammates and he has leadership responsibilities on each team.
John painstakingly watches his schedule for conflicts between sports and Scouting. He knows that he doesn't need 100% attendance in Scouting, but his sports activities require 100% attendance. As a result, John is often late for meetings, is sometimes out of uniform, and occasionally forgets to make sure his responsibilities in the troop are taken care of. Sometimes, when he makes it to a Scouting meeting or activity, he's just there and not very interested in what's going on.
John, too, is preparing for his Life board of review. It has taken him a long time to complete the requirements. He has been working at it for more than a year and has had many conferences with his Scoutmaster about his leadership responsibilities and the troop's expectations. Fortunately, John boasts an attendance of 80%, even though he wasn't always there on time or actively participating in the activity. Technically, he has met the troop's attendance rule.
Unfortunately, John has simply been there. If the rule is strictly enforced, he will be advanced because his attendance percentage is high enough. The rule doesn't specify actively participating in 75% of the meetings and activities because that would be too vague. If the rule didn't exist, however, John would likely still advance because he did his best - didn't he?
What Is Perfect Attendance?
Finally, we turn to Frank. Outside of Scouting, Frank has no life at all. He's not a bad student, but he doesn't get involved in extracurricular activities. He loves Scouting and misses no opportunity to participate. In fact, he has been known to invite himself to other Patrol's activities because they sound cool and exciting.
Frank lobbied for a position as a Den Chief so he could be more involved in Scouting. He attends every troop meeting, every campout, every fundraiser, and in his role as a Den Chief he attends every den meeting and activity, and every Pack meeting and activity. Unfortunately, Frank loves the fun of Scouting and doesn't pay much attention to his responsibilities.
On any given campout or at any given meeting, if there's a disruption you won't find Frank far from the source. He's not a troublemaker, he's just easily distracted in his search for fun. On several occasions he's had conferences with his Scoutmaster about disrupting meetings and activities. His Den Leader has talked to him about disrupting den meetings as well, but hasn't talked to the Scoutmaster about the problem because the Cub Scouts love Frank.
Frank, of course, if just about ready to advance to Star. He's managed to complete enough of the dozens of merit badges he's started to advance, and he's completed his tenure as a Den Leader without a bad report. Frank has no problem with the troop's attendance rule because his attendance is 100%. Under the rule, Frank will advance because he has the right attendance level. His leaders haven't truly dealt with his disruptive behavior because the troop has rules to prevent advancement by troublemakers.
Would Frank advance if the rule didn't exist? Well, his leaders would have been much more inclined to deal with his disruptions and work with him to correct the problem if the rule didn't exist. The rule, openly communicated, has the effect of actually tying the hands of the leaders. It works both ways. If you state concretely that "active participation" means attending 75% of the meetings and activities, you can't further define the term without changing the rule.
Pleading For Common Sense
In reality the rule should be unnecessary. Mark should be advanced because he's done his best to attend activities, he's done his job effectively when he was there, and made sure his job got done when he wasn't there. John should be advanced as well. He too has done his best to attend meetings, although he may not have done his best to be an effective leader. That could have been addressed long before he was ready to advance. Frank, however, shouldn't be advanced unless of course he has also been working hard to correct his disruptive behavior.
In these scenarios, of course, it's not necessarily the rule that has caused the problems. The rule contributed to the problem, though, by deluding the adults into believing that the rules would solve any advancement problems that cropped up. In reality, the leaders should have been working to solve the problems before the Scout was ready to advance.
Adding these rules appears initially to solve certain problems. Unfortunately, they also add to the complexity of the game. They remove the judgment of troop leaders, the evaluation of each individual Scout's circumstances, and promotes the tendency to treat every Scout the same. That is one of the things that sets Scouting apart from many other youth organizations. Scouts are supposed to be treated individually. The whole concept of advancement in Scouting is based on each Scout advancing at his own pace.