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Boy Scouts is changing its name to Scouting America
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IRVING, Texas (AP) — The Boy Scouts of America announced after 114
years that it will change its name and will become Scouting America in
an effort to emphasize inclusion as it works to move past the turmoil
of bankruptcy and a flood of sexual abuse claims.
The rebrand is another seismic shift for an organization steeped in
tradition that did not allow gay youths or girls to begin joining its
ranks until relatively recently. Seeking to boost flagging membership
numbers, the Irving, Texas-based organization announced the name
change Tuesday at its annual meeting in Florida.
"In the next 100 years we want any youth in America to feel very, very
welcome to come into our programs," Roger Krone, who took over last
fall as president and chief executive officer, told The Associated
Press in an interview before the announcement.
The change will officially take effect on Feb. 8, 2025, timed to the
organization's 115th birthday.
The organization began allowing gay youth in 2013 and ended a blanket
ban on gay adult leaders in 2015. In 2017, it made the historic
announcement that girls would be accepted as Cub Scouts as of 2018 and
into the flagship Boy Scout program — renamed Scouts BSA — in 2019.
Over 6,000 girls have now achieved the vaunted Eagle Scout rank.
The Girl Scouts of the USA, a separate organization, has clashed with
the Boy Scouts in recent years over its recruitment of girls. The Girl
Scouts did not respond to requests seeking comment Tuesday.
A wave of reaction to the change on social media included criticism
that the word "boy" will no longer appear in the name, including from
Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas.
Like other organizations, the Boy Scouts of America lost members
during the pandemic, when participation was difficult. After a high
point over the last decade of over 2 million members in 2018, the
organization currently serves just over 1 million youths, including
more than 176,000 girls and young women. Membership peaked in 1972 at
almost 5 million.
Generations of scouts have included eventual presidents (among them
Bill Clinton and Gerald Ford), astronauts (Buzz Aldrin) and
celebrities (actor Harrison Ford, filmmaker Steven Spielberg). Krone
said the organization must continue to attract newcomers.
"Part of my job is to reduce all the barriers I possibly can for
people to accept us as an organization and to join," he said.
There were nearly 1,000 young women in the inaugural class of female
Eagle Scouts in 2021, including Selby Chipman. The all-girls troop she
was a founding member of in her hometown of Oak Ridge, North Carolina,
has grown from five girls to nearly 50, and she thinks the name change
will encourage even more girls to join.
"Girls were like: 'You can join Boy Scouts of America?'" said Chipman,
now a 20-year-old college student and assistant scoutmaster of her
troop.
Rebranding can risk alienating supporters who think the change is
unnecessary, said David Aaker, vice chairman of the national branding
and marketing firm Prophet. But he described the Boy Scouts'
rebranding as savvy, saying it kickstarts a new conversation about the
organization while not being so drastic that it strays too far from
its original scouting mission.
"It's a one-time chance to tell a new story," said Aaker, who also is
a professor emeritus at the University of California-Berkeley Haas
business school.
The move to accept girls throughout the Boy Scout ranks strained a
bond with the Girl Scouts of the USA, which sued, saying it created
marketplace confusion and damaged its recruitment efforts. They
reached a settlement agreement after a judge rejected those claims,
saying both groups are free to use words like "scouts" and "scouting."
Past pressure to allow girls into the Boy Scouts had come from those
including the National Organization for Women, which applauded
Tuesday's announcement.
Much of the online criticism invoked the word "woke," including Rep.
Andrew Clyde, a Georgia Republican, who said on X: "Wokeness destroys
everything it touches."
But Lois Alvar, a 20-year-old Eagle Scout and assistant scoutmaster
from the Dallas area, said the new name helps all scouts feel
accepted. "Having it nationally recognized that girls are being
welcomed and included in scouting allows it to be a more safe space,
just in general," she said.
The Boy Scouts' $2.4 billion bankruptcy reorganization plan took
effect last year, allowing the organization to keep operating while
compensating the more than 80,000 men who say they were sexually
abused as children while in scouting.
Although the organization won't officially become Scouting America
until next year, Krone said he expects people will start immediately
using the name.
"It sends this really strong message to everyone in America that they
can come to this program, they can bring their authentic self, they
can be who they are and they will be welcomed here," Krone said.
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Kendria LaFleur contributed to this report from Dallas and Jim Vertuno
contributed from Austin.
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