BSA guidance on Scout Accounts is immoral.

https://www.scouting.org/about/faq/question10/

A Scout is Thrifty. “Work to pay your own way.”

https://filestore.scouting.org/filestore/merit_badge_reqandres/personal_management.pdf

1(a) Choose an item that your family might want to purchase that is considered a major expense.

1(b) Write a plan that tells how your family would save money for the purchase identified in requirement 1a.

Millions of kids have been taught that a Scout should fundraise, that one’s parent shouldn’t be paying for Scouts. It’s a great stance to have. Teaches the value of money. We sell that fundraising programs are how families can afford Scouting who otherwise can’t. That if you work hard you can cover all your costs.

That goes against BSA guidance on fundraising.

https://troopleader.scouting.org/fundraisers/ which links to this 8 year old article.

https://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/2014/12/03/individual-scout-accounts/

The case against Scout accounts is the phrase “But to the extent we have people that are raising significant funds, and those funds are being used for costs that would normally be parental obligations in connection with Scouting”

That’s right, national is clearly worried Scouts are doing too well at covering their costs. They need to step back and fundraise less. Parents need to pay more. That’s so horrible I’m at a loss for what they were thinking. This is classist at it’s very worst.

Take a troop with a diverse membership. One family makes $15,000 and another $150,000. (This approx describes my unit coverage income range). We all know one family can more easily afford to cover everything outright, they don’t need to fundraise as much. The other, not so much. We all know not everyone pays their way using fundraising.

A Scout from the poorer family can’t benefit from working harder. Instead, if they do an outstanding job fundraising this is what must be done:

”If they use it as a means to pay down the cost for the unit and each member to go to summer camp, nothing wrong with that.”

A family who refuses to fundraise should get to go to camp for free based on the hard work of a few families. That’s what the BSA says.

Oh, the unit should benefit from fundraising but it shouldn’t take most of the money from a Scout who works hard and gives it to one who doesn‘t. One can argue the percentage a Scout should get, but it‘s absolutely not 0% past a certain point, which is the national stance today.

If that Scout wants to go to NOAC, summer camp and Philmont, let them fundraise to pay their way. Put the money in a Scout Account for them. Let them fundraise and pay for a parent to go with them to Philmont too.

Ballpark price on that goal is $5000-6000 needed with transportation.

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Edit: there's some good responses and several misunderstand what I wrote. The BSA is still giving that guidance, and it's wrong. It's posted as current and correct on the national fundraising guidance page for Troops. Several people correctly got that my point was you have to ignore this guidance entirely.

As of this editone person knew the real standard. You need to work with your charter org and do what they want. It's their tax status at risk. If someone with district or council tells you not to have Scout Accounts, which has happened in our council, ignore them.

Comments on "too much" is also relative and not a standard you can follow. If a family needs to raise $5000 to afford all the activities that's not too much. The unit needs to have a method to enable them to have that much in a Scout Account. If a family has six kids and two adults registered, they may need to raise $10-15,000. Summer camp for that many could cost in the range of $3-5000 by itself, depending on the exact programs and ages. Registration varies by council but $1000 per year for 8x isn't unrealistic. There's zero reason they shouldn't be able to earn enough and pay their way with a Scout Account. And the unit shouldn't be making Scouting unaffordable for them in some misguided attempt to be fair.

Real world what needs to happen is units have strong fiscal policies about where money can go that's made available to families. So you can enable a family to earn a ton of money but they can't just use it for whatever they like.

Because across the entirety of Scouting, one size does not fit all. Some families can't afford the program otherwise.