The Girl Scouts Went Woke, Now They’re Going Broke
“The Girl Scouts of the USA (GSUSA) may raise yearly membership fees by 240%, from $25 to $85.”
The Girl Scouts of the USA is considering raising their membership fee by 240 percent due to declining membership. This is not happening by accident.
In recent years, the organization has gone quite woke. In 2020, they congratulated Amy Coney Barrett for her U.S. Supreme Court appointment in a tweet but then deleted it when leftists complained. In 2021, it was revealed that they have an ‘anti-racism’ guide.
Adding to their problems, the Boy Scouts of America also went woke and now accepts girls. Why are the Girl Scouts even needed anymore?
The FOX Business Network reports:
Girl Scouts may raise yearly dues by 240% amid declining membership
The Girl Scouts of the USA (GSUSA) may raise yearly membership fees by 240%, from $25 to $85.
“We have collectively acknowledged that a membership dues increase is needed which is greater than the 25 percent (or $6.25) the National Board has authority to approve in a single triennium,” Girl Scouts of the USA President Noorain Khan and CEO Bonnie Barczykowski wrote in a handbook for delegates who will vote on the potential increase this weekend.
The vote comes as membership in the Girl Scouts has declined in recent years, due in part to the pandemic and other factors. The Boy Scouts of America, now called Scouting America, allowed girls to join its ranks in 2018.
The organization ended the 2023 fiscal year with a $4.4 million deficit, according to the handbook, and it is expected to increase to $5.6 million at the end of the 2024 fiscal year.
“Over the past few years, costs have increased everywhere, and neither GSUSA nor our councils have been immune to this pressure,” the handbook said, adding that the National Board has been using its financial reserves to cover costs.
Here’s a video report from WKBT News:
One of the problems with raising their membership fee by so much is that it is going to price out some potential new members.
Some who are involved with the Girl Scouts worry the increase could price out middle class and financially struggling families. https://t.co/dT2xYalkgp pic.twitter.com/GnyG3hTFF9
— FOX 2 Detroit (@FOX2News) October 19, 2024
Not the Girl Scouts thinking about raising the membership price from $25 to $85‼️ .. in this economy? Then have the nerve to state that they cut expenses so it can be reallocated to other “potential endeavors” within the organization. That’s a BIG jump in price🫠 https://t.co/p4h95LYIgZ
— 🌻Molinda Jae🌻 (@MissJae2u2) October 19, 2024
Perhaps a change in ideology is in order.
Featured image via YouTube.
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that wont stop the leftist self hating racist femminazis from successfully blaming the white patriarchal males
Boy and Girl are not included in the latest Newspeak edition.
That’s officially “Demspeak” now.
About 15 years ago i looked into becoming a leader since there were no cadet or senior troops in our area.
Then I looked at the changes in the badges. 30 only for each level, and the science badge for one of the upper levels was “the science of beauty”.
Minimal actual science, scouting, or even life skills anywhere to be found. Needless to say I did not continue, and neither did my girls.
Good riddance!
About 8 or 9 years ago, my daughter expressed an interestin Girl Scouts after years of watching her older brothers and their own scouting adventures. She lasted about 3 months. She was very put out that they didn’t do anything practical or fun. No camping, no cooking, no sewing, no derbies, none of the things that made it useful or even very entertaining. It was all too-simple arts and crafts and getting ready to sell cookies. You have to wonder what they are doing with the money from the cookie sales if it isn’t going back into the troops.
Boy Scouts were not much better. I joined thinking of camping, shooting bow and arrow etc. First meeting was run by a lady in her basement and we made Halloween dolls and decorations. It was my last meeting.
As an Eagle Scout (1980), the Boy Scouts are now dead to me. Another cherished American institution, ruined by the left and their communist intentions.
It depends on the troop leaders. The troop our boys joined in NC was a blast. They went camping every month, focused heavily on the “practical” badges, like first aid, orienteering, and forestry. They were a bit rag-tag, but their skills were solid. The other troop in the area could march in formation and set up camp like nobody’s business, but were lost when it came to how to stabilize a broken arm, choose firewood, or “leave no trace” after camping. The cub troop my youngest joined in Germany was fantastic, but he quit once we got to Maryland where they just sat around tables in a large open room and listened to the leaders talk a lot rather than allowing the kids to “do” much of anything.
If anyone wants to have their kids actually learn and participate in a scouting tradition, go look up your local Young Marines. They act more like the boy scouts used to be and they take boys and girls. They teach discipline, various life skills and field skills and love to integrate inner city kids into their ranks and give them a chance to thrive and succeed in life outside of the inner city. All kids are welcome. Depending on the location of the “regiment” and the availability of teaching, they may even get some firearms training.
I’m not affiliated with them but have worked with them in the past and found them to be fantastic for the kids. Some kids do go on to enlist in the Marines, some ROTC college, all the kids I found were outstanding.
Obviously they are run by ex-active duty Marines.
Isn’t that price gouging?
Why aren’t they laying off overpaid executives?
Nonprofits are required to file Form 990 with the IRS and to disclose executive compensation. The latest Form 990 I can find is for the fiscal year ending 9/30/23.https://www.girlscouts.org/content/dam/gsusa/forms-and-documents/footer/financials/IRS%20Form%20990%20FY%202023.pdf
Six employees made over $300,000 per year (including $785,000 for the top dog). Oddly, none of the top six reported working over 35 hours per week and one worked 0 hours per week. Probably reporting incompetence (either by the preparer of the form or the instructions for completing a form). I can’t recall ever working less than 50-60 hours a week during a 45 year career–but I never worked for the Girl Scouts!
https://paddockpost.com/2022/09/08/executive-compensation-at-the-girl-scouts-2021/
2021 listing – 191 employees received more than $100,000 with the 16 most highly compensated reported to be:
$1,576,925: Sylvia Acevedo, Former CEO and Ex-Officio BD (to 8/20)
$ 452,193: Angela Olden, Chief Financial Officer
$ 346,573: Maureen McNerney, Chief People Officer (chief PEOPLE officer? WOKENESS.
No. It is “price gauging”.
Since when has any Leftist run organization cut its bureaucracy to help accomplish the purported mission?
Subotai Bahadur
Right, Girl Scouts became a cash cow of those at the top. It has been that way going back at least 30 years. They pulled some really nasty crap on my now adult daughter, both scout management and the school circulated the wagons, I removed my children from the district and killed numerous attempts to raise or renew school taxes.
This was only one of many things which caused me to dislike public schools. Thye are not doing the job they should be.
By the way, my daughter was disabled.
If they aren’t buying your product at $25 they will be less likely to buy it at $85. Maybe they need a merit badge in economics.
It is CRITICAL that the GS stay in business. So that young girls can be forced to share a room with TG boys.
They pulled the rug out from under scientifically accurate two sexes, and now there is no reason for them to exist.
It is not a safe place for girls anymore than the former Boy Scouts are a safe place for boys.
It would be better for groups of parents to organize their own local groups.
Rule: never accommodate, never apologize.
Antidote: both of one’s middle digits.
In the same way that McDonald’s bent the knee and removed beef tallow from their French fries to appease people who wouldn’t be caught dead eating McDonald’s French fries, the Boy & Girl Scouts should never have listened to the progressive mob.
Boy Scouts: media agitation, board meeting eruptions, schisms, resignations, denunciations, lawsuits, sponsor flight, organizational upheavals, uneasy resolutions.
Girl Scouts: “All the cool kids are doing it!” ‘Yes, let’s!”
Should have clarified: the history of each organization’s encounter with wokeness.
The only think I will say is that Boy Scouts made changes that everyone knew were lies when they made them. When the started accepting openly gay boys they still said no openly gay leaders. I said at that moment it was a lie. You are going to give a young man an his Eagle Scout and then 10 minutes later when he turns 18 he can no longer be associated with the scouts. That made no sense.
I question the entire concept of a “national organization” for Girl Scouts. Healthy Scouting always was a local effort, with kids learning life and scouting skills in the basement of the church after school. Moms and dads filled the administrative posts needed and there was no such thing as membership fees
Now Girl Scouts appear to be nothing but the vehicle to push cookie sales and possibly to inculcate girls in toxic leftism.
Ring down the curtains on Scouts; enroll your girls in American Heritage Girls for the original experience.
just gonna ask if GS tanks
who gets the cookie franchise
Will be the only thing left. Zombie Franchising!
George Soros, He doesn’t even have to change the dough molds.
Scouting encompasses all the skills that disturbs the left…self-honor, individualism, morality and faith.
It must be destroyed.
As well as patriotism, love of country.
Long, long ago when the world was new and my children were of scouting age; I had two daughters in Girl Scouts and a son in Boy Scouts. My wife helped run 2 Girls Scout troops [separate troops so each daughter would have something of her own] and I helped run a Boy Scout troop that my son was in. It was something well worthwhile, both for the kids and for the adults involved back then.
My grandkids are way below scouting age, but when they get there if there is still both a country and scouting and there is a question about them joining scouts I intend to weigh in heavily against. I see no reason for them to as even back when the Boy Scouts went bankrupt [2018??] there was no reason to put your kids in either version because all they would learn is to hate our country and our culture. The Girl Scouts just have a head start on the hating, and I look forward to them going out of business.
Subotai Bahadur
Same for boy scouts. Because LGBT agenda. They don’t stand for anything anymore.
As a single mom, a few decades ago, Boy Scouts was absolutely valuable to my son. Dad had left town (though kept the financial support). My son loved scouting. He learned a lot – we had a terrific set of adult leaders.
It pained my heart when they decided to accept girls and when the Girl Scouts starting going woke.
The left destroys everything it touches.
Sad to say but both the BSA and GSA leadership were too damn cowardly to reject the demands the wokiesta leftists made. Since then they’ve been on their heels desperately trying to keep the ordinary, traditional membership audience often in Troops sponsored by or affiliated with traditional religious groups and their massive alumni base in the fold while continuing to cater to lefty wokiestas on every major policy.
Ordinary, average folks didn’t give up on the BSA/GSA, the organizations gave up on them. Parents don’t have time to try and work 1.5 -2.5 jobs per household to make ends meet and still monitor every damn thing in the world around their children. Sure, in a better world, they would invest the time…but the world of 2024 ain’t the 1980’s much less the 1950’s. So Parents avoid there organizations b/c they are no longer ‘reliable’ when it comes to being able to send their children and have them return better not worse much less indoctrinated by wokiesta nonsense.
Well said!
Boy Scouts was a youth paramilitary organization, an introduction to the regimented life, teaching survival skills, map-reading, duty rosters, fitting into a hierarchy, etc. Preparing young men to be in the Army… and it made no sense to try to apply all that stuff to girls.
Sorry.
I loved the Girl Scouts. My mother was a Girl Scout leader, ( took our troop to EXPO 67 and Niagara Falls and camping) and I was a scout till cadette’s, and then a leader for 13 years. My daughter was a scout who earned her gold award. Breaks my heart to hear these stories. Each leader can change this, and bring camping, travel and love of learning to girls! If this group can’t be resurrected start a new group.
There are alternatives to each of these organizations id you dig a little bit:
Trail Life for boys: https://www.traillifeusa.com/
https://www.faithwire.com/2021/08/27/unapologetically-christian-alternatives-to-boy-scouts-girl-scouts-see-big-membership-increases/
Just another part of the plan. Eliminate and degrade cultural norms in a society. Begin to erase and repaint the picture of how things were, or at least our perception of things.
The biggest mistake the Girl Scouts made was a complete failure to market their top award.
Ask people what the top rank of Boy Scouts is and most will tell you. Ask them the same for Girl Scouts and nobody knows. Ambitious girls wanted to be in Boy Scouts because you can be an Eagle Scout and everyone knows what that is. Who cares that someone has the Gold Award.
Trail Life for Boys and Heritage Girls were started to replace the Boys and Girl Scouts. Once the BSA and GSA lost their way, they were no longer what parents wanted. When I was a girl scout, we learned all of the same outdoor stuff as the boys. We didn’t need to join them.
In 2023, the Girl Scouts reported total revenue of $116 million most of which came from membership dues ($39 million), contributions, gifts, and grants ($25 million), and sale of inventory ($22 million).
Expenses totaled $124 million (including $10 million in depreciation) with the largest expenses reported to be compensation ($46 million), office-related expenses ($25 million), and fees for services ($25 million of which $5 million is to Salesforce).
512 employees received $46 million in compensation – or an average of $90,000 each (although the organization also spent $5 million with Salesforce in 2023). 166 employees received more than $100,000. The most highly compensate employee was Sofia Chang, the former CEO (who was with the organization for just over a year) who received $805,541 in compensation.
The 12 most highly compensated employees were reported to be:
$805,541: Sofia Chang, CEO (thru 2/2023)
$482,494: Angela Olden, Chief Financial Officer
$400,935: Jocelyn Johnson, Chief Marketing Officer
$389,411: Wendy Lou, Chief Revenue Officer
$384,157: Maureen McNerney, Chief HR Officer
$325,325: Thomas Hassett, VP, GSM E-Commerce (thru 9/2022)
$287,260: Brian Crawford, VP, Licensing (thru 9/2022)
$283,265: Kenneth Distefano, Deputy Chief Financial Officer
$258,254: Philip Kagan, Executive, Former IT and Security Officer (thru 9/2022)
$250,413: Dianne Rieger, VP, Foundational Services
$184,673: Brandt Haynes, COO, Head of Transformation
$178,519: Amy Bodin, Former Chief Admin Officer (thru 6/2022)
Sylvia Acevedo, a former CEO who received $1.6 million in 2021 although she departed in August, 2020, received $330,000 in 2022. From 2018-2022, Sylvia Acevedo received more than $3 million in compensation:
2022: $ 330,000
2021: $1,576,925
2020: $ 732,132
2019: $ 598,527
The 10 most highly compensated employees received more than $9 million from 2018-2022:
Sofia Chang: Total Compensation 2023: $0.8 million
2023: $805,541
Angela Olden: Total Compensation 2018-2023: $2.6 million
2023: $482,494
2022: $398,298
2021: $452,193
2020: $442,422
2019: $428,006
2018: $406,917
Jocelyn Johnson: Total Compensation 2023: $0.4 million
2023: $400,935
Wendy Lou: Total Compensation 2021-2023: $0.9 million
2023: $389,411
2022: $293,249
2021: $223,237
Maureen McNerney: Total Compensation 2020-2023: $1.3 million
2023: $384,157
2022: $318,094
2021: $346,573
2020: $279,922
Thomas Hassett: Total Compensation 2023: $0.3 million
2023: $325,325
Brian Crawford: Total Compensation 2018-2023: $0.8 million
2023: $287,260
2022: Not Reported
2021: Not Reported
2020: Not Reported
2019: $263,828
2018: $260,837
Kenneth DiStefano: Total Compensation 2022-2023: $0.6 million
2023: $283,265
2022: $265,893
Philip Kagan: Total Compensation 2021-2023: $0.8 million
2023: $258,254
2022: $246,198
2021: $259,673
Dianne Rieger: Total Compensation 2019-2023: $0.7 million
2023: $250,4113
2022: Not Reported
2021: Not Reported
2020: $231,974
2019: $235,702