7th Collingwood Needs You

    Scouting youth of Collingwood and area need you!

    With the longevity of our newly formed Seventh Collingwood Group in mind, we would like to bring awareness to the ongoing need for Scouting Parents to volunteer as leaders, in order to continue providing the program, and expanding its availability to more youth in the community.   

    Many of our leaders have youth in the program, and as those youth 'age out' of certain groups (like swimming up from Beavers to Cubs, for instance) that parent volunteer may no longer have the time to continue providing the Beavers program their youth is no longer a part of.  

    Each program covers youth within three years of age. Beavers is 5-7, Cubs is 8-10, etc.  Our first year was Beavers only, and so we had the most parent volunteers in this age group. We're on our second year of having re-started the local Scouting Group in Collingwood, which means by next year, many of our scout leaders will have had their youth 'age out' of Beavers in September 2026.  We're expecting this to be a time of need. 

but thats 9 months away...

    Yes and hopefully we can have a great new group of Scout Leaders that can join the crew by that time. With 9 months providing ample time to complete the online training program at a leisurely pace.   I may have finished mine over the course of about 6 months and it was only ~40hrs, so we understand if you can only dedicate a couple hours a week to the training.  There is also a waitlist for Police Reference Checks last I had heard, and ample time should be provided to have that completed.   

Who are we looking for? 

    Parents and guardians with youth interested in participating in Scouting in Collingwood.  Our group is filled for this season, however, as a Scout Leader, your youth is guaranteed to skip the waitlist queue and join as soon as you're a full scouter. 

    Volunteers should be passionate about engaging with youth from the position of being a positive influence and role model.  You'll have an opportunity to spend time with your youth doing something you both enjoy, all in the company of other youth and volunteers who share similar feelings.   

    It will be most important to find volunteers for Beavers ready to start in September 2026.  So if you have a youth of 3-4 years old right now, with a little bit of evening flexibility, and you were already thinking about getting your child into Beavers - this may be perfect for you. And not to be overly dramatic but - it may not be able to happen for much longer without you.

    Scouting is youth-led which means we want to enable our youth to plan some aspects of our future meetings.  There's also a large component that is facilitated and planned by the volunteers. If you have interesting things to share with the youth - you'll have opportunities to share that interest and insight with younger generations.  For instance, our beavers, when polled at the start of this year had a lot of interest in fishing and camping.  And our Cubs this year had a lot of technology related activities they wanted to participate in.  We integrated a 3D printing pen into a recent craft night, and have been able to visit the local Police Station, Fire Station, and even holding a meeting at one of our scouting families' local farm properties.  

Light the Fire...

    I generally try not to rush anyone into anything, however, if I could light a tiny flame under you, I would do it by reminding anyone interested that if you show your interest early, and make it through some base level qualifications, you could attend meetings before you're completely 'trained up' in more of an observer capacity. Now this opportunity wont be around the whole time until September season -- we break over summer from mid June onward, and so to attend some meetings in more of an observer capacity will only be available until then.

What does this mean? 

    A volunteer should have one to 1.5hrs available per week to attend our meetings with the youth on our set meeting nights. Currently those happen on Tuesdays.  Beavers are 6pm to 7pm. Cubs are 7:15 to 8:15. We occasionally hold planning meetings via zoom, amongst the volunteers. And occasionally we have special events that are full day or multi day weekends but are by no means mandatory, so we're very respectful of your personal schedule. 

    If you need a slightly selfish reason to help push you over the edge of indecision; here's a great takeaway I've found in my own life after becoming a Scouter; You get a better idea of what the peer influences over the course of a school day might be like for them, and it can help you guide your parenting decisions at home when you've been equipped with that knowledge.  

More Information

    If you've made it this far -- thank you -- but there's likely something I could have explained better, or elaborated on further.  For that reason, if you're at all interested in the concept of becoming a scouter, please seek some more information at the links below; 

    For Overall scouting concepts, learning about the Canadian Path, the badge system, SPICES, and more please visit; 

Scouts Canada Website 

I don't know what this website will look like before you're included in a scouting volunteer position, but we do our online learning through a portal at the website linked below.  You may be able to set up an account and explore a little bit at your leisure ahead of time.  

My Scouts Website