Challenges in Our Trailblazers Program
Experiences as a Leader 9 Comments 
backpacking, camping, outdoors, trailblazers, volunteers
If you’ve been following my blog, you’ll know that since 2020, I’ve been attempting to get some sort of outdoor program for older girls up and running in my council. I haven’t provided an update since my last post about visiting the Adventurers in the Skyline council, so the following encompasses some rambling thoughts about what’s going on.
Here’s a little bit of history in case you’re just now joining us. In the summer of 2019, GSUSA released guidelines to resurrect Trailblazer and Mariner troops targeting girls in 8th through 12th grade. My co-leader and I decided to set up a council-wide Trailblazer troop in the fall of 2019 and recruited leaders from different parts of the council. We kicked off in the fall of 2020, and our first year was a resounding success due largely in part to the fact that all other activities had been cancelled due to covid regulations. We filled up for every event and had waiting lists for most of them. The second year still went well, although we didn’t have as many girls attend our events overall. However, by the third year, the world had gone back to normal, and we were dead in the water. We cancelled all but one event due to a lack of registrants, and interest in the troop was low. During this time, two other Trailblazer troops tried to make a go of it and weren’t successful either. We didn’t want to give up on the idea though, so we tried partnering with our council and got rid of the troop model but still called ourselves Trailblazers M2M. In other words, a girl didn’t have to join a TB troop in order to participate, and our events were advertised on the council calendar and open to any girl in 8th through 12th grade. We did a little better, but some events were still cancelled due to low registration.
In early 2024, I learned about the Adventurers group in the Virginia Skyline council, and my lead for TB M2M and I traveled up there to participate in their training weekend. We brought back a lot of ideas and felt inspired to emulate their program here in GSSC-MM. We started off with high hopes and had moderate success this past year, but I’ve realized a few things that give me pause moving forward.
Over the past 11 years of this blog, I have purposely steered away from making any comments that could be deemed as critical toward my own council. There’s a time and place for everything, and I don’t think airing dirty laundry on a public blog is the right place to do it. But, in order to make my point, I do have to share some aspects about my council that could possibly be viewed as negative. I’m not pointing the finger at anyone though, but I feel I must be honest and realistic. My bet is that a lot of other councils have the same issues, so perhaps sharing my experience will help others.
For the 2024-25 membership year, we offered a variety of programs and overnight trips including camping and beginning backpacking. We also ran a session on nature therapy, one on outdoor cooking, and one involving painting wildflowers using watercolors (which happened to be our most popular session). Previously, we only offered TB M2M events to 8th through 12th grade, but after crunching some numbers, I realized we needed to include 6th and 7th graders in order to have a bigger pool of girls since we’re a small council. But after making it through the year, I’m wondering if what we’re doing is sustainable.
First of all, we don’t have enough volunteers to run this program. We’ve attempted to recruit at our council’s volunteer-oriented events and via social media. A lot of folks are interested in learning more about what we do, but they don’t want to become a Coordinator for a variety of reasons. I suspect that some of it has to do with the fact that it involves the outdoors. Or maybe they just don’t want to take on anything more than what they’ve already got on their plate. Most of the comments I get are, “I can’t do what you do” or “I don’t mind helping but I don’t want to lead anything.” Without volunteers, this program can’t run.
When it comes to developing volunteers with outdoor skills, we fall short as a council. Our council’s outdoor training isn’t very thorough, in my humble opinion. In our quest to accommodate volunteers who don’t want to spend a lot of time on training, we traded in our overnight training in 2018 for two separate sessions consisting of a few hours each that run at a fast pace. Unfortunately, it doesn’t give leaders the confidence to take their troops outdoors when the rubber meets the road as evidenced by comments from volunteers. We also don’t offer any sort of advanced outdoor training either. Just a basic Cabin Camping (which is really just Trip & Travel Training with a few “outdoor” modules such as cooking on a camp stove) and Tent Camping. I served as an outdoor facilitator for one year and found myself disliking it because I felt like I was rushing through everything to get it all in for the few hours we were there. And I love to teach, so this was very disappointing for me personally.
I don’t have any data to back this up, but I feel like our very rushed and limited outdoor training has had an impact on troops going camping and participating in outdoor events. And because of that, a lot of the girls who participate in our TB M2M programs come in with very few outdoor skills. We always have to offer the basics over and over again to older girls because it’s not being done on the troop level. And nobody signs up for events that require more advanced skills. Plus, there are very few volunteers who have the outdoor skills we’re looking for to run outdoor programming.
Another challenge we’re facing is the fact that a lot of parents don’t want to drive very far for our events. We attempt to hold events in different areas of the council, but we always get comments from folks saying “everything is too far away.” Well, we can’t move the mountains so that they’re fifteen minutes away from everyone. I love to hike and even I have to drive at least 45 minutes to get to good trails. That’s just part of the outdoor experience. I’ve heard that even our main camp is considered “too far away” for some parents now. It’s all of 45 minutes to an hour for a large portion of our membership. We’ve tried to set up carpooling, but unless multiple girls from one troop attend, it’s hard to arrange due our events drawing council-wide. During our first year partnering with the council, council staff wanted us to put on additional programming and set up campsites for parents who were complaining that they didn’t want to drive and drop off. We did not agree to this for a number of obvious reasons. For what it’s worth, we didn’t have these complaints in 2020. Parents said they were happy to see us putting on events and programming for their daughters since everything else was cancelled. But now that we’re back to normal, parents don’t want to make the drive. Based on this observation, I put this squarely on priorities and the fact that Girl Scout programming, for a lot of parents, is low on the list.
We’re going to offer backpacking training to adults at our fall leader weekend (since our council doesn’t run any sort of primitive camping training) hoping to try to recruit more volunteers. We’ve got a few events planned, but with the recent turnover in leadership and staff in my council, I don’t know what the future holds. I just feel like Girl Scouts in general has lost the plot when it comes to the outdoors, and we’re just going through the motions as an organization. It has me wondering if maybe Girl Scouts isn’t the right vehicle to run something such as a Trailblazers troop or program, at least not in my area. I receive positive comments from leaders stating their girls are looking forward to being able to participate in Trailblazers M2M events when they get older, but I feel completely limited by reality when it comes to trying to pull this off.
And so the saga continues – there is no OUTing in Girl Scouting without trained leaders/parents to make it happen. Compressing the training and eliminating the overnight part of the basic training and doing zero “primitive” overnight training where critical sucess skills are taught/lived/learned is WHY many councils or areas within councils are failing in delivering on the real patrol method.
It is such a worthwhile program! I’m not sure where you are….but in Texas there are groups connected to the county agents called Texas Master Naturalists…these people love and know the outdoor life…and they have been so helpful with my granddaughters Gold Award and our 4H group.
I think what you say above, echoes all across the country. I suspect our outdoor training has also not properly prepared leaders to have the confidence to take their girls out – and so they just don’t. There are a few isolated places where outdoor programs seem to be OK but I’m not sure why. Hate to blame it on COVID but … our museum has had a long record of very successful partnership programs with our Council. But since COVID, we have had to cancel 4 out of 6 programs each year, which is incredibly disappointing. We have plenty of volunteer help; we offer programs that are requested by troops; we keep expenses low; but there is very poor attendance. We are even trying the option of bringing the programs to the Troops or to the Service Units – but have had absolutely no interest in several months. Hoping things pick up with the new school year but sometimes I think the leaders/parents aren’t even reading the newsletters with information on these options. I wish I had some answers….. (And I’m REALLY sad for the lack of interest in the outdoors. That was a hallmark of my Girl Scout experience and it made such an impact on my life.)
I want to provide a ray of hope. My Council has patch programs for various levels of outdoor skills and offers a robust training for adults in outdoor skills. My multilevel troop voted to go camping more often, and do more outdoors activities this year. I can see us eventually earning the Trailblazer and Mariner pins, per the new requirements released in July 2025. It helps that I have leaders who were already wanting to do more outdoor skills and camping. We live in an urban area, so we already drive 15-30 minutes on a regular basis to attend events. Some drive that far for our weekly troop meetings. I wish we were close enough to collaborate.
Healthy minds, healthy communities. Vitamin N – Vitamin Nature restores our souls and heals our bodies moth mentally and physically. “Forest bathing”, Walk in the woods provide mental health breaks from phones and computers.
GS Virginia Skyline Council is hosting our second Mental Health workshop for the community in September. The president of GSUSA is scheduled to attend.
I really appreciate your thoughts on this. I am leading a similar effort in the San Diego council, called WayFinders, and some of these observations really struck a cord. We are starting our fourth year as a special interest group that scouts can join in addition to their traditional troop. We have been relying on parent volunteers, which I just don’t think is sustainable. Going forward, as we have scouts graduating, I’m looking for Lifetime Members who still want to be involved in Girl Scouts even after their scout has gone on to the next stage in their life.
Your post resonates — I have volunteered with the GS San Diego backpacking program for nearly 25 years. After initially bringing the program back from the dead, we have spent the last 2 decades extending our program’s reach and building sustainability, in spite of our Council’s ups & downs. And sometimes it is a struggle — especially since Covid wrought enormous changes in both Council personnel and family priorities.
In 2017, I started California Girl Scout Backpackers (https://www.cagirlscoutbackpackers.com/) — whose membership has grown to include backpacking program trainers across the U.S., though mainly West Coast. We are a coalition of GS volunteer backpacking trainers who are dedicated to providing support and enthusiasm to each other to help get our Girl Scouts out into the wilderness. We meet every January for our annual Summit, where we share program ideas, training concepts, good vibes, and tons of enthusiasm to keep us rolling within our individual programs.
Backpacking programs across the U.S. differ in delivery (council programs, camp programs, Trailblazer troops, Legacy Troops, etc.) but all of us volunteers share a passion for getting our girls outdoors, and helping our Girl Scouts become strong, self-reliant & capable people through wilderness experiences.
It sounds like you — and those who are commenting on your blog — might enjoy the camaraderie, resources, and emotional boost that comes from this group. Please feel free to contact me via the California Girl Scout Backpackers contact form, or respond directly to me via the provided email.
Summit 2026 will be in San Diego (we rotate venues) at our GS campus on MLK weekend (Jan. 16-19). We are always welcoming new members to our group. Sometimes it is hard to row alone, and it helps to renew one’s energy & enthusiasm with likeminded people who are equally passionate about both the GS mission AND the outdoors.
Best to you!
Val Ross
Wholly Crap! I just read Amy’s blog and I could have written the exact sentiments about council trainings. We seem to have lessened the training time due to leader/volunteers time commitments. We are lucky to have two Trailblazer Troops in our Council due to the vast size of it. And we utilize the active members in the Order of the Silver Trefoil group. The members of the group are mostly retired ladies who are lifetime members, bringing tons of knowledge with them.