Scouting provides youth with an opportunity to try new things, provide service to others, build self-confidence, and reinforce ethical standards. These opportunities not only help them when they are young, but also carry forward into their adult lives, improving their relationships, their work lives, their family lives, and the values by which they live. You can
read more here.
In Cub Scouts, we teach values, but what effect does that have? A
Tufts University study conducted over a three-year period showed that boys who engage in Scouting activities on a regular basis report significant increases in the following qualities:
- cheerfulness
- hopefulness
- helpfulness
- obedience
- kindness
The study also showed that Scouts were significantly more likely than non-Scouts to choose other-oriented values, such as helping others and doing the right thing. Scouting instilled these values better than sports, and better than a combination of Scouting and sports. The longer Cub Scouts are active in their pack, the greater their...
- self-regulation
- trustworthiness
- hopes for the future
What's more, their grades are better, too! In short, being in Cub Scouts has a positive, near-term effect on young people, and the longer they are involved with Scouting, the greater the effect.
Scouting works.
Watch the video here.
In addition to the immediate impact on youth, Scouting teaches values that serve people throughout their lives. An
in-depth Harris poll showed that about
four out of five men who were Scouts in their youth agree with the following:
- the values they learned as Scouts continued to be important to them
- what they learned in Scouting helped them be better leaders
- the self-confidence they learned in Scouting carried over into their work as adults
(Read a summary of the poll
here.)
Here is a highly condensed list of men who were Scouts in their youth and went on to achieve excellence in their fields:
Hank Aaron
Neil Armstrong [pictured; photo courtesy of NASA]
Jimmy Buffet
Gerald R. Ford
Harrison Ford
Bill Gates
Michael Jordan
John F. Kennedy
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Branford Marsalis
Ellison Onizuka
Mike Rowe
Nolan Ryan
Steven Spielberg
Jimmy Stewart
Joe Theisman
Sam Walton
John Wayne
Actors, astronauts (
2/3 of all astronauts were Scouts!), athletes, businessmen, directors, musicians, politicians, and more—so many men who accomplished extraordinary things in their lives were Scouts when they were boys. What will
your Cub Scout grow up to be?