There was a lot of cross over between my local Boy Scout troop and the high school marching band for whatever reason. A lot of Scouts dropped out, myself included, once they got to high school and had to focus so much of their spare time on the band.
Iāve already considered it. Only child needs to get pushed out of the house and get some seasoning.
I have a weakness for the 2-week specialty camps, though. I recall being 14 or 15 and my parents driving 25 minutes each way to Sandy Hook for half the summer to take me to some special marine biology camp. I donāt even remember how I found out about this thing but I lobbied them to let me go. Shit was ridiculous. Every day out exploring with the park rangers, doing all sorts of dissections in a lab classroom, etc.
The two week specialty camps are good for the actual material. I was a counselor at āCybercampsā one summer.
However, the 8 week sleepaway camp is good for the culture, traditions, going back every year (costing you lost of money), and building a group of friends that isnāt related to school or family. I wasnāt able to do that because I couldnāt go to the same camp every year for all 8 weeks, but my cousins and lots of other people did. I was jelly.
I did this. 8 week camp in the Poconos. Which is why I was like 
when Rym was all āfuck the Poconos nothing of value is thereā when talking about skiing. Itās where my 8 week camp friends were.
I agree the Boy Scouting experience is very dependent on how the adult leaders decided to run it, which is why my Eagle acceptance speech thingy was 100% spent thanking my dad and my friendsā dads for creating a decade worth of adventures for me and my friends. They planned and researched new trips for us every month (many of us got the year-round-camper award several times) from mountain climbing, to backpacking, to cross-country ski trekking, to orienteering (I still participate in meets regularly!), to low-key local camp-outs in the state forests around our home town. It was awesome, it was incredibly enriching, and summer camp was just one small part of it.
Except the BSA doesnāt have Native American origins. Its Native American-themed elements (like the military-themed ones) are a play-pretend veneer partly to make the content more interesting to young boys (of a certain era) and partly an intentional appropriation of perceived philosophical and spiritual ideals without any real understanding, respect, or participation of the appropriated culture. Every āNative Americanā I ever encountered in Scouts was actually a white dude in a Halloween costume who knew fuck-all about Native American culture. The BSA could and should do completely away with this disrespectful theme-park bullshit and double down on the good parts: outdoor- and life-skill development, and mentorship-based (rather than authority-based) leadership where more experienced kids lead and teach the less experienced ones.
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I had a great scouting experience, but it was a big well funded troop run by people who really just wanted to focus on skill building and camping (and not the religious side), I never advanced beyond the first level that allows leadership positions because all I wanted to do was go camping, explore off the trails and play magic/D&D.
I just realized that my earliest introduction to webcomics was probably when a friend of mine brought one of his OOTS books to summer scout camp and a bunch of us read it around the fire.
Webcomics didnāt exist when I was in camp. But I was introduced to Linux there. Also Battletech.