youth and tithing

[Tick's wife]

My parents never made me go. I remember one Sunday as a teenager standing there telling my mom I didn't want to go that day and she told me that I didn't have to and it was my decision.

I eventually decided to go anyway because my dad was inactive at the time and seeing the pain it caused my mother I didn't want to be responsible for even more of that.

good for you....seriously.

[DapperDan]

Not trying to increase 'fun' trying to increase 'interest' and activity.

To a kid if it isn't fun, it isn't interesting.

[Tick's wife]

Our youth just went up to Nauvoo. That couldn't have been a cheap trip.

now, see, that is a cool trip. Our youth would love that.

[wally]

The youth programs are already built around "fun" too much. My kids hitting the 14/15 yo age don't want to go anymore. I have a hard time telling them they have to. Either go and hang out and play dumb silly games with the ward kids at YMYW or go hang out with their friends who are also LDS.

Should youth programs be built more around "seriousness?" Should it be more like the the video in the Jesus Camp Thread?

[Tick's wife]

To a kid if it isn't fun, it isn't interesting.

true

[The_Tick]

Locally we get hammered by what we would like to do as a ward and what we can afford to do.

The Stake has set a goal for 6 campouts a year for the scouts. Those cost anywher from 50-125. We are allowed to ask for 10 dollars per kid from each family to cover food. The rest is to come from the YM budget.

If we do the 6 campouts, and the 2 leaders turn in receipts for gas (as they are instructed) I was looking at the campout costing about 150 per from my budget. Even after the kids contributed.

6 * 150 = 900 for scouting.

1500-900 = 600 remaining.

We are allowed 1 fundraiser for the year and it raises about 1000. Split with YW and we are looking at 500.

600+500 = 1100.

The YM budget $75 per kid to scout camp/high adventure. This year that was 8 kids.

75*8 = 600

1100-600 = 500

Gas for scout camp is about 125.

500-125 = 375 remaining

So...I was looking at about 375 a year to really work with for Mutual activities. Not much at all.

Now...I don't turn in receipts. Some folks turn in everything. I don't fault anyone either way.

But I will say that the YM in my ward do way more enjoyable things than the YW. The YW are getting hosed by the Stake YWP. But that really isn't my issue.

[The_Tick]

now, see, that is a cool trip. Our youth would love that.

Our SP wont sign off on out of state trips.

We had proposed to take the YM/YW on a trip to St. George temple and a day at Lake Mead. Had 2 house boats and a ski boat being donated 100%.

No go.

[jay santos]

Locally we get hammered by what we would like to do as a ward and what we can afford to do.

The Stake has set a goal for 6 campouts a year for the scouts. Those cost anywher from 50-125. We are allowed to ask for 10 dollars per kid from each family to cover food. The rest is to come from the YM budget.

If we do the 6 campouts, and the 2 leaders turn in receipts for gas (as they are instructed) I was looking at the campout costing about 150 per from my budget. Even after the kids contributed.

6 * 150 = 900 for scouting.

1500-900 = 600 remaining.

We are allowed 1 fundraiser for the year and it raises about 1000. Split with YW and we are looking at 500.

600+500 = 1100.

The YM budget $75 per kid to scout camp/high adventure. This year that was 8 kids.

75*8 = 600

1100-600 = 500

Gas for scout camp is about 125.

500-125 = 375 remaining

So...I was looking at about 375 a year to really work with for Mutual activities. Not much at all.

Now...I don't turn in receipts. Some folks turn in everything. I don't fault anyone either way.

But I will say that the YM in my ward do way more enjoyable things than the YW. The YW are getting hosed by the Stake YWP. But that really isn't my issue.

We generally raise about $5K per year with our fundraiser. Sucks to be your ward.

[Tick's wife]

We generally raise about $5K per year with our fundraiser. Sucks to be your ward.

u get to do fundraisers? we only get to do one a year, as Tick said, and it goes to camp. yes, our ward/stake sucks.

[The_Tick]

We generally raise about $5K per year with our fundraiser. Sucks to be your ward.

You must live in Utah?

You have about 4k more to play with, so you can't understand how tough it is for wards that don't have the same advantage.

[The_Tick]

We generally raise about $5K per year with our fundraiser. Sucks to be your ward.

And the sad part? We have the most succesful fundraiser in our Stake.

[Moliere]

My friend (Catholic) tells me about all this cool stuff they do with their youth, like trips to Disneyland and so forth. Our local leaders want to know why we lose so many youth. Maybe we should put more of our tithing, and keep it local, to support the YW/YM programs, especially the YW. I know our tithing is used to build the kingdom of God but what about the local kingdom...how about putting it there.

I'll echo this, although I don't think trips to Disneyland are really worthwhile from a church persprective (and I know you aren't insinuating that). Either increase the budget or allow for more fundraisers. Stake prohibitions on certain fundraisers make life hard sometimes for certain wards, especically my previous ward which was in a not very affluent area but affluent enough to donate a bit of money every so often.

On a side note, there are a couple companies in my current area that will donate money to a non-profit if employees are spending time helping that non-profit. Obviously there are restrictions, but the Boy Scouts fall into the guidelines so if a ward has a member who works for that company, that member is almost automatically called into young men's in some capacity to work with the scouts. It brings in a lot of money and helps the young men's program in this area quite a bit.

[Eddie]

We don't do fundraisers for scouts - aside from the "friends of scouting", but that is an entirely different animal. I'm not sure how everything is funded.

I know our stake likes to do organized scout camp for boys 12-14 as a stake - and it is paid out of the stake budget. So that helps a great deal. We're asked to hold 11 campouts a year - every month but December. As far as I know the food has always been paid for by the ward.


I know there are some folks who don't turn in receipts. Our bishop cracks hard on that. He says that without the receipts they really don't know what the program costs to run. And then if they call someone who financially can't afford to just absorb the receipts, they end up short because they haven't had an accurate accounting of past costs to plan for the future. He really wants all receipts turned in.