Survey Results: Take Action Projects

This is the third in a series of posts drawn from responses to a survey I ran about GSUSA programming.  If you want to know what type of people responded to the survey, read this  linked post.  

This post reviews the questions dealing with Take Action Projects on the different levels.  I stated that I thought that for TAPs, GSUSA wanted the girls to identify a problem, learn about things related to the problem, and then design and create a sustainable solution to the problem.  I asked if people agreed with that definition.

I asked if Journeys were an effective way to teach the girls to do TAPs, and only 5.5% of people said they were if you followed the directions.  15.2% had done Journeys and didn't realize that was what they were trying to teach. 18.8% had done Journeys and tried to teach that and failed. 12.1% had never done Journeys. 27.3% said they were, but that they had to do a lot of work outside the GSUSA plans. The rest of the answers were write-ins but most were some version of "no".  

Finally asked, if, assuming my definition of a TAP was correct, their troops has ever properly done a tap. 

I personally think Journeys are a two-headed monster teaching content and then the TAP process, and that too many people get hung up on relating the content to the TAP or seeing the TAP as an afterthought or hoop needed to finish rather than the point of the Journey.  I think a stand-alone TAP program would be more successful in teaching the process and I asked if people agreed.  38% agreed that a stand alone program would be more effective.  12.5% thought Journeys were better and 49.4% said that it didn't matter, the whole TAP process is too much for young girls.  

Next, I asked how troops picked their TAPs.  Here were the responses for the Original Journeys, in raw numbers, not percents:

	Daisy	Brownie	Junior	Cadette	Seniors and Ambassadors
Leader selected, leader designed	24	16	8	8	2
Girls voted between leader-given options; leader directed how to do it	28	15	4	5	2
Girls voted between leader-given options, but gave input into how to do it	21	25	22	12	2
Girls came up with the project, but leader said how to execute	4	14	10	4	1
Girls came up with the idea and figured out how to execute	5	21	35	38	16
Did what the book said	10	8	10	9	1

Here are the responses for the Think Like a Journeys

	Daisy	Brownie	Junior	Cadette	Seniors and Ambassadors
Leader selected, leader designed	11	11	9	6	3
Girls voted between leader-given options; leader directed how to do it	10	10	6	3	1
Girls voted between leader-given options, but gave input into how to do it	16	17	18	7	1
Girls came up with the project, but leader said how to execute	2	7	10	7	1
Girls came up with the idea and figured out how to execute	6	10	23	19	7

and for the Outdoor Journey

	Daisy	Brownie	Junior	Cadette	Seniors and Ambassadors
Leader selected, leader designed	9	9	7	3	1
Girls voted between leader-given options; leader directed how to do it	16	12	8	2	1
Girls voted between leader-given options, but gave input into how to do it	16	23	10	3	2
Girls came up with the project, but leader said how to execute	3	8	7	5	4
Girls came up with the idea and figured out how to execute	8	20	33	21	7

My Comments

Well, this post is getting too long so I'll talk about badges in another post.  I'm also going to have posts about TAPs at various levels.  Thanks for sticking with me. 

One thing above that struck me was the amount of girl input on the TAPs for the various Journeys.  The book Journeys and the Think Like a Journeys were specifically designed with the idea of teaching a TAP process.  The Outdoor Journey was bone thrown to leaders--do these badges and then a TAP--but that's the Journey that showed the most girl involvement in picking and doing the TAP. 

What do you think of the results of my survey?  

To read comments people had about Journeys and TAPs, click here. 

Thanks again for sticking with me, and stick around for more posts about this survey.