Hello,
So…I am naturally resistant to new sparkly apps and software, hence I hadn’t attempted the DLE - I had learned Scoutbook (finally), am a senior person in the Pack, taught other leaders to use it (as much as that can happen) and went along my happy way. I heard rumblings that the DLE wasn’t good but I didn’t even concern myself.
This year, however, I have some spunky, forward-thinking leaders who wanted to give it a try and I applaud them for trying to streamline their process in their very busy lives. However, they have now regretted it. Since August, I have been seeing den meetings that couldn’t have happened (the same day as Pack meetings and other Pack events, during school holidays, etc). Dutifully, I inform the leader that they have created a meeting on a day that there is a conflict. Each time, they say “OK, I’ll fix it”, but sometimes they don’t or they moved it to the Christmas holiday (when of course I had to remind them they weren’t having den meetings).
Now, I finally sit down and have a conversation with one of these den leaders and he lays out for me just how terrible he feels this app is. He explains the inability to do much of anything once the plan has been put into Scoutbook and how frustrating it has been for his den, to the point where he told them to completely ignore Scoutbook and has published a document with all the den dates that he distributed separately.
Innocently, I tell him - “Don’t worry! I’m a Pack admin (and multiple other things), I’m sure I have access to delete/fix them - just give me a day, I’ll take care of it for you and I’m so sorry you’ve been struggling with this!”. The wonderful look of gratitude and the kind things he said still ring in my head…as I now think of how I have to tell him that I cannot help him. I was SO sure I would come here to the forum and it would have the magic answer - that I was merely uninformed about the tool and that there would be instructions/steps to resolving this seemingly basic need. I have touted the success I have found here in the past (and thank you everyone who has helped me!) so there was never a doubt that I would stroll through the posts and find one that fit the bill.
But…no. Sadly, I am sitting here with the realization that after years of existence, the one request and feature that everyone has complained about, the mere ability to delete a schedule that did not or cannot happen, is still not fixed or resolved. For those who will say “put it in the past” or “hide the DLE”, this doesn’t change the fact that it’s there and only masks the problem that still exists.
So, you might ask - after reading the forums and realizing that there is no hope, why do I decide to write a diatribe about my personal annoyance with this? Because, in this world, I believe in speaking up and out. I could sit and vent to my husband (bless him) or my fellow pack leaders (bless them even more!), but we are teaching our son (and the Scouts in our care) that it is their responsibility to say something when they see things that need to be changed, that are wrong. It is not OK to merely complain, you must do something.
To our embattled software developers: Please realize that this use case is common, not an outlier. Garner some feedback (real feedback, not ranting or venting) about how the users (and the organization of course), need this to work. Otherwise, no one is using this tool that surely Scouts BSA spent much time and money to have developed.
Thank you all for listening -
Yours in Scouting,
Karen
