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Well let’s just do this? Close the doors go home and wait on death!!!

"We do thing that are not easy" Para phrase Jack Kennedy? Why no!? There were 34 entries among 14 Junior at this years Nats not bad considering 2100 entries and 600 entrants if the rumor mill is correct!

To be honest a junior would have to have a great desire to enter our National contest. our standards is high! and it should be. The expense has to come out of a parents pocket/ Parents like us need to see a bang for their buck Right? So music, Baseball soccer where their is a star, a ribbon placed on a child is automatically.

Our Junior don’t receive a “atta boy” just for showing up. I’ve heard parents and members say “Not even HM!?”

OK lets get a handle on this and all of yall that hate kids and don’t want IPMS to expand, Stop reading and go buy a $299 kit

Keep the Junior dues low as possible

Junior IPMS Nats the same as the dues not 20- 30 dollars

Give a savings Bond for the Best Junior at the Nats or a gift card to Hobby lobby!

Make Juniors welcome with their parents don’t expect them to create award winning model just build

Promote Junior activities in our Chapters Yes the MIT program or something?

How many of the Board members seek out and shake hands with parents and Juniors I know not many Because Our chapter had 5 Juniors and the parent that took his children and with the others models didn’t say anything about how the Board or the host chapters made the kids and parent feel special!

IPMS really isnt user friendly that’s what killing us off! Parents don’t want to get into chapter rivals, r disagreements. This stuff really is killing IPMS and the hobby!

Thank you

Tim Kirkland

President Spartanburg Scale

and President of 4 Juniors Champions 2016

and 9 in 25 years!

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I'm trying hard not to come off as callous and negative.

 

I'm all for members and chapters being family friendly. It would be great if they came up with some sort of outreach program, or worked with scout troops or Big Brothers/Sisters, etc. I don't think a lack of cheap kits is preventing that. There are modelers going into old folks homes with 100s or 1000s of kits in the basement, and their families are selling them for cents on the dollar just to get rid of them. I'm pretty sure if we asked for kit donations at my chapter for a youth program we would average at least 1 decent, buildable kit from every member.

 

Interestingly, the value of those kits would probably be more than my chapter's members send IPMS in dues every year. Look at the business meeting presentation; last year IPMS spent $22,000 more than they brought in. IPMS doesn't have the money to buy make-n-take kits or otherwise subsidize a youth program.

 

IPMS membership today is the result of 10s of millions of kids building models 30 years ago. There is no way IPMS can reach out to 10s of millions of kids.

 

The other ugly truth is that a lot more members would donate a kit than their time. Based on my chapter, most IPMS members are 50+ years old. Many have raised their own kids, they have already been Little League coaches and Scout leaders, and they have taken care of sick parents, and turned around and raised their grand kids because their kids are in two-job families trying to make ends meet. They are not looking to babysit someone else's kids, especially on the 1 day a month they go out with friends.

 

So by all means put together a chapter youth program. Post here how you did it. But don't be surprised if everyone doesn't jump up to help you.

 

Don

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Tim, while you do make some valid points please tell the whole story. I met one of your friends Thomas at the Nationals with his two little girls who both entered the contest and won awards in the junior category. I am sure Thomas also told you that he had his family membership refunded due to the fact that another IPMS member payed it forward. There was another junior that his membership taken care of the same way. He also had entered in to the contest and won several awards. Marie the Office Mgr made sure to seek out juniors to pay there membership from the kindness of the anonymous member.

 

I also personally gave a young modeler a kit that I won in the raffle that I would have never built, it was a 1/32 scale P-51 Mustang that he was more than enthusiastic to get. I also gave another a book on helicopters and they were just as appreciative to get it.

 

As far as entry in to the convention, there has always been a reduced charge.

 

I know it doesn't seem like much, but there are people (including E-board members) who try to do things to encourage younger modelers. I also took time to talk to Thomas and the mom of the other young modeler.

 

Mike Van Schoonhoven

IPMS/USA 2nd VP

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Well let’s just do this? Close the doors go home and wait on death!!!

"We do thing that are not easy" Para phrase Jack Kennedy? Why no!? There were 34 entries among 14 Junior at this years Nats not bad considering 2100 entries and 600 entrants if the rumor mill is correct!

To be honest a junior would have to have a great desire to enter our National contest. our standards is high! and it should be. The expense has to come out of a parents pocket/ Parents like us need to see a bang for their buck Right? So music, Baseball soccer where their is a star, a ribbon placed on a child is automatically.

Our Junior don’t receive a “atta boy” just for showing up. I’ve heard parents and members say “Not even HM!?”

OK lets get a handle on this and all of yall that hate kids and don’t want IPMS to expand, Stop reading and go buy a $299 kit

Keep the Junior dues low as possible

Junior IPMS Nats the same as the dues not 20- 30 dollars

Give a savings Bond for the Best Junior at the Nats or a gift card to Hobby lobby!

Make Juniors welcome with their parents don’t expect them to create award winning model just build

Promote Junior activities in our Chapters Yes the MIT program or something?

How many of the Board members seek out and shake hands with parents and Juniors I know not many Because Our chapter had 5 Juniors and the parent that took his children and with the others models didn’t say anything about how the Board or the host chapters made the kids and parent feel special!

IPMS really isnt user friendly that’s what killing us off! Parents don’t want to get into chapter rivals, r disagreements. This stuff really is killing IPMS and the hobby!

Thank you

Tim Kirkland

President Spartanburg Scale

and President of 4 Juniors Champions 2016

and 9 in 25 years!

Tim,

You make a lot of good points and I appreciate the passion you have. If we could get everyone to buy into a least some of the good points that have been made on this thread we might see gradual changes. This will take a little effort on everyone's part.

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I'm 37 years old now, and I worked at a hobby shop in college in the late-90's early-00's. I can say for sure that we had lots of people my age and younger coming in to buy models. Most did not buy tanks,ships or figures, but airplanes, cars, and sci-fi (Gundams, Warhammer 40K, etc.) were all very popular. There was an especially large group of young people who came in to buy cars and some were really good modellers, too, even getting into scratchbuilding. But what they wanted was different than what I see at IPMS shows even now. The cars weren't muscle cars and NASCAR, but Honda Civics and Nissan Skylines. They would spend a lot of money, too, on upgrades like Dayton-style wheels, "hydraulic" kits, photo-etch, etc. Having grown up with video games and being part of the "younger" generation, I can say for sure the interest is out there.

 

What they did not have was an interest in being part of IPMS. I was always the youngest modeller at the local IPMS club back then. Occasionally, someone would show up at a meeting, but I think the focus of IPMS was not to their liking. Some might call it critical, but I think most IPMS members enjoy research and history as much as model building. From my experiences in my teens and twenties, the interest was in building "cool" subjects along with your friends. The younger folks probably don't care about being super accurate or detailed, they just want to build models with their friends and socialize. Sitting around and talking about history and molding quality with people 20 or 30 years older than you just wasn't appealing to most teens and twenty-somethings. Just look at the Games Workshop/Warhammer scene to know what I mean. There's plenty of modelling going on there from all ages, and good stuff too, but it's very social. I was just an oddball who happened to love both history and the competitive aspect of model competitions.

 

More than likely, IPMS will die a slow death, but modelling will stick around in one form or another. If the IPMS wants to survive, it will need to change - a lot. From what I have seen as a "background member" since around '97/'98, IPMS/USA seems very change adverse. Small changes, sure, but culture shift and change seem anathema. If IPMS wants to grow, it's culture must change. It's got to get more social. It's got to be more fun. Contests are great, and improving modelling skills is awesome, but not much about an IPMS contest, local or national, really helps develop skills or create fun if you're not already stuck in.

 

Make it fun. Make it social. Create real ways to help people get more out of scale modelling without seeming overcritical. Do that, and IPMS/USA will grow regardless of what age group you focus on. Otherwise, I don't see much value in IPMS for the under 40 set unless you're an oddball like me.

 

David

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David,

I agree and you make a lot of valid points. I'm 40 yrs.old and have been modeling since I was 13. I grew up in the same era you have.

The history of it I love just as much as I do the modeling and contests, but the younger generation has the world wide web and they don't feel the need to retain this knowledge like we do, when all they have to do is go online and find anything they want to know about a subject in a matter of minutes.

Edited by tgidcumb
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I'm glad you posted Tim and David validating my observations.

For another way to look at it do a search on You Tube for guys building the miniatures (Games Workshop and others) compared to "regular" model building. There are gazillions of people showing how to paint these minis.

What the Admins need to realized that to "young" people (except my son) WW2 subjects are comparable to the Civil and Revolutionary Wars. It's something that happened a long time ago. While I'm not say to get rid of these subjects, I am saying to look at these other subjects as being just as valid.

Maybe, with the help of the local clubs to help welcome these new people, the IPMS should advertise in these mini and other magazines of the type like they do in the other modeling magazines.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Let's not use the Nationals as a litmus test for the success or failure of recruiting juniors. This year there was an additional factor--the start of school. Since the majority of junior modelers must be either local or on vacation with parents, a school conflict will always blunt attendance. We were in the Atlanta area on vacation before the convention and I heard on the morning news the annual piece about the start of school in several Atlanta area districts. The local guys can verify this, but it may have also been the case around Columbia. The way the contest is set up, the only way a junior could get a model entered before judging under these conditions would be to proxy it.

 

The next several conventions are also kissing the first week in August. Different areas of the country, sure, but earlier start dates for school is becoming a trend so I expect them to be more lightly attended as well.

 

Rick Jackson

 

 

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