Discussion: Youth groups

We have a large youth group wanting to participate in our next meet so I am trying advance registration. (We are a young, small club.) Our meet registration form includes a liability waiver section with a typical clause "if under 18 parent or guardian must sign". The youth group leader is balking at gathering 40 signed parental waivers. I think the registration part of our form is likely to perplex the parents and likely many forms won't get signed.

Some clubs have significant participation from youth groups. How do they handle this?

Do we even need parents to sign for an organized youth group?

We ran into this problem with a group of Cub Scouts and sought advice from another club who has done a lot of work with Scouts. Their solution was to create a custom waiver that was signed by the leader on behalf of the entire group. It was our usual waiver but the text was modified like this:

"As leader, on behalf of our group, I have been informed of the physical risks of injury inherent in the sport of orienteering and I voluntarily agree that our group will accept full responsibility and legal liability for any injuries or damages which result from our assumption of these risks. Our volunteers and group members are fully capable of participating in this event. We hereby release and forever discharge the officials and all organizers...blah blah blah"

The Scouts themselves are insured for their activities. We only needed something that stated that our club and landowners were absolved of liability. I'm told that liability waivers carry more weight in Canada than in the U.S. You'd certainly want to get a U.S. opinion on this as well.

In the US it appears there are three main youth group organizations that may be involved in orienteering: Boy Scouts of America, Girl Scouts of America, and JROTC. I would like to hear experiences handling waivers for groups connected with any of these organizations.