Starting next year, the Cub Scouts, which is an introductory Boy Scout program made up of boys in first through fifth grades, can opt to create girls-only packs or co-ed packs with girls-only dens. (In Cub Scouting, packs are comprised of dens, which are smaller groups of scouts.) And by 2019, the Boy Scouts say they will also offer a program for older girls to earn the Eagle Scout Award. The Boy Scouts currently offer a handful of smaller co-ed programs, like Venturing and Sea Scouting, but none are as prominent as the Cub Scouts.

The Boy Scouts say they’re doing it to make life easier for busy families with multiple children who might want to enroll their kids in a single organization. But the move could also help the organization grow its steadily declining membership.

In its official response to the news, GSUSA accused the Boy Scouts of adding an “accelerant” to its “house fire” of an organization, referencing recent allegations of sexual abuse within the Boy Scouts, as well as accusing it of offering “deficient programming.” Margosian told me she was disappointed when she learned of the Boy Scouts’ decision. “In many communities across the country we’ve really worked together to serve youth,” she said. “So I think it’s disappointing that when they started to contemplate this three years ago, they didn’t reach out.”

The two organizations disagreed over how clued-in the Girl Scouts were before the decision to admit girls was made. The Boy Scouts said they held several phone and in-person meetings with the Girl Scouts to discuss the move, but the Girl Scouts say that no one from BSA reached out to them before or after the announcement—that the Girl Scouts took the initiative to contact BSA but were only able to after the issue of admitting girls was already decided.

In clear contrast with the Girl Scouts’ swift and aggressive comments denouncing the Boy Scouts’ decision, Margosian said she isn’t worried that girls will choose Boy Scouts over Girl Scouts. “There will be some girls who make that choice, but the reality is we, for 105 years, have really focused on serving girls and their emotional, psychological, and developmental needs,” she said. “We’ll be sorry for those girls because they will miss out on the best experience, and that’s just a shame.”

The experts I spoke with were doubtful that the Girl Scouts’ current membership would be significantly affected—but they acknowledged that they might lose some potential scouts. “I don’t think there’s going to be a whole lot of impact as far as a whole bunch of Girl Scouts deciding to join the Boy Scouts,” said Elizabeth Searing, an assistant professor of public administration and policy at SUNY Albany and Director of the Institute of Nonprofit Leadership and Community Development. “The experience of the two organizations are very different.”