Boy Scout Troop 325
Scoutmaster Minute
James Rogers
October 23, 2007
from www.wikipedia.com
Larry Polyak, Scoutmaster

James D. "Jim" Rogers is the President and CEO of Kampgrounds of America (KOA). He currently lives in Billings, MT and Reno, NV. He has a wife, Sandy, and three sons: Ben, Judd, and Tyler–all three are Eagle Scouts.

Rogers became an Eagle Scout in Greenbrae, California in 1965 and a recipient of the Distinguished Eagle Scout Award from the Nevada Area Council of the Boy Scouts of America in Reno, Nevada in 2002. Scouting's values play an important role in this entire family. He is the brother of T. Gary Rogers, who is also an Eagle Scout and Distinguished Eagle Scout. Their brother Don is also an Eagle Scout; as are seven of their sons, for a total of 10 Eagle Scouts across two generations of this family.

After graduating from the University of California, Berkeley in 1972, he contacted KOA for an interview and got a quick, positive response. As an executive of the Billings, Montana, company later told him, "We wanted to meet an Eagle Scout that went to UC Berkeley."

Rogers had worked each summer during college at the Lair of the Golden Bear, the California Alumni Association's camp, and he dreamed of building a company that would develop alumni camps across the country.

Rogers got the job at KOA and stayed for two years before heading to UCLA to complete a master's degree in business administration. After a couple of years as general manager of a South Lake Tahoe resort, he went to work for Harrah's Entertainment Inc. in 1978, eventually becoming senior vice president and general manager of Harrah's Reno in 1994. Then, in January 2000, he returned to KOA as president and chief executive officer.

Throughout his career, both the skills and the values he learned as a Scout have served Rogers well. The advancement program, he said, "helps you understand what it takes for achievement." And the values? "I can't tell you the number of times I think of trustworthy, loyal, helpful, and all the rest as being requirements for the people who work for us at KOA," he said. "The Scout Law is just a wonderful value list."