Venture Crews in Troops-Part IV

Now that you have had a chance to see how one district has implemented the
Venture program, here's what we have done in our troop. The troop has two
Venture crews, one for the 11-12 graders and one for the 9-10 graders. Each
crew has about 14 scouts in it. The crew has an elected Crew Chief who is a
member of the PLC, along with an Assistant Crew Chief and Crew Quartermaster.
The crew is advised by an Assistant Scoutmaster-Venture. The crew plans its
programs and the ASM helps to find the resources to carry the program out.
Our older scouts have been working on some pretty exotic merit badges (most of
the 11-12 graders are Eagle or are pretty close). In the last two years we
have done Crime Prevention, Cinematography, Rifle Shooting (black powder),
Aviation, Climbing, Space Exploration and Auto Mechanics. We have also spent
the last two month doing Leave No Trace training. We meet with the rest of
the troop and still go on troop outings. Every three to four months, we have
a Venture event, for Venture scouts only. This could be a backpacking trip, a
dinner and a movie out together, a day of rock climbing. We also try to do an
ultimate adventure each summer. Right now the troop is on a three year cycle
where the 13-14 year old scouts do our council's high adventure camp, our
14-15 year old scouts go to the Adirondacks for a week long canoe trip and our
15-17 year old scouts go to Philmont. Are we busy, yep! Does it take more
planning to carry out the program? Yep. But are we serving the needs of our
older scouts. You bet. Hope this helps. I would be interested in hearing
from other leaders about how their troops/districts have used the Venture
option.

Cooper Wright
ASM-Venture, Troop 1519
District Venture Scout Coordinator

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