Re: Venturing and Venture Patrols
(no name) ((no email))
Fri, 1 Jan 1999 15:36:13 -0600
Happy New Year, John!
You asked:
>Please clear up a confusion on my part.
>I have been laboring under the assumption that the
>relationship between Venture Patrols in a Scout Troop and
>Venturing Units was the same as the 1950's "in troop Exploring"
>and "Exploring Units".
>However, I am begining to get the impression that that is not
>correct; that there is more of a difference than simply Venturing
>Units get the girls, or you have to be in a Venturing Unit to earn
>Ranger (and its stepping stones).
(You're not as old as me, John! *laughter*)
Simply, here's the deal:
VENTURE PATROLS in a Troop is a Troop program OPTION. Your Troop
does NOT have to have a Venture Patrol. Look at the Venture Patrol
in your Troop in the same vein as our old Varsity Patrols, or as
the SENIOR Scout "recognition" as you and I remember back in the
fifties and sixties.
VENTURE Patrols are simply older-boy groupings for those youth that
you choose (and they choose) to retain. They continue to work
toward Eagle and MAY involve females as *associates* if the Troop
agrees. The females DO NOT WORK ON ADVANCEMENT, DO NOT WEAR THE
TROOP UNIFORM, AND DO NOTHING EXCEPT "be there" with their male
friends!
VENTURING is the BSA's new "older youth program" for MALES AND
FEMALES of high school and junior college ages. The purpose of
Venturing is the same as the purposes of other divisions of the BSA
except that a more mature approach to carrying out those purposes
are taken. Venturing is organized by a unit with five or more
youth called a Crew, led by a youth Crew President and his or her
elected officers, and advised by two or more adults called
Advisors. The program is intended to be more mature and more
upbeat and not a rehash of Boy Scouting.
VENTURERS work toward the Bronze (in one of five categories), Gold
and Silver (which is the highest rank in Venturing). Additionally,
the Ranger Award (a separate award, available to ALL Venturers to
earn) offer a more rigid outdoor and personal growth challenge to
those Ventures that choose to work toward it. Males and females
work toward those awards with no difference or "accommodation".
There is NO PLAN (that I'm aware of, Scott Smith, do you know?) to
"connect" the two "venture-like programs" together as we did
successfully with "Explorer Crews" and Explorer Posts and Ships
back in John and my time. Back then, Explorers could continue to
associate themselves with their Troop but be placed into a separate
"Explorer Crew" WITHIN the Troop, not associated with any
particular Explorer Post or Ship....as the Crew got larger, it spun
outward to form it's own Explorer Post or Ship or continued to work
as a Crew in the Troop program. The reason why I feel there will
never be such a plan to do this is because the BSA does NOT want to
connect female youth *participation and membership* with Boy Scout
Troop participation and membership. This is why I stressed above
that females participating in Venture Patrol activities are
*guests* and DO NOT WORK ON ANYTHING except the goodwill and
friendship coming from friends of youth involved in Boy Scouting.
Hope this all helps out, John!
Settummanque!@HEY!! MAN!! I thought I would be using a NEW email
program for this, my first posting in 1999!! Oh well...
(c) 1998 Mike Walton ("no such thing as strong coffee,...") blkeagle@mninter.net
http://mninter.net/~blkeagle Burnsville, MN 55306-7130 (612) 435-3085
privately at kyblkeagle@aol.com or waltonm@server.kaiserslautern.army.mil
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