From: Mick Cole (MicCCole@AOL.COM)
Date: Wed Jun 28 2000 - 01:00:14 CDT
In a message dated Tue, 27 Jun 2000 1:06:44 PM Eastern Daylight Time, Paul Lamson <plamson@GISCO.NET> writes:
<< Greetings Fellow Scouters,
I have a question for the list concerning OA elections. We had ours
recently at our spring
Camporee. 4 Scouts were eligable, 3 were elected. Our council does
Tapout at Summer Camp and
all 4 will be there. As the SM, I had to sign the election results but
I have not told anyone
else yet including the father of the scout not elected, and he is one of
our ASM. My question
is when is the best time to tell this scout that he was not elected, or
should I not do that
until after tapout? We have never faced this as usually if eligable the
scouts were elected.
Normally we tell the parents shortly before camp so they cam come to the
Tapout ceremony.
Part of my problem is I beleive that when he is told he will be
resentful that he was not
elected and several younger scouts were. He sometimes has a tendancy to
carry on and try and justify why
things does not go as he thinks they should without taking
responsibility.
Paul Lamson
SM, T21
Gouverneur, NY
>>
Paul
This is a tough question, caused in part because of the unnecessary secrecy surrounding OA elections. In my troop, I have the tapout immediately after the votes have been counted. It has been my experience that no good purpose is served by delay. In any event, It is my firm belief that all scouts subject to the election should be informed of the results at the same time. If you inform only the scout who was not elected, it probably won't be too long before everyone else figures out that they were elected. In your circumstances, I would arrange for a tapout as soon as possible, so will you have an opportunity to counsel the scout before summer camp. You description of his anticipated reaction suggests to me the reason that he was not elected--it is at least possible that his fellow scouts simply do not think that this is not the type of reaction to be expected for someone being considered for election to OA. While I would not poll the troop, I would counsel the scout to reflect!
on why he thinks he was not elected, and on what he can do to best prove to his fellow scouts that he should be elected at the next opportunity.
