Scoutmaster Minutes
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LATEST POSTS
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By Cburkhardt · Posted
When a Council becomes fundamentally dysfunctional, it is because the council board is not doing its job. This is usually coupled with professional leadership that either overly-dominates the board or is incapable of inspiring its volunteers to fully embrace their board roles. The volunteer Board Chair (formerly known as "Council President") and other principal volunteer leaders are responsible to set policies and priorities for the operation of Scouting within a geographic territory. The Scout Executive is paid by and reports to them and not the other way around. Board members who allow themselves to be relegated to only program implementation or menial tasks are simply not the right kind of people to serve. We need strong minded and objective individuals who have local and informed judgement -- and they should be the ones setting the critical budget, property, fiscal, fundraising and program prioritization policies. They should exercise their fiduciary duties on behalf of the youth who benefit and not be concerned about being popular or receiving awards. The examples of dysfunctional property and membership circumstances I provided above could easily have been avoided if board members had been willing to recognize and transparently deal with the obvious -- plummeting membership, excessive and underutilized properties, unproductive professionals and uncontrolled spending or debt. Professionals are responsible to implement the policies of the local board in a manner consistent with the rules and regulations of the BSA. They should neither dominate boards nor take the entire blame for everything going wrong in a council. The ineffective ones should be counseled to success or discharged if unable to perform. When I finished my role as the council president who worked with our board and professionals to implement the merger and correct dysfunction, I received no award or even a note of thanks from those who benefitted from my work. This did not disturb me, because it was the satisfaction of serving effectively that was my reward. I am no hero or example of the perfect board member -- but we do need volunteer leaders who are capable and willing to make the hard calls and who do not bring narrow or rigid thinking. Now is the right time for interested volunteers to influence who will serve on your 2024 council executive boards. Chartered Organization Representatives have the responsibility and right to be involved. -
By InquisitiveScouter · Posted
@Tron, I have noticed this over many years of Scouting as well... There is no attempt to "standardize" the program, or encourage/incentivize Troops to hold to those "standards." So, you wind up with everyone doing their "version" of Scouting. Most never pick up the book and read to try to find the purpose of what we are doing. In most parent minds, the purpose is to make my kid an Eagle Scout so he/she can put in on a college/service academy application. You most likely know this, but this "standardization" is the purpose of the Commissioner Corps, starting with Unit Commissioners. https://www.scouting.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/NCST-Unit-Commissioner-Job-Description.pdf The last time we saw a Commissioner in our unit was when we invited them to present an award on behalf of the council. During my 7+ years tenure as Scoutmaster, we had one unit contact (at our request) and never once saw a unit assessment. That said, I understand the program and policies, and during that time, our unit charter was always clean and on time, and we always reached Gold Level on Journey to Excellence (for which we submitted the report at recharter time). (BTW, during the last year, we finally hit one of my personal goals for our unit: to reach a maximum score on the JTE.) So, perhaps, since we were not a "problem unit", their attention was devoted elsewhere. But, a phone call to our COR, CC, or SM saying, "Hey, just wanted to let you guys know you are doing a great job!" would have been a 2-minute phone call or email well spent. --------------------------------------- Another mindset I have seen is from many adults being so defensive about their unit program. They think they are right, and even if they aren't, well, it IS their program and they'll darn well run it they way they want to. There is no mindset of "continuous process improvement" or asking simple questions like "What is the right way to do this?" or "What is a better way to do this?" It's just, "I don't care about all that stuff. Let's muddle through, get my kid's Eagle, and get the heck out..." What can men do against such reckless hate? 😛 https://youtu.be/t6qQSll7InQ -
What do we know about this mechanism for the public to search for YPT violations? Is it a website? Do we enter the state/council/unit number and a list of YPT violations (potentially redacted) populates? I am curious as I would just like to know, and I am also curious to know if a unit folds and a new unit replaces it at the same CO with a different unit number will the search return zero results on that unit? -
Training is key; however, it doesn't matter how well trained a volunteer is if they don't want to run the actual program AND it's all about "their kids" and not providing a good program. All of the dying troops in my area have the same things in common: no relationship to a pack, cadre of key 3 leaders who need to rotate out, doing their own thing. All of the dying packs in my area have the same things in common: only have a relationship with 1 troop, do not run year round programs, doing their own thing.
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By RememberSchiff · Posted
The Little Guy Hotel Eagle Project for Wildlife education Center More at source: https://www.newschannel10.com/video/2023/09/25/video-scouts-bsa-builds-bug-hotel-wild-west-wildlife-rehabilitation-education-center/
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