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Showing content with the highest reputation on 02/10/18 in all areas

  1. There is the other side: 1) You have a boy (girl) in scouts. 2) You slowly get sucked into the myth and re-discover your inner boy. 3) Some old scouters or real boy scouts teach you some skills, you get just enough 'official' training to stay our of trouble. 4) You deliver the best program you can, make friends, and gain 100 unofficial nephews. Some inspire you, most are memorable, and a few break your heart. 6) You ignore national unless you hang around the forum or there is a press release. Look the whole world seems to be falling apart, some of us on the front
    3 points
  2. My troop (coed) is lucky enough to have a twin troop in Canada, also coed that we have done a series of exchanges with.. Obviously I can't speak for any other Canadian troops but they do no such thing. At night adults go to bed, simple as that. Same this side of the pond as well. Absolutely no need for there to be any extra stress. Young love occassionally blooms but it's never caused a problem. The boys and the girls are there to do what scouts do and it's never caused us disruption.
    2 points
  3. I’m 19 and I knew everything until I found out I didn’t. My dad tried to warn me but I knew he didn’t know anything until I found out it was me who didn’t. Missed one car payment and didn’t renew my plates. Two tickets and I learned an expensive lesson that my parents were way smarter than me. I’m learning again how to taxes with dad this weekend. I didn’t pay attention last year because I knew more then. Thanks dad.
    2 points
  4. Being responsible to your obligations is a part of growing up. Or, as the kids say, "adulting". I have a 20-something nephew whose parents are no longer around, and is living with another uncle. He fancies himself a "grownup" who doesn't have to follow our advice, return calls or texts, or bring over necessary paperwork so I can do his taxes and wife can file his trust paperwork. He wants all mail going to him, not us. He failed to renew his license plates on time, in spite of many reminders from us, and my offer to bring him over so we can do it together online (a 10 minute process). No
    2 points
  5. One might distinguish between "dying" and negligent homicide. The olduns' recall the "Improved Scouting Program" of 1972 . Volunteers who resisted at the onset were run out of BSA. That they proved to be correct was regarded by our lords and masters as even worse. "Obedient," with the part about trying to get change written out, has replaced "Trustworthy" as the most important gauge of a "Good" volunteer. Well that and $$$$$. Maybe there is a better way. BSA has followed the West Plan. Things die for a reason, and BSA is dying under the West Plan. Of course, past res
    2 points
  6. How about redesigning venturing into a young adult program? Overlap it with college ages. Overlap it with college service fraternities. Put certain boundaries on it (no drinking, etc). It's about service and adventure. I often think about this as we had multiple scouts age out and become 18-20. They hang around in a pseudo fashion. They just don't have the time and commitment to become a fully trained and committed ASM, but they are not really a youth either. It would be nice to have a program to serve them. And, I'd be okay calling it Scouting Young Adults. Gotta check the acr
    2 points
  7. Folks: I've been lurking for a while, and just decided to jump in. I'm liking what I see here. I'm a District Training Chair, a Venturing Advisor, a committee member for the troop and pack. Perhaps more importantly, I'm involved with United Methodist Scouting Ministry. I'll be serving as course director for the UM Scouters' Conference at Philmont Training Center. I'm already learning from y'all, and hope I can contribute to the conversation.
    1 point
  8. Remind is a common message app where teachers can send reminders via text to students without having their numbers and vice versa. My school use it and I was like “Why not use it for my troop?”. That following Wednesday I brought it up to the adult leaders and PLC then it turns out they loved it and some scouts could relate. We’ve been using it for atleast 4 months now, and it’s obvious that improvements are made. We send messages about payments, important information, times to be someplace, etc. BUT WAIT! What if I want to send a email too? If a scout/parent has their email l
    1 point
  9. This is my 14th year of homeschooling my boys. They both participated as much or as little as they want - it's their choice. Older son earned his Eagle about 3 years ago, and the younger is one merit badge away from his. The only real influence I see is that by homeschooling & not working, as a leader in the troop I'm usually available to head up outings and opportunities that other working leaders might not have the chance to do (high adventure, daytime activities, etc).
    1 point
  10. We do. The fact some scouts are home-schooled doesn't influence anything as a result. We have public school scouts, and private school scouts too. One could not tell them apart. The schooling choice of the parents has no apparent influence.
    1 point
  11. Here's the routine: 1) you tell them in person. 2) then you send them with a written note 3) then you email them 4) then you text them 5) then you leave a message on their voicemail 6) then at parent/teacher conference they will swear up and down you never told them. I find the most effective way is to staple it to their foreheads. THEN they remember. I have found over the years of teaching that if someone wants to remember (memorize) something, like 7 phone numbers, all they have to do is READ them faithfully every morning and every night for 21 days i
    1 point
  12. Whether or not they read it is not the question. The problem is they rarely respond. They don't remember that they need to respond. They no longer take notes in class because it's all on line. They really have little experience with the idea of notes. I'm sure very few ever write down a phone message. As I said before, the technology is not the issue. There are dozens of apps out there. My troop uses Discord. It doesn't make a difference what app they use.
    1 point
  13. Ever since this all came out I've always felt this was the only possible solution...the only way to reconcile "girls are in" with "same opportunities and equal program."
    1 point
  14. In Louisiana, Mississippi and Florida they they pole a pirou (sp?) in much the same way as you do a punt. I think the punt is larger and much heavier though. The bayeau waters are slow, almost still, and not especially deep. In Florida, the Everglades are perfect for poling.
    1 point
  15. Yes. Especially if your opinion differs from theirs I have noticed.
    1 point
  16. Must have been mine as it was deleted. I asked if someone was willing to have their son sell popcorn outside the gentleman's club. Why it was deleted is beyond me as long as we are dealing in hypotheticals and trying to determine just where the line of acceptability is going to be drawn. Heavy-handed moderators at their best.
    1 point
  17. BSA National Leadership = Bumbling, clueless, deceitful liars. What an embarrassment.
    1 point
  18. Don't go there. I already had one supply employee tell me that the cheap pants that are current issue do not have a lifetime guarantee anymore. Had to get a manager involved in that. And the second pair was just as bad. had to use ebay and get some "expereinced" shorts from the 1990s.
    1 point
  19. @Tampa Turtle I’m just sorry I can only upvote once
    1 point
  20. Let me make it simple for you... The new program being proposed for girls is not additional Patrols in an existing Troop, but new Girls only Troops. If nationals really wants that to roll out correctly (and not be paper Troops) they will need to allow plenty of time for the the organizational structure to get in place. Adding a den is fairly easy in an existing Pack. Having volunteers generate brand new Troops will take a lot more work and time. If they don’t want girls waiting around until mid 2019 for crossover then nationals will have to launch the program this fall. If nationals
    1 point
  21. My take on this has always been that no matter what the intent of the folks in Irving might have been, they will not get the volunteer base that would be required to run separate Troops in most communities. The more opinions I see, and the more I think about how the heck they plan to roll this out, the more I am convinced that we will see separate Patrols in mixed Troops. The other thing that no one seems to be able to answer is when they plan to roll this all out. The issue with no clear dates as of yet is this: Let's say, a 10 year old girl joins a Cub Scout Pack on January 15th as par
    1 point
  22. Yup. It's funny that the Millennial Generation and Generation Z are the most connected in history, but ridiculously hard to get a hold of. (I can say that as a Millennial.) Snapchat is a terrible medium for important information since it doesn't save messages. So you aren't missing anything by not using it. Plus it's really hard to follow YPT on Snapchat.
    1 point
  23. Agree. But the irony here was that Remind was suggested by the PLC because they didn't want to use email. The adults had been complaining that they never checked it. The boys made a big deal about how they check texts messages "nearly instantaneously" but only rarely email, so Remind was suggested as a way to get in touch with them faster. The reality was that teenagers don't check (or at least don't bother to respond to) texts either. I suspect if we used Snapchat they'd eventually find a way to ignore that too.
    1 point
  24. This is a decent idea, Fred. Many of the guys and gals in my son's crew are older high school and college. Our crew is mostly like a high adventure club. It would be odd having folks 14-24 in Venturing, so maybe we change it to 16-23 or so? Maybe Juniors in HS to Seniors in college (not older than 23 or 24). Maybe it's just over 18. Interesting idea.
    1 point
  25. This is in order of likelihood a pigtail mafia member will leave a thin mint bomb in your mailbox. 1 - start with sisters of existing members 2 - have them reach out to their friends to recruit them to join 3 - standard Join Scouts Night stuff (flyers, yard signs, emails). Have something fun to do for the kids and ensure some girls that plan to join attend 4 - reach out to existing GSUSA scouts 5 - recruit existing GSUSA Troop leaders 6 - boom... your mailbox just exploded Overall, I don’t see much of a difference from recruiting boys other than making sure
    1 point
  26. I was a reluctant Tiger leader but my 2nd week in I was at the grocery store and one of my boys pointed me out to his mom "That's him! My Scoutleader!". I was hooked. I felt like a rock star.
    1 point
  27. Maybe it's a bit like the Golden Rule. You send out a scathing email and you get scathing silence in return.
    1 point
  28. I can only speak about the WB'ers in my area. They are so high up on their pedestal they can't see us little folks. Surely not all are like this, but in my area they are rabid, nasty and back-slappingly self-aggrandizing.
    1 point
  29. Well, our 83 year old Pack just had our first girl den meeting... and I believe the Earth is still rotating. No media present but we did have some pictures taken of the girls. Most were in uniform and no skorts. Overall it was a lot calmer than a boy den meeting. We have 3 den leaders working the 3 separate age groups present. All of us we experienced in the Pack and we remarked that we need to prepare more as the girls got through the material more quickly than we planned. That could be due to smaller groups, but they were also a bit more focused. Several of the girls were tal
    1 point
  30. We have an Eagle equivalent from India. He's a great person for the boys to talk to. Different perspective altogether. We just have rattlers, copperheads and cottonmouths to look out for. Imagine dodging mambas, cobras and vipers on camp outs.
    1 point
  31. I would think a Scout or Scouter from another country would be perfectly acceptable in their country's uniform, no matter where they are visiting.
    1 point
  32. @@ianwilkins, if it's a medal and the scouter is attending a court of honor or some other affair wear medals are worn, I would encourage wearing the medal. If it's a knot, I would encourage sewing it on to help draw the uniform police off our boys! We need to realize that the goal of the insignia guide is to encourage a tidy appearance (and reserve certain portions of cloth for advertising BSA functions like Councils, O/A, and National Jamborees), not to dictate what and what not a scouter proudly acknowledge.
    1 point
  33. there's not a knot for that, but surely it's not all for naught?
    1 point
  34. Disappointing that some have taken this discussion off the rails with exaggerated, explicit examples that have no place in a topic about Girl Scouts, let alone a scouter forum. Too bad, as this OP story is still developing. If you don't want to follow the Scout Oath and Law in writing a post, your post will be removed. It is that simple. Topic is locked .
    -1 points
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