Leaderboard

Don't ask for rules please! It's a judgement call on whether the scout is doing something intentionally or simply making a mistake. In the old days, a leader would have stopped the behavior, then treated the situation as an opportunity to talk with and mentor the scout on how to make better decisions. With that discussion the leader could make a better determination about intent and determining a course of action. Of course that's way more difficult than just making a zero tolerance rule and taking away the scouts knife.

"Hideously flawed man" Sounds like my wife describing me.

Imperfectly. Someone was questioning how this discussion relates to Scouting. One way it relates to Scouting is that Scouting does NOT require its members to believe that our moral code was dictated by a higher power. It merely requires a belief in a higher power. I for one believe that a supernatural force, beyond our comprehension, created the Universe and then probably retreated to the sidelines to watch the show - leaving the creatures on planets that eventually developed “intelligent” life to work out their own moral code(s) the best they could and try to survive in the process.

I do propose moving to the language of “Cubbing” and “scouting” to refer to the different programs.

You can have a big impact without spending a lot of money I learned. I did my project last year and I spent around $500, with all of it being donations. I built two moving carts out of trek wood, put stone down around the building, build a horse shoe built, and some little stuff. The beneficiary is a adult day center, and was so excited just for these little things since it helps them move activity to activity. The stone helps with drainage and improved the overall look of the building and more. On the other note, I know a Eagle who painted a basement and all the paint chipped up a week l

Slavery is still the social norm. Just now a days it is fluffy and has a happy face. When one person, or group of people, lays claim to the labor of another person without real consent or just compensation, often but not necessarily claiming the other person as a piece of property. The government demands that people pay money to it, presumably using an implied threat of violence to ensure that they do. If you earn money through your labors, and if another party unilaterally lays claim to that money without your consent, this implies that said party is laying claim to your labors wit

For those interested in reading about the formation of ethics from an atheists viewpoint; ie not relying on religious or other teachings. Here is a link to an essay on the American Atheists website. While many may disagree with his viewpoint, it is a good read to understand where an atheist is coming from. https://www.atheists.org/activism/resources/ethics-without-gods/

Please note that the Whitlin' Chip and Totin Chip have no specific requirements. There is no BSA list of "do this this way", not like tying knots or cooking or fire building. The teaching of "safe handling" and "good tool useage" is a ultimately a local culture thing. If you are fortunate to have a skilled craftsman to teach your Cubs and Scouts, count yourself lucky. Kids will want to "experiment" . I was at a B&G banquet one evening, helping to hand out the PopCorn Prizes. One young Cub, sold umpteen dollars worth of Popcorn, was awarded a multi blade pocket knife. As th

Yep, but it's not hazing. Barry

You reminded me of my eagle project from almost 40 years ago. The unmarked path in the park which I organized its rehab and constructed erosion controls is now a marked trail with a name. It now is also literally on the maps. Thanks for conjuring up an old memory.

And on page 69: "Describe how the Whittling Chip, if revoked, must be re-earned as a complete unit in order to again carry and use a pocketknife. The corners cannot be cut off from the Whittling Chip for infractions—the certificate must be treated as a single entity."

https://filestore.scouting.org/filestore/training/pdf/510-033(17)baloo.pdf page 72 “ There is no such thing as “cutting a corner off” for infractions. The rules are followed at all times. The Whittling Chip card stays as a complete unit.”

At the end of the CoH, our TC's Eagle advisor was invited to speak, gave an excellent description of how he counseled scouts with their projects. It was excellent, but I fear that I would misquote him if I tried to list his all of key points, but I really liked one bit of advice to the boys (which, indirectly was a hint to parents): pick a beneficiary who excites you and a project that you'd be proud of. @robert12, don't lose the forest for the trees. Visit roundtables and encourage your leaders to think out of the checkbox and on the above terms. At a local park, I made an orienteer

I agree with with the quote @Thunderbird found. Anything can scale up to the point of requiring leadership. Planting 6 flowers is easy. Planting 600 requires leadership. I suppose it's difficult to measure leadership. At least one way is to ask what would happen if the leader wasn't there. In this case a Webelos scout could have decided the flag pole needed flowers, asked mom to buy a pack of 6, and planted them. So what did the scout in your example provide? All he did was make a task list that was completely unnecessary. Another way of looking at a project is asking how much pre

Facts not in evidence: what laws the Chin made fell along racial lines https://www.zum.de/whkmla/sp/0910/hersheys/hersheys5.html#ii To Merlyn's main objection ... Jesus did address slavery, but not in a way that we would at all find comfortable. The theme of "ultimate toppling" was at the forefront of Jesus' teaching. (E.g., Make peace with your enemy while he is far off ... Lazarus the leper and the master who wouldn't employ him.) That is, if you sought to be a master with select servants -- effectively casting others out and subjecting them to disease and decay -- you c

We have two girls in our Pack now! They are sisters, a 1st grader and a 2nd grader. I asked if we might pull in a few more girls, but was told that every other 2nd grade girl is already in Girl Scouts, and that these two girls are not "Girl Scouty". I like them already. Their mom is volunteering in the Pack as an assistant Den leader and we'll make the whole thing work.

Feel free to read all nine pages:

Thank the complaining parents for volunteering to run the Pinewood Derby and tell them you'll forward their names to the Pack Committee for further consideration.

What, like your nonsense replies? I give back what replies deserve. PS: what you have are humans claiming their god wrote the ten commandments. It's still humans all the way up.

Go ahead and argue that it's good. So slavery is moral? You can buy slaves from other countries and leave them as property to your children? But you're getting that from religion. Humans wrote the bible. I see you didn't understand my comment. There ARE unicorns in the bible, and false animal husbandry.

Go right ahead and argue that it's good. This is just silly. Morals are opinions. Gods have nothing to do with it. That's why religions keep changing what is moral or immoral. Christianity said slavery was fine for centuries. How did the SBC change then? They didn't claim their god showed up and corrected them. And your assertion is no different than saying "elves" give people their morality. It's just baseless assertions.

I'm not saying only Christianity is worthless in deciding morals, ALL religions are like that. They are based on assertions that try to be unquestionable. And oh dear, "hate speech", when I'm replying to assertions that atheists can only be moral due to religion.

Even granting that, it still makes religions useless for deciding moral questions. Christianity literally had centuries to call slavery immoral, yet failed to do so. Aquinas was OK with slavery and plenty of popes endorsed it and some owned slaves themselves. All of them? There are over 30 examples. Whataboutism doesn't wave away how worthless religion is for determining morality, it only shows that you're trying to deflect the issue.

Goodness, if only there had been some advance notice of this deadline...

A group of atheists that cooperate would outlast your imaginary brute-force society. There are human fossils that predate the oldest religions on earth that show they were either handicapped or elderly, and lived long past where they would otherwise die without help from other humans. Religions are terrible at morals; the Southern Bapist Convention was founded in 1845 expressly to defend slavery, and they finally officially apologised for it -- in 1995. If a sect as large as the SBC in a religion as large and old as Christianity can't even get a basic moral question like slavery right,

Barry, Gender dysphoriais an emotional and psychological condition experienced when a person's gender identity differs from the sex they were assigned at birth. It is a recognized condition. So to not support a youth with gender dysphoria will harm that youth. There have been some people who believe that some youth are being diagnosed as gender dysphoria who might not actually have the condition. One must be an expert to determine what is the appropriate diagnosis - something that adult volunteers are not able to do unless they are a child psychiatrist or psychologist. So to best support

That is crazy DEs would do that to a unit... unbelievable. If a DE wants a girls Pack in the area and existing Packs are boy only then: - Find a willing CO - Find if any Pack would be interested in mentoring their leaders or identify key council volunteers who will help. - Recruit girls and parents making it clear they would help found a new Pack. Sending then your way is garbage and lazy. In my area 60-70% of the Packs have decided to go coed, but not sure of the results yet. We have at least one girl from another Pack who decided to remain Boy only.

Should not have been a part of the plan. In my district, it was explained to everyone that it was up to each CO to determine if they would accept girls, and if so, would it be an all girl pack or a co-ed pack with separate dens. The caveat however, was that if a pack was not accepting girls, there would be representatives from a pack that would accept them at the school night program. I am not aware if that actually happened, as we have had large numbers of new scouts so far, both boys and girls. in fact, of that 32,000 girl number mentioned recently, the last numbers I heard here in C

Yep, and it supports my deepest concerns of inexperienced adults leading the program. I can't see it going any direction other than Advancement based Eagle Mill camping programs. Barry

Having seen some of the Scouts I have seen, I might consult with legal counsel first.

There's only so much retraining you can do with older Scouts. I try to avoid telling stories about my troop, because every situation is unique, so there's a chance this can't be replicated. I joined my Troop in 2005 as a new Scout. The Scoutmaster at that time was finishing up his Scoutmastership and was done by 2007. He had us running a great patrol method troop. He was a stern but fair man, and what he excelled at was giving youth leadership room to make their plans and fail or succeed. He was always available to coach the youth, and if the SPL wanted to, he'd have weekly phone calls w

This happens a lot with SM changes. I have helped and observed a lot of troops where the new SM wanted to change the program and I have learned that change pretty much comes from the new and younger Scouts. I now advise SMs in your situation to pacify the older Scouts with the program they want and build your new program with the new Scouts. Older Scouts (in this case 13 and older) simply don’t like change. Building new with younger Scouts is a lot less stress on everybody. It seems like two groups in one program will be a hassle, but you will find the older Scouts will pretty much take

You have the right idea, it's about inertia. But isn't that the older scouts running the program. I don't understand why you don't see taking on more of the troop responsibility isn't boosting the flywheel that will keep them engaged. This is where I see adults fail, they don't know how to build it up. Everything, I MEAN EVERYTHING, should be reviewed to improve for the next time. Especially the adult part of the program. They should also be reviewing how the "Planning, communication, feedback, dealing with negative scouts". I've said before that to most common questions ask by

I agree in principle. The how and when though is not obvious to many. First if the PL is struggling with "setting up a tarp", I immediately wonder what the older boys who know how are doing at that moment. If it were at a troop meeting, the PLC decided on that activity, did they have an instructor ? if no older boy was available, then they could have planned to have an ASM demo. If it were on a campout, then I wonder why the PLC didnt plan to instruct this at the prior troop meeting, or again where are the older boys. If none are available, then I might ask to see the PL, and away from his pat

When I started working with my current troop (now on 10+ years ago) the go to attitude was can't go down and interfere with the Scouts, they have to figure it out. I had (on my first campout) a good discussion with active troop leaders, explained sure you can. We are to observe and mentor. They explained the long time SM (who did not attend outings regularly) direct that. I knew him and felt it was a misinterpretation. Guess what, it was. They took "don't do things for a scout he can do for himself" as Hands Off. Take for example setting up a tarp. If they have never really set one

Gentlemen, thank you for your posts...both made my day. Kudos to all who are still striving.

It exists, and we created it. Let me provide some examples. Pinewood derby - when the winning car comes from the kid whose family has the tool set at home to build the perfect racer or art object. They get the awards, while the kids who actually did it himself goes home discouraged. The next year, other parents learn the rules of the game and take over. Campsite pioneering projects - where the camp rewards the 2:00 AM dads, while the Troop of boys whose gateway is a lashed collection of random poles and lines (but with proper knots) does not place. The next year, adult leaders either

RIP Decatur. Merging with GSLAC is pretty much death to those small town Units

Yes, national policy is that cutting corners on the Whittling Chip is now prohibited, but no mention of cutting corners on a Totin Chip being prohibited. Currently troops can decide how to deal with Totin Chip. Don't know why that is, but I assume it's because the PLC, which is comprised of Scouts, should be makign that policy as ooposed to adults on the Cub Scout level. Never heard of it being considerd hazing until the rule came out last year.

I think the BSA's decades-long disparagement of atheists both by word and deed contributes to the slurs against atheists in this forum. You know, like when scouts write things like "Merlyn ... You're the Stalin of the web era", as if I'm equivalent to a mass murderer. Oh, that was you who wrote that.

Update 10/1/18 One scout has died. https://abcnews.go.com/US/driver-charged-dui-plowing-group-boy-scouts-critically/story?id=58197864 https://abc7ny.com/1-dead-man-charged-with-dwi-after-car-plows-into-boy-scouts/4377783/