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Showing content with the highest reputation on 10/22/20 in all areas

  1. In my experience the biggest obstacles to succession planning are: Scoutmasters/Cubmasters who do too much - they don't delegate which makes the job appear huge. Someone who isn't looking for a 20 hour a week job isn't going to sign-up when the current SM/CM is doing that much. Delegate, delegate, delegate. Make sure you don't need a Scoutmaster to keep functioning before you go find a new one. Troops/Packs without sufficient adult support - similar reason. When the SM/CM realizes that other adults are not their to support them, they don't want to take the job on. Lack of
    3 points
  2. Could that be because many of those claims are nothing more than a response to lawyers hawking the idea of a big payday? I know for a fact that abuse did occur, and have first hand knowledge from more than 50 years ago. I also cannot believe, based on the few real cases I have first hand knowledge of, that the true numbers are anywhere near what the lawyers want the public to think. We had a discussion at a council leadership event almost a year ago on this topic, and what was likely to come in regards to bankruptcy. We were given the example of someone who filed a claim, but cou
    2 points
  3. I have often said (only semi-jokingly) that the demise of kids interpersonal and conflict resolution skills was organized sports. Organized sports have pushed down to the youngest ages and subsumed all sportsplay activities. Prior kids would play kickball, or tag or or street hockey in their neighborhood. They made up games too. When the inevitable conflict, you're out/safe, arose there was no adult making the call and the kids had to figure out a resolution. The most common was "do over". Kids didn't just make this up, they learned that from the older kid who learned from other older kids yea
    2 points
  4. @Eagle94-A1 is a the Scoutmaster I would have killed for (metaphorically) when I was a Scout. Just gets it. @ParkMan you've described the problem really well, many adults don't understand it, and they either waffle between two extremes, stepping in and "fixing" things just so the Scouts have something to do and then never stop "fixing" and start developing or teaching the youth how to do it themselves. Or they take a hands off approach and it's Lord of the Flies, 21st century addition. Ideally the patrol method allows the Scouts to "make their own fun." This fufills both the purpose of teach
    2 points
  5. This came up in another thread, but I wanted to pull this out for this reason. I've seen units with 12 scouts and 120. I've seen units with 1 ASM/Den Leader and 12. The one thing I have consistently seen is a complete and total lack of succession planning for Scoutmaster/Cubmaster (I know there's difference, but bear with me). I know it isn't about the awards/knots, but I wanted to point out the following is part of the Unit Leader Award of Merit. Think about about that: It is an "Award of Merit" item to have a succession plan for the Scoutmaster/Cubmaster. The result
    1 point
  6. As I’ve been saying, pretty soon the institution of the family will be sued because of the increase risk of abuse that it poses to kids.
    1 point
  7. You have hinted at the main role of the SM/ASM as the solution. SM conferences. For most, these are something done at the end of a rank. They are much more important. SMs should be conferencing with the scouts continuosly. This should almost always be in the form of questioning (Socratic Method) to help the scouts learn and grow. Using your example of type A scouts... The situation should not go on until the Bs leave. Nor should the SM fix it, or attempt to intervene with a large group "talk". The SM needs to conference with the scouts individually (within YPT) to help the scouts learn and gr
    1 point
  8. Does BSA get any protection for the scouts chartered to government organizations? This is at least 10,400 units in 2004. From my limited understanding, past liability was re-opened by recent law changes. BUT, that liability was not re-opened for public schools and other governmental organizations. I'm trying to understand ... So BSA can be sued, but the charter organizations of many can't be sued even though they selected the leaders, provided the building, owned the materials and implemented the specifics ? From what I read below, as of 2004, 400 units were sponsored by militar
    1 point
  9. Discussing policy implications? Sometimes it seems a bit more intense than that. Either way, it seems that just about every thread on this forum that goes on for more than a few pages follows a similar pattern. Start with a random topic. Talk about that for a page or two. Move off onto iterating between what was done wrong years ago and what should be done in the future until there are just a few people left and hope the thread dies before it gets personal. As long as people try and stay away from it getting personal it's fine with me but it just makes me wonder. My son had a soccer
    1 point
  10. Wonderfully said. I was writing a post, hit reply and saw yours. You said it much more artfully than I did. I feel like this is exactly the kind of issues we faced. Your post reminded me of a period where we have two Webelos dens of the same age in our pack. One run by a very organized set of parents. The other by a parent with a ton of outdoor experience. My son was in this fellow's den. One month we decided to hold a joint den camp out for the boys at that level. In preparation the other den had all kinds of plans and schedules. The den leader surveyed the site and was very wel
    1 point
  11. I think the focus on false metrics is such an apt phrase. I think it's part of why scouting has lost the sense of fun for some scouts. I return to youth led however. I myself struggle with what the guard rails are. What is an acceptable mistake? If you don't store or cook your meat properly and make everyone sick, that is certainly a lesson learned but then that camp out has not been fun. A patrol where the Type A personalities constantly over shout the Type B personalities until the Type B's eventually leave is maybe a lesson learned for the Type A's -- be overbearing enough and you'l
    1 point
  12. Yes, but herein lies the the interests of the National and the insurance companies. They are going to want (and are asking, see the claim's form) something more than "someone did something bad to me at some time when I was a scout".
    1 point
  13. if the adults are not trained properly, the "natural" thing they tend to do is be "helpful." " Here, let me help. You will burn that pancake [taking the flipper in hand]." Hence the counsel of my first Sm: "No one ever died of a burned flapjack." The primary job of a Scoutmaster, beyond insuring safety, is training the leaders to lead their patrols and troop. But if, the adults don't know where they are supposed to be going, the odds of getting lost are rather high. So the BSA deemphasis on adult training , including of lack of knowledge about the Scouting program themselves, i
    1 point
  14. I'm thinking a scout can cook a meal but not have other scouts eat it. We were talking about this for some requirements tonight.
    1 point
  15. 1 point
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