Eagle76

In re-reading the thread it seems I may have misinterpreted the original meaning of "non-advancement" activities as originally posed, and they are not the "playtime activities" as I jumped to conclude. I guess I have been guilty of skewing things based on my own experiences/perspective. My apologies. Regardless, I think limiting them to no more often than every two months to allow for activities which provide advancement opportunites still holds.(This message has been edited by Eagle76)

First, to give my opinion on the original question, a "non-advancement" activity every two months is probably not unreasonable. I may lean more toward one every three months, and would say one a month is too much. My reasoning is, in general, a troop should have a campout every month and one additional activity. This keeps the number of events for the boys to plan to a manageable level. Some of these activities should be opportunities to meet advancement requirements: 2nd class 5 mile compass hikes, nature hikes for plant identification, 1st class orienteering hike, service projects, e

Here's another idea. (A Scout is Thrifty) When our Little League wanted to have a radar gun booth at their fundraising event, they contacted the city police officer who visits elementary schools, runs the D.A.R.E. program, etc., and through him they were able to borrow a radar gun from the police department. Maybe you can contact your own police department and arrange to borrow one.

Since my comments seemed to set off this debate, I'm going to try to play mediator a little. In my original post I said that in some cases combining patrols may be the lesser of two evils. I was just saying that we shouldn't jump to it too quickly or automatically. In the Klondike example under discussion, I like CNYScouter's idea of encouraging the PL's to contact their patrol members to try to encourage them to attend. This is making a worthy effort to strengthen patrol spirit and to get them to work together. However, if this effort failed, then I would not prohibit the two small p

In our troop, sign-offs for rank requirements for Tenderfoot through First Class are only done by Scouts Star rank and above. However, I have observed quite a number of Scouts who didn't seem to be able to perform a skill (knots, lashings, etc.) which they should have been capable of based on their rank. Also, we recently had a Scout come up for a Scoutmaster Conference for First Class, only to have his advancement postponed because, although the requirement was signed off, he had not yet served as patrol cook on a campout, procured the food, etc. I don't believe this was due to dishone

I'm going to weigh in on funscout's question, and elaborate on the underlying issue. "Are the leaders supposed to over-ride their decision and tell them they MUST stick with existing patrols only?" First, there may be specific occasions where combining patrols or creating temporary patrols is the lesser of two evils. However, in general, we should be striving to create strong patrols which work together. We should not be too quick to abandon the Patrol Method. The underlying question, I think, is when do adults override the boys. You may have a better understanding after taki

Sigh. My troop isn't responsible, but... I live in my own troop's Scouting for Food area. In 2004, no bag was left on my doorstep, so on pickup day I took my bag of items to our assembly point and added it to the pile. In 2005, a bag was left, so I thought "Good, it was a one-time goof," and left my stuff on my porch. But, it didn't get picked up. Why? I don't know know who's at fault. Did our Scoutmaster goof when he handed out the map sections and not assign the area? (I know first-hand of a case where he assigned a couple streets to two separate teams.) Did someone get a map

What an interesting idea! I don't have the answer, and I'm thinking on the fly but, here goes. Each patrol has a designated leader. Make the 2 patrol tasks similar, but different. Something relatively simple like, each patrol has a basket full of balls, half red, half blue. One patrol is supposed to take the blue balls out and put them in a bag, the other patrol is supposed to take the red balls out and put them in a bag. A timed contest, of course. First, the boys are supposed to plan what to do, who's going to do it, and how, without touching anything. Then you scramble the p

EagleInKY, Oak Tree, and others, You confirmed my own interpretation, thank you. However, my troop contains some of those "overzealous Scouters" mentioned... Tomorrow I depart for a campout with 2 other adults, and 8 Scouts. One patrol is young (1st years) who are eager and enthusiastic, the other patrol is older, jaded, and likes to sit around. There's a 300 acre lake nearby with a 4 mile circling trail. We'll see what happens... d;-)

I have a hypothetical question that I would like opinions on. Situation: A campout with 2 patrols, 4 boys each, and 3 adults. One patrol wants to go on a hike around the lake, the other patrol wants to stay in camp. 1 adult is going to accompany the hiking Scouts. Question: Is this a violation of Youth Protection guidelines, since there is only 1 adult with the hikers? Or is this exactly why YP requires 2 deep leadership on outings, so that the group can split and still have an adult with each group? Thanks.

SueM, NeilLup, and Lisabob, thank you for your thoughts. You made me blush, and you made me think. I've been thinking about this very hard all week. SueM says I can't do it on my own, and she's almost certainly right. NeilLup says Wood Badge can help complete my list, and I'm sure I'll need it. The classes I attended at University of Scouting last Saturday were OK but short on specific ideas and tools. And as Lisabob points out, there are short, intermediate, and long term goals involved. We need to conduct youth leader training next month, and we need to get the PLC more involved i

Our troop elects its SPL in the normal manner, by troop election. However, one of the requirements to run is that the Scout must have attended Brownsea/NYLT. In order to earn the Brownsea trained patch, the Scout must complete 3 goals after the camp session in June. Normal expectation is for the goals to be completed by November, when a graduation ceremony is held. Our Scoutmaster has made it a policy that the cost of camp will be reimbursed by the troop only if the Scout completes these goals by November. Basically, Scouts volunteer or request to attend, and the Scoutmaster approves or d

I'm taking off for the afternoon for personal reasons, but before I go I'll paste in my list of things I want to see the troop do. If desired, I'd be happy to share my reasons and motivations next week. Don't parse the wording too harshly; these are just notes I made for my own purpose to help me keep focused. I guess my biggest concern is I don't want to be diverted from these things. I'd be happy to have any and all comments on these things. I guess I'll be using all of you as kind of a virtural WB network. ;-) BTW, I'm taking courses at our University of Scouting tomorrow on Trai

Thank you all for your responses. After I posted my question, I dug up some old threads, including a couple posted by Old Grey Eagle about 4 years ago on the same topic. Between your responses and the earlier ones, I think I have a better idea what it's all about. However, it seems that a perception developed amongst some of you that I will soon be attending Wood Badge training, and that is not the case. Although, I guess my question was prompted because I have been idly considering it. My idle consideration started when someone said to me, "You should go to Wood Badge. You'll have a

I only know a little about Wood Badge, and I've heard the term "working your ticket", and that conjurs certain images in my mind. However, it occurs to me that facts are better than guesses. Please post examples of ticket items, especially your own actual projects. Thanks in advance.

Well, Scouter4321, you haven't had many responses to your last questions, so I'll stick my oar in, but bear in mind that I am engaged in the same struggle, and don't know all the answers. First, regardless of what some of your committee members think, Scouting is not just a youth fellowship group. In fact, I plan to use this very argument in any future debates if there are objections to becoming more boy led. Second, I think it is the SM's job to push the program toward being boy led, and provide the necessary guidance and support. It doesn't involve the Committee, and it's not the

The way msnowman says "this Troop is almost fanatical in being "boy run"" rings an alarm bell for me. I would characterize my troop the same way - until you use your own eyes. Then you see that although they talk the talk, they don't walk the walk. Just saying it don't make it so. As an example, see my "Ketchup" thread to see how automatic it is for some adults to dictate things that should be left to the patrols.

Thank you all for your thoughts. I had the same ethical concerns as all of you, but I didn't state them in my original post because I wanted to see if this opinion would come up without any prompting from me.

Wow, who would have thought that ketchup could become such a hot issue! But this has become an "issue" in our troop as well. In the past, there were many leftovers after campouts, and they were divied up among the boys and taken home. My son was elected PL last fall, and was the patrol cook at the next campout, and he decided it would be more thrifty to save the less- or non-perishable leftovers for future campouts. Thus, we have in storage a started bag of pancake mix and yes, a started bottle of ketchup in the extra fridge. Shortly thereafter, an adult announcement was made that

A Boy Scout video game! An interesting notion; but nothing beats actually doing real stuff out of doors. This is where Scouting should have an advantage over video games. I just want to comment on the first point made by Beavah in his original post, and put a different spin on it: "* It is not adult-run. At all." Later Beavah asks: "My question back at you is: Can you tell us what we could change/improve about Scouting to make it as fun and addictive as video gaming? Or at least take a step in that direction?" I would submit that there is plenty of adult involvement

Some interesting points raised in the original post. First, I've never heard of a troop setting up camp like this. I suspect the only reason you'll be given is the common trap of "It's the Way We've Always Done It." Even if you're going to set up in a line, why can't all the tents be set up at once? There's no reason to wait until one tent is done before the next in line begins. My vote is to categorize this as hazing, as it involves imposing a delay which serves no purpose, and ends up making the task unnecessarily more difficult by forcing it to be done in the dark. Second, thi

Or you get the situation in our troop. Nothing but car camping for the last few years; I guess the idea was that backpacking was reserved for Venture Crew. So now we have 12, 13, and 14 year olds who have never backpacked and are intimidated by it. Most (including all the youth leadership) took a pass on our short backpacking trip in October, but the 6 scouts who went (1-10 year old, 3-11 year olds, 1-12 year old, and 1-13 year old) did great, enjoyed it, and want to do it again.

At the moment, there is no program planned by the PLC for the committee to review. The idea just arose (among adults) and was bounced around a little. The next step would be to suggest it to the PLC for discussion, but that doesn't happen until after the CC plans to have it discussed by the committee. (Next PLC is 12/14, next committee meeting is 12/12.) Some of the objections so far: - This would be making an exception to our policy, and we've never made exceptions before. - Our older Scouts are not prepared or capable of providing this training - This would be changing rules an

A big email debate has just begun in our troop. I will try to describe it briefly, and I would really appreciate input from this forum. Our Council OA anually offers a Winter Awareness training course. Our troop requires Scouts and adults to attend this training course before being allowed to go snow camping. (I am trying to determine if we have a written policy, or if this has just been passed around by word of mouth until it gained the stature of law.) Some of our Scouts missed the course this past weekend because of illness or outside committments. Someone proposed that we conduc

How about this, particularly the last sentence, which is in bold-type in the G2SS: Guide to Safe Scouting Section VII - Fuels and Fire Prevention Chemical Fuels Knowledgeable adult supervision must be provided when Scouts are involved in the storage of chemical fuels, the handling of chemical fuels in the filling of stoves or lanterns, or the lighting of chemical fuels. The use of liquid fuels for starting any type of fire is prohibited. The rest of the section seems to be pretty clear in allowing flammable chemicals only in chemical stoves and lanterns.