Eagledad

There has been a lot of logical reasoning to make an intellectual argument presented over the years. So, I think you are presenting yourself to be a bit naive in the tropes and memes on this forum over the years. You were by no means silent through the discussions. You have either chosen to ignore opposing opinions, or, well there is no or. You are ignoring any concern by placing the opposing responses under the category of, "when won't know what will happen until we make the changes". It is still a mystery to me that when the perception of the BSA by the public after a 100 years or so is still one of integrity, some folks want to willingly change that very program. It honestly amazes me. OK, I get that the Girl Scout program fails where the Boy Scout program succeeds, but does that mean risking the successful program? And please don't use the argument of increasing the declining membership to save the program. If the program is declining under it's own weight now, how in the world would adding more youth fix the cause of the decline in the first place? The BSA other bigger problems that this change would not even address, let alone fix. Several youth scouting programs in North American have made the program change leap that included accepting membership of the opposite sex. It's not like the BSA would be the first to try this experiment. I'm an engineer that uses past data to determine future designs. Please point to something that provides some hope of success for such a radical change of a successful program? Believe it or not, I am respected as a pretty open minded and innovative person, in person. I generally like to make changes for gains and don't usually let personal biases get in the way. And those of you on this forum know that I spend a lot of time balancing data to understand trends of the scouting program. I generally don't respond too much on discussions where I don't have experience or knowledge of the subject. So, I'm comfortable in standing against the idea of such a change until someone can present me with some sensible reasoning for the change. I'm even open to other ideas of the BSA getting more involved with girls in the program. But as the direction of the discussion has gone so far, I am not in favor of going coed of the present program. Barry

Exactly.

We humans tend to think the worst of people and thus become a bit disparaging to sway our personal theory. And maybe you are right, the BSA simply wants to keep making money with paper copies. But, I worked with National on some ideas of improving their membership software, back in the day, and found that they were just barely hanging on the trailing edge of the technology of the day. We assume National has brilliant tech people with unlimited funding for and unlimited staff of brilliant tech people to advance the up and coming computer technology into our youth camping program. I found that wasn't the case. My guess is they just haven't figured out how to profit from online yet. Barry

And here we go, if this value in single-sex environments, then how can it be otherwise? I just don't see the logic when this kind of reasoning. Posters give examples over and over in these discussions of the advantages of single-sex environments compared to coed equivalent programs like schools. So how does going coed all of a sudden push the program into a super program? I would much rather honesty in admitting that going coed will not be an improvement for the boys program, but will the program as a whole will fit better in your view of this culture. At least that is honest and who could argue. Barry

Yes, you and NJ have been hanging on this reasoning all the way back to gays scout debates. My unbiased response is the program as a whole will have to change to accommodate the coed program. New documentation, training and unit activities of the whole troop program (I'm not even talking about cubs) will be created and designed with coed in mind. The boys only program will be forced to fit in the coed design and as a result will have to conform to the requirements of that program, whatever they turn out to be. That doesn't appear like a big deal at first, but the BSA completely rewrote and issued new adult training courses as a result of introducing female troop leaders. Barry

Ah, I see. Makes sense now. I don't agree, but it makes sense. Barry

Yah, I generally respect and enjoy your comments on the forum, but this one comment crossed over in to the "because everybody else does it" PC column. Barry

We don't often agree, but this is a good post. I tried to post something similar, but gave up because the point got lost in my wordy reply. I do think Stosh has patrol method and dynamics backwards. Patrol method is another name for the dynamics he describes using outside the troop. The dynamics is just called Patrol Method inside the troop program. The only reason Patrol Method appears different is because prepubescent males are mixed in with everyone else and that does present some different aspects of the same dynamics. Venturing doesn't require the role modeling of a patrol of younger scouts. Let me say that differently; Venturing requires a different kind of role modeling for the ages involved. qwazse has a very good grasp of the dynamics as well, which is why he makes it work in both Venturing and the troop program together. Having a name for the process of teams working together successfully toward common goals isn't important. Getting the process to work under it's own momentum is the goal. Barry

I ran into the exact same problem with our JLTC (now NYLT) course staff. The youth instructors where using bad adult-lead examples from their home troop during their subject instruction. I pulled them together and basically advise them the same as qwazse. I also pointed out that they were coming off as immature and juvenal because their personal examples sound more vindictive than instructional. They needed to present the experience in such a way of being positive for change and improvement without sounding personal. I think qwazse's line of "getting him/her to reflect on how to be an agent of improvement" nails it. The staff took the hint and did very well. Barry

Our troop used that course as a guide because it is a true leadership skills course. But we found it to be too much content without a lot of exercise or practice. Kind of a shotgun approach to throwing a lot of information at the participants and hoping they catch 15% of it. So we scaled it way way down and the Scouts got a lot more out of it. Better to use three skills well than to forget all eleven. And we added other subjects important for our program like testing and signing off rank requirements. Yes, that subject was added as a reaction. We had a communication class but not like the 11 skills communication. This was much more basic like phone etiquette. This goes back to what I was saying that course leaders need plan what they really want the participants to take back with them. Then build some meaningful activities for practice. Also maturity needs to be considered. I think the guide was designed for 14 and older Scouts. The average age of patrol leaders today is probably closer to 12. Big difference. The frustration for me about training courses is that they should only be used to teach a needed skill that is not getting developed in the natural environment. But the BSA has pushed them to be a fix for all things whether or not anything in the course content needs fixing. I grew to measure the performance of our patrol method program by the skills Scouts were lacking to perform their duties with confidence. I viewed any outside lessons needed for the Scouts to function with confidence in our program as a failure to our patrol method. Training is just a bandaid to bring skills to an acceptable level. So while we used training to build skills, I was always looking how to Build more practice of the skill in the natural patrol environment. There is very little a senior scout could take from a council level junior leadership course that shouldn't already be practiced at a patrol level. The syllabus we developed for our Council Course intended for Scouts 14 and older came from the Patrol Leaders Handbook and SPL Handbook. You don't have to guess what two resources the Scouts were issued and expected to have with them in their classes. I have harped on this forum many times that if the adults would just give their Scouts the PLHB and SPLHB and let them go, they would have a jump start on a patrol method program. I even required Scoutmasters bring those handbooks to my Scoutmasters Fundamental course so they could see just how much of the SM fundamental course material was in scouts' leadership Handbooks. Why lecture to Scouts what their books already say. Anyway, I've gone to long. Happy Fargers Day Barry

It was probably very much like your course with a few modifications here and there. But I'm not sure the use it anymore since I was on the district committee. An old Brownsea syllabus is a good start if you can find one. Barry

Yes, we do that at district patrol leader training where we are teaching team building. But the course I was referring to was a Council level course where focus was on management skills. Not that team building isn't important for managing a troop patrols, we just assumed they had that kind of training. Personally I believe is one of the most challenging team activities in the program. Barry

Pride Ignores quality of performance. Barry

The Scoutmasters certainly liked the results their scouts brought back with them. The problem was finding like minded adults to continue the course over the years. I had plenty of support from the council professionals, but not the council level volunteers. We treated the participants as students attending a profession training conference. But many adults use to the old NYLT courses just wanted the scouts to be patrols on a troop like campout. Our thinking was senior age scouts have been camping in patrols with their troop for 3 or more years. Why did the course of learning new managing skills need to duplicate what they already knew and experienced? Many adults wanted the scouts to cook because that is what boy scouts do. But we found cooking took up almost 15 hours of additional prep time that could be used for learning instead. I had learned from training in our own troop that learning skills in an entirely different atmosphere raised the awareness and excitement of learning new skills. We treated these young men as adults in a professional training environment learning only new skills to help them manage patrols in a boy run troop. That was it. I have helped a lot of units and districts develop training courses and the first point I made with all of them is to first list the goals of the training, then build your course around obtaining those goals. Don't get locked into developing a course that doesn't really apply to the goals just because that's they way it's always been done. If you want to teach patrol method, then develop a course that pushed the participants to practice patrol method, whatever that means to you. But a lot of folks get confused that developing a course with a lot of camping and scouts skills activities will teach patrol method. Actually it just teaches camping and scouts skills, that's all. If you want to teach patrol method, then create activities that forces the group to make decisions the effect the whole group. One of the better simple quick exercises forcing a group to organize and make decisions for the group I've seen is giving the group of a sack of ingredients to make sandwiches. The group is force to organize and develop a system to make sandwiches for everyone. Actually our troop does it with icecream and the fixins for banana splits. Much harder than sandwiches and more tasty after a long hard physical exercise outside. Time is critical for learning from group decisions. The faster a group has to respond to a situation, the faster they make decisions that teach them from the repercussions of that decision. That's why I like tight agendas on our campouts. Time is a great teacher of living by the scout law because we humans learn best under stress. The point is focus on the objectives and build a fun program toward your goals. Think outside the box so the scouts don't know what comes next. There's a lot of pleasure in the unknown. But more importantly, treat your scouts as adults. That will be a new experience for many of your participants. They will be immature, but the course will help them grow up a little. Good luck and have fun. Barry

Three contacts for something like this the Scout Executive (SE), District Executive (DE) and the District Chairman (DC). In the back ground, the SE will contact the DE to learn of the facts as far as how the camp was planned to make sure all the proper procedures and paperwork were performed. The DC will contact the DE as well to make sure everything is official and get advice on how to proceed. Nip it in the bud as it were. Depending on your Key 3, the District Commissioner will be asked to help. If all is in order, BSA insurance will likely cover the windshield. The issue of how this happened will likely follow. But just like in this thread, don't let the "Why it happened" distract from the "how to pay for it". Some folks just can't help themselves. Insist they deal with the two questions separately and the windshield cost promptly. You may have to repeat yourself in the matter depending on the professionalism of the players. Barry

Hmm, I have not seen "that's the way we have always done it." used in this discussion. Barry

Well said. Barry

Well sort of.. Based from our own personal life experiences, we all have different opinions of what we want the scouts to get out of the patrol method. As a result, there are several different aspects of experience of patrol method in this forum. For me, patrol method is giving the scouts the "independence" (meaning little or no outside influence) to make decisions as a group and learning (growing) from the consequences of those decisions. It's all about growth for me. As a result of my experience as both a boy and adult, I find same age patrols don't provide a good atmosphere of growth because the old scout mentor is missing. Without that experience, growth is much slower and more narrow. Outside influence is required to speed up or even sometime start growth. However, several forum members here are very pro "same age patrols" because the scouts all know each other. The interpret self-selected team of friends as their Cub Den or same age friends. That is an example of a different outlook among members on this forum. I was in your shoes a few years ago and your challenge is that the course is still so structured in scheduling that it's hard for the groups to make independent decisions that wouldn't have an effect on the other patrols. Your course was designed with decisions already made. So while you could put them in patrols, experiencing Patrol method in the limited time of the course would be next to impossible. Since we looked at our course as a senior level leadership course instead of mid level patrol leader course, we created groups of PLCs instead of Patrols. Then we had all PLCs meet twice a day to review past troop performance and plan the rest of the week, once after lunch and once after dinner. Each PLC had a list of activities that had to be attended by the scouts. The activities included classes, three meals a day, unit meetings or camp fires each night, and free time or leisure time. Each PLC was asked to create a schedule for the week with the activities left to be completed. Then one schedule each day was selected randomly for all the groups to follow the next day. The selected PLC was responsible for managing the schedule and contracting the staff for teaching and cooking. If they weren't contacted, there was no class and no meals for all the participants and staff. They were truly responsible for everyone's (including the staff) lives during the week. When the first PLC schedule wake-up at around 9:00am, everything kind of fell apart and supper wasn't ready until 7:30 pm, AS SCHEDULED. And they suffered the anger of hungry scouts. They also still had one more class to attend that day along with a Troop meeting. You can bet the next PLC rescheduled the next day a little better, and the next even better and so on. The scouts were totally responsible for the how the course was presented by the staff. The staff was told not to do anything each day until the acting PLC contacted them. By the end of the week, each PLC had done 12 PLC planning sessions and managed one course day. They learned how to structure and prioritize every activity of each scouts day. They learned how to communicate "clearly" to each group and each staff member on the course, otherwise nothing happened. The minimum age of our participants was 14 and 95% of them had never experience the level of decision making, planning, and program management as they experienced all week. Not only were they confident that they could go back and lead their troop, they were a bit cocky about. You have basically five days with the scouts. What do you want them to learn? Keep asking yourself that question and form your course around that answer. Is a patrol method experience necessary for your goals? Maybe not. As I said, they don't really have the time to experience enough patrol method lessons in a week to take back to their troop and make a difference. But, they do have time to experience making choices and working from the consequences. Our goal was to teach organizational, management and group communications skills. Those may not be your goals. Hope that helps. Barry

Just the opposite, liability is restricting a lot of our volunteerism. Barry

Agree 100 percent. Because of that fear, we work with all our new scouts on their telephone skills just to get them confidence in calling their first counselor. We also advice the parents to listen and guide them as well. This is a big fear for many (most) scouts, but we found that they pretty much overcome it by their third MB. It's and important skill because our scouts are also expected to make calls for setting camp reservations, asking for demonstrations and just plan asking for help. As has been said, if they can't get past that, they are stuck in the mud. That being said, cell phones were just becoming common when I was the SM, I think what scouters are dealing with today is all that more challenging. Barry

Yep, us too. I don't believe there is a right or wrong between the two styles, it's just personal styles working within their environment. Barry

This is where our styles are completely different. All I wanted to know was who the counselor was. On an official level, I could care less about the scouts interest, his history or whatever. I'm more concerned that he is developing skills of initiating a polite call to the counselor and making a plan to meet for discussions on the subject. The scout wants to invest some of his time on a subject that interest him for some reason, that is good enough for me. Honestly, if it weren't for the the required signature, I would have little knowledge of what the scouts was doing with merit badges. At least until a Scoutmaster conference and finding out in passing, which is more my style. Our troop program encourages scouts to make decisions based from their ambitions and dreams, then shown how to put those ambitions and dreams in action. Trust is a big part of that. Giving the independence to make those decisions without having to check-in with the Scoutmaster is to me a big part of that growth. I learn it on back end in casual friendly conversations. But I do understand adults today want to keep a close watch. I'm old school and I get that. Barry

It's really more complicated than that. As the creator of a Patrol Method Council level youth leadership course, the real problem is repeatability of presenting consistent quality courses. As much as many of us harp on Boy Run and Patrol Method, we don't discuss what that really is. Patrol Method is for the boys the independence of making their own decisions and dealing with the consequences. Trust me, that is really really hard to write in a course curriculum. One Scoutmaster working with several patrols over several years works because the program is held together with one consistent vision. But try a new course leader every year. The challenge of finding like minded adults of the same basic vision was so great that our course was dropped after three years even while the troop leaders deemed it a huge success. The challenge of boy run and patrol method is having a consensus of how to apply boy independent thinking. 'm open minded, but youth level courses are very limited by the course directors. After being a course developer for both youth and adult leadership courses, I personally would rather develop a patrol method course for adults so they can take what they learn back to their units because what the scouts learn really doesn't matter if it isn't supported by the adult leaders. Because the success of what a scout uses from a course is mainly dependent on the Scoutmaster, the better youth level courses teach techniques for troop management and operations, not leadership. Leadership requires repeated experiences of decision making and courses just can't provide those kinds of experiences. Barry

Last Frontier Council in central Oklahoma had been doing something like that called Scout'o'rma since at least the 60s, maybe longer. It may have gone every other year, I don't remember. But they would give a theme for the units to develop a scouting based activity around. Ironically, our troop did a demonstration of the Scouting Information resources from the Internet in 1997. One of our brainiac scouts set up several computers so we could help Scouts and Scouters surf the Web for scouting sources. Scouter.com was one of our lead sites. The Council hasn't done it in several years, but I think I heard they are trying to bring it back. Barry

We've had the discussion several times of taking the troop completely out of the mb process. Then it's just between the Scout and the counselor. But I think the fear of abuse and manipulation of the system motivates some kind of check on the process and the SM is the best person for that responsibility. Same reason patrols can't camp by themselves, adults have too many fears. What does a a SM signature at the beginning of the process prove has been done anyway? The MB cards our council uses, or did use, doesn't even have place for a 2nd signature, so ew at least had that going for us.