Eagledad

Even humility is refreshing on this forum. Barry

That is interesting. I always took Tour Plans as more of a check list to help units perform actions they may not have otherwise thought of. I admit it's a lot of red tape, but it did develop some good habits. Barry

I scheduled a parents/leaders meeting twice a year to review the Aims and Methods along with Mission and Goals. I did that for several years and learned that 9 out of 10 parents could care less. But, I also did it so they could hold me accountable. Barry

I tried to get our CCs to attend the Scoutmaster trainings so they would have a better understanding of the program. In fact, while I was on the District Training committee, I encouraged all the troops to send their CC. But rarely did I see them in the classes. I'm glad you have a drive for this stuff, I hope you can become at least an ASM so you have more leverage with ideas. As for BORs, I would like to try the idea that a Scout's parents get to talk to a BOR while there son is doing his, so that they can speak their minds about the program. Maybe that is something you could experiment with. Barry

I am looking at your post blw2 as if you are asking how an adult in the troop can make a program suggestion to the SM? I understand the frustration. I myself have seen the frustration of bucking the SM. OK, I know bucking isn't exactly what you meant, but that is how some SM's take it. To be fair, I've always advised committees to search for Scoutmasters that fit their group goals for the troop. Everyone should be on board with the Scoutmaster and their program, so really the committee, not the scoutmaster should have the vision. The problem is that rarely do committees as a whole have much of an understanding of how the program works. So they really don't have collective ideas of what kind of program they want for their sons, much less a vision. As a result, 9 times out of 10 committees are just happy to find someone to take the responsibility and hope that all goes well. And lets be Frank about it, Scoutmastering is a huge responsibility. Anyone one who has not been a SM can't understand or respect the weight of the position. I aged 10 years in my first year on the job. It's not an easy position to fill. Personally I believe Scoutmaster's should have the humility to listen to ideas, suggestions and even criticism. Not so much to listen to committee members yammer about program ideas, but more to listen to scouts equally in stature. But if you get the humility of one, you get the other. Here is the problem of Scoutmasters listening to advice from parents, Scoutmasters in general have a vision and a plan. Does your ideas work within the Scoutmaster's vision and plan. Example: I am a boy run patrol method fanatic. I eat, breath, and live the ideals of using the patrol method to develop citizens of character and leaders of integrity. To that point, one would think that you and I could build a great program together. Yet, in our discussions over the years, you are pro NSP and Aged Based Patrols. From my experience, I don't like using those patrols in my program because they don't perform to my expectations (vision). I have a vision and a plan. Your vision and plan, while the are similar, are still divergent. Does your ideas work within his vision and plan of your Scoutmaster? You think I'm tough, there is one SM on this forum who in the years he has been here has never been wrong. Humility? How can a committee person even get to speak to him? He likely wouldn't even know your name. I don't really know of a formal opportunity in the program for expressing ideas of change, but I think you can figure out a way of creating that discussion. Still, one must approach the "keeper of the vision" with respect if you hope for an open mind to your ideas. Then if those ideas don't interrupt his vision and program, maybe he has the humility to consider your suggestion. I wish you luck because you have some great ideas. Barry

Boy run is my favorite subject of the BSA program and I spent a lot of time helping units turn that direction. Still, I tend to get in the weeds and go over the top, so I will try to keep the post simple by giving multiple posts. Boy Run in my perspective is "the practice of making choices". Why is that so important, lets read the BSA Mission Statement: The mission of the Boy Scouts of America is to prepare young people to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetimes by instilling in them the values of the Scout Oath and Law. The Mission of the Troop Program is to prepare boys to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetime. The statement also says the boundaries of those decisions are the values of the Scout Law and Oath. Very important, but we will get to that later. Experts tell us that the more choices a youth makes before they enter the adult world, the more prepared they will be for the tough choices as an adult. Experts also tell us that we humans are more likely to learn from the stresses and struggles of choices because we are forced to reason (make our brain actively work) to ease the struggle. In other words, growing in maturity isn't simply making choices, but it's making choices that force us to reason. The brain is instinctively figuring out how to get away from the stress and struggle of the context in that choice. Simply, the wrong choice we make in our early life helps us make better choices as adults. I teach adults that the more wrong choices a boy scout makes, the more his maturity will grow. But that is a tough fact for parents to appreciate because our parental nature is to protect. Give their sons the independence to screw up and then deal with the consequences of that screw up is painful. It's not easy to watch your son suffer. So they simply don't want to allow choices. But we have to get past that. I had a reputation for having a good understanding of boy run program, so I got a lot of calls from other units for advice. I got one call for a new troop of 40 scouts where the leaders wouldn't even let their scouts lead the Troop Meeting Opening Ceremony. Imagine such a fear of failure that you couldn't even let the scouts lead a flag ceremony. Fear of failure is the number one cause of adults not letting scouts make choices. Adults have to teach themselves how to get past that fear. I worked with a lot of units to help adults push those fears back to allow their scouts to make more choices. But I will get into that later. Another place where many adults also fail their scouts is in understanding that the patrol is a safe place. Not safe because the boys are protected from physical harm of predators or accidents, but the harm of be made to feel a lesser person for their choices. The Patrol is the real world scaled down to a boys size. For scouts to grow from their choices, they have to feel the patrol is safe from ridicule and condescension of their choices, especially wrong choices. A choice should be an opportunity for growth, not an instant that should be discouraged. Boy Run is the practice of making choices. The adolescent mind wants to grow and the more challenges of learning the mind gets from the choices, the more it wants to learn and grow from the practice of making choices. The brain feeds on reasoning, so it wants more. But while it wants to grow from reasoning, it also protects itself from continued stresses,so a scout will quickly learn to stay away from decisions where he risk exposeing himself to the harm of ridicule. I know you are deaf, but I imagine you have seen situations in other troops where the adults over reacted to scouts action or choice. What is the lesson the scout learned, that he made a bad choice; or how to prevent the hurtful reactions of that adult? We want scouts to learn from their choices, but we don't want the experience to push into making NO choices. Of course there are instants where adults have to react to choices, mostly for the safety of the scout or scouts. But even the scout can understand the difference of actions toward his choice. However, as the patrol and troop mature with the experiences of their choices, scouts will replace the adults where quick reactions are required for bad decisions. It is rare for scouts in our troop to approach the SM with bad behavior because through practice of reacting to all choices, the scouts have matured greatly and deal with very few behaviors that they can't handle within the boundaries of the Law and Oath. Tobe continued Barry

You are certainly welcome. I love this scouting stuff. When you have the time, I think the list here would enjoy learning the challenges of being a deaf Scoutmaster. We had a couple of deaf scouts, one of them made Eagle. We had some challenges, but none that had to do with his hearing. Barry

I'm not sure exactly what you are looking for, so I will kind of give a simplistic example of how we encourage scouts to initiate and control responsibility. Our goal is for out scouts to initiate their goals, imagine the process to the goal, and a timeline to complete the goal. With a new scout it goes something like asking the scout when he wants to learn the Tenderfoot knots. The answer can be anything, but the ball is in his court to making a choice of learning the knot. Now likely he will be asked if he wants to do it now or later. If later how about... . Believe or not, these are tough decisions for boys this age. But most say now and he learns the knot. Now he is asked if he wants to complete one of the other Tenderfoot requirements. When would you like to complete it? If later, then we show him how to set a goal and even write it in his book. This is all very simplistic for new scouts, but as the scouts kind of get used to making decisions of completing single tasks, the habit is developing and you can see him setting multiple goals with multiple timelines. Its about now that we start to suggest processes or mini-actions to complete larger task. For example, we now ask him when he wants to complete the first class requirement. That is a much more difficult goal because it requires achieving several smaller goals. But by guiding him to think in steps of knots, first-aid, cooking and so on, he starts to develop a process of setting small goals to reach a bigger goal. This all seems regimented and complex, but it's a the scouts pace and very informal, if not in passing. One scout may request teaching for first-aid and the instructor decides to schedule a class for several scouts. At that time, the scout can choose to take the class or wait for another time. The hard part is that parents are tempted to tell their son to take advantage of the class to speed up his advancement. But we want the scout to make decisions based on his goals so he can live with the consequences of his decisions. Scouts learn to build a pace by their personal ambitions in the program. Some like to advance, some rather camp. I once took A LOT flack from a parent whose son didn't earn a single mb at summer camp. But taking talking to her son, it was his best summer camp ever. However, because all his friends jumped a head in rank, he spent his next year catching up, which was not only fine for him, some of his friends admired his choices. You see, we all develop habits as we make decisions and learn from those decisions. Where most leaders in my opinion struggle is they don't allow the scouts to make enough decisions for them to formulate who they are in their minds. Making a decision tell the scout if he mastered a skill or needs to learn a skill. But I admit, standing back is the hardest thing of adults, parents and leaders. As you can see, scouts by their third year should be pretty much in the habit of initiating their objectives, developing processes to reaching those objectives, and setting some kind of expected completion time. Not just in advancement, but in planning meals, campouts, patrol meetings, fund raisers, service projects, and even summer camp. The habit of setting small goals to reach big goals makes it much easier for scouts to plan projects, major outtings and even the Eagle. A new scout looks at earning the Eagle as almost impossible because the list of requirements in his book is several pages long. But if he look at Eagle one requirement at a time, he surprised to experience that the task isn't all that hard and doesn't require near the time he first expected. We found that our scouts got to Life so fast that they took a couple years off from advancement to do the other scouting stuff. Then at about 16 and half, they realize they still have a few MBs and a project to complete. So they get back up to speed. I remember some adult asking one scout who did his EBOR a day before his birthday why he waited so long. The scout smiled and only said "I was busy". He was the OA Chapter Chef for a year of that. My point is they didn't worry about doing the last few requirements because they had learned how to complete them in a chosen time. As for accountability, there are several sources. Scoutmaster conference is one, the BORs are another. The scouts are responsibile for keeping records, but they are encourage to put each rank and advancement card in a binder with baseball card sleeves to hold the cards. They are ask, but not required to bring that binder along with their book for the BOR to review so they can see just exactly what the scout complete at the point and ask questions pertaining to his personal experience. It is rare that a scout will see the same adults in the BORs, so it's easier for them to review his accomplishments at least by looking at his scout handbook and the binder if the scout chooses. But I have personally found that peer pressure is a very powerful controller (motivator) for how the scout schedules his expectations for setting goals. I personally never set goals for my scouts. My goal is for them to learn the life long skills of setting goals and initiating a process to reach the goals so that they are reaching their expectations by their decisions, not mine. I do ask scouts to visualize themselves in two or three years in the program and to write it down in his book, In fact, I ask scouts to write down goals for us to review at their next SM Conference just so he has kind of see himself in the future. That is tougher than you would think for this generation of scouts because they live by so much by the moment. I want each scout to plan his own future, so I try to get them to see a future. They can and will change those visions and goals all the time, but settings goals is based on invisioning those goals. So you can see that see we try to guide scouts in the habit of taking responsibility for their future actions by making simple choices in setting goals. Then a simple choice for reaching that goal. The process of reaching that goals can be more complicated, but we base that development on their maturity and experience. A 2nd year scout doesn't have the experience nor maturity to plan a week long high adventure trip that a 16 year old is capable of planning. Eagle! It's just a series of goals and accomplishments over the next few years. Its a series of choices. I know this post is silly long. Sorry, I wish I could put down my thoughts more eloquently. Barry

The local news reported on this and it was all positive about how the girls are excited to be there. I think it will help membership and cookie sales. Barry

http://mashable.com/2017/01/18/girl-scouts-inaugural-parade/#_LSYzM4TTsqf It will be interesting to see the responses. Barry

Maybe, but we are taking about how a youths mind is swayed from observing a role models action. "Ignorance of the Law" is an man-made judicial guideline in the justice system. Learning by observing is human behavior that isn't set by man's rules or expectations. My reasoning is pragmatic. We learn by watching, if we don't know the action is wrong, then human nature assumes that the action is right. "Ignorance of the Law" is an attempt to sway acceptance of an opinion by using gilt. I'm an engineer, emotion doesn't come into play for me. I need logical reasoning to change my mind. Drives my wife crazy. Barry

Agreed, and may I suggest to additionally add the information to your training syllabuses. I learned over the years that if you want to educate the district as a whole of changes, do it through training. Sadly a very small percentage of units attend RTs, but just about all adult leaders have to attend training. It's amazing how a district of units develops bad habits in policies and procedures over the years. I attacked them through training and saw a general acceptance of the changes within about three years. One last thing, back everything up with BSA source references so that your information has integrity. Barry

We had a 16 year old life scout transfer in our troop only needing 5 mbs to complete his Eagle requirements. No real problems until his dad approached me at a troop meeting. He wasn't being aggressive, but more inquisitive. His son asked our Advancement Leader to finish his Eagle paperwork and send it to the district to set up the EBOR. Our Advancement Leader replied that the scouts are responsible for all the paperwork and sending it to the district. We would of course double check his work to make sure it was all in order, but the responsibility to send it to district completed was his. The scout is also responsible for scheduling the EBOR and to telling the SM so that he can introduce the scout to the board. This scout's previous troop not only scheduled all the scouts MBs Eagle Project, they also took care of and stored ALL their scouts' advancement paperwork from the first day they started. So, he didn't have any expectation or experience in recording, storing and documenting ANY of his advancement requirements. They even took care of documenting the Eagle Project that they found, approved and assigned to the scout. Not knowing his son's troops policies, I sat down with dad and explained that our policy and routine was for scouts to control all their advancement from signing up for requirements down to handling all the Eagle documentation. I told him that we believe the Eagle represents the character and qualities of an adult, so it seems silly that another adult should take care of their business. I remember the dad smiling and shaking his head in agreement. That was when he explained how his son's previous troop handled advancement and advancement records. I suggested that since his son doesn't have any practice in taking care of his personal documentation, he could certainly request for some advice from the troop or his family. Dad thanked me for the few minutes of my time and I got a call from his son a couple months later inviting me to his EBOR. I worked with a couple hundred scouts and about 20 Eagles as a scout leader in our troop and not one of them ever complained about our troop advancement policy's and procedures. They didn't know any different. To be honest, I think we thought all troops did it about the same way. I learned differently when I joined the forums. I think the key is start teaching scouts from their first day how to take the initiative for advancing as well as how to take care of their records and paperwork. I can see it being a problem for older scouts who have not practiced those habits. I am not suggesting troops make a sudden 180 degree change in their advancement policies, but I can attest that the scouts can handle it if the adults can. Barry

OK, here is what my CPA says about this, "it's not worth anybody's time to worry about it because so little is gained, especially the IRS. The IRS doesn't have the time to review, adjust, and teach, every violating unit because the benefit for them is A LOT less than the cost of their time. Since she has worked with a few scout units (boy scouts and girl scouts), she would guess that 95 percent of them don't have a clue what they are doing. If the adults don't know they are doing it wrong, how would the boys? Barry

Davids post really hit home with me. I had a lot of passion, youth experience and idealism when I started, but I was lucky that forums were just getting started so I could balance my "actual experiences" with different (better) ideas. And I did find myself abusing the time between God, family and scouting. It came to a head after about three years into my Scoutmasting gig where I was forced to make tough decisions. But one thing I must add, scouting helped give me the street smarts that confirmed my beliefs in my faith. Scouting and family grounded my relationship with God. I didn't expect that when I joined the BSA. Barry

Do a troop roast. Of course it should be more of an opportunity for troop members to stand and say a few kind words. But a fun or funny story or two makes it more enjoyable. Connect the roast to the end of the troop COH. Barry

I didn't want to high jack the "Twenty Skills That Are Dying" so I'm starting this one. Chadamus and I started getting into the challenges of new scout leaders and it got me thinking about my challenges as the new troop leader of a new troop. The two other adults and I had a pretty good troop experiences as a youth, so we pretty much had and idea the direction we wanted to go with the new troop. But our first big challenge was the NSP and troop guides. Between the three of us new leaders, we had around 17 years experience as a youth. But the NSP was so new, it changed how to implement the Patrol Method of our youth. We gave it a good try because we assumed it was the new and improved patrol method. But because of our youth experiences and expectations, we couldn't make it work. We gave up after three years. So what were your challenges as a new scout leader? Barry

Yes, maybe, but we found that adults with a youth scouting experience had two to three year advantage in leading a troop. Skills are big part of that, but the confidence of just camping in the woods with scouts is a big advantage as well. Barry

Yes, the London poll hints at why scouting is changing, even in the U.S. It wasn't all that long ago that our council calculated that over 70 percent of new adult leaders never had a scouting or weekend tent camping experience as a youth. Honestly I think the number is closer to 80 percent. So as we have these training, patrol method and boy run discussions, we need to keep in mind that new adults reading our post have almost no skills for outdoor camping with a group of boys. While patrol method appears simple in its description, it is extremely complicated to apply for adults with no scouting experience. Barry

Many of us have found ourselves in this situation. We handled it by asking for meeting with the leaders and laying out the concerns. In many cases, the charter leaders typically aren't the individuals who work personally with the troop, so they don't have an opinion one way or the other. The solution for us, and several other charters in our area with the same circumstances, was changing the charter individual responsible for the troop to someone who is more pro BSA. Also, ask your DE for advice as well. They deal with this situation more often then they would like to admit. Barry

Yes, my thoughts are along the same line. The PLs are responsible for how they respond to behavior in our troop. I never suggested cutting off corners of totin chip cards to our scouts, but I have seen corners missing. Probably some senior scout's dad reminiscing of the old days. Barry

I'm getting old and cranky and have come to find these evil parent discussions distasteful. I have no problem with venting a recent experience to an understanding-been-there-done-that audience because that's a healthy way to ease frustrations. But these threads more often than not grow into generalanti-parent or anti-adult rants. You would have thought that Scoutmasters were born perfect and above it all. We can be assured that we Scoutmasters are just as mortal and with same flaws as the little people. I believe and taught young Scoutmasters that if they want the support of parents, they need to spend as much time working with the parents as their sons in the purpose and processes of the program. Scoutleading is hard and even the very best leaders screw up. When our egos grow big enough to block our humility to see parents as equals, we become dangerous as their sons' mentors. Sorry for the rant. Barry

The reason you haven't heard of tethering sky lanterns is because they can't handle the weight of the tether. The small flame provides just barely enough thrust to lift them. Barry

That would be like asking Hillary Clinton and Nancy Pelosi to leave "Grandmother" out of their political statements. Barry