Eagledad

Qwazse, I've been an adult leader almost since the induction of women troop leaders and the program has changed a lot as a result. Any addition of female leaders will further change the program away from the boys. It WILL BE less adventure and less boy run (more adult run). I don't approve of any changes that takes quality away from my son even if it does improve for my daughter. There is a program for girls, it's time the energy for promoting girls in the BSA get turned to the swaying the Girl Scouts to improve their program. Barry

Your topic is the primary reason I don't want girls in the BSA below age 14. Your observation is more typical of of the Girl Scout program then we would like to admit. Believe it or not, one of my mentors of becoming a boy run scout leader was a women who in her life was the equivalent of a Council Executive for two councils. She became so frustrated with dealing with the very same attitudes you describe that she left the organization. She eventually got involved with Cub Scouts with her son, which is how we met. She is so adamant about women being terrible scout leaders that she wouldn't allow her son to join a troop that accepted women leaders. She believes, and I agree, that the nurturing instinct of a woman doesn't work well in a program where young boys are encouraged to learn from their independent decisions and mistakes. Protecting their youth from any kind of hurt (mistake) is part of that nurturing instinct. The goals of a boy run experience are counter to the instinctive nature of mothers. Because they don't understanding how giving youth some independence leads to grow and maturity, these leaders don't understand how teams (troops), camping, and responsiblity all work in the scouting program process to build mature decision makers. So they change and improvise the program to fit more of what they think is good for their girls. They simply don't get it, so they ignore the published program and make it up as they go along. Your daughter's leader doesnt understand the growth your daughter gained from the award, so she has no respect for the Gold Award or your daughters effort to earn it. Ask yourself, how many people outside of the organization even know what the Gold Award is. There isn't a unified acceptance in the Girl Scouts organization for what a girl gains from the Gold Award. Not like the Eagle. To be fair, we have a couple of posters here on the forum who believe the are the 2nd coming Badon Powell and dis everyone else's opinions. But the BSA community as a whole believes in the program and holds these leaders in check. The Girls Scouts don't have that community, so each Troop leader does what they want. My wife quit the Girls Scouts after three years. The frustration wasn't worth it. Accepting young girls in the BSA would also bring more female leaders with the same nurturing instinct and I personally believe that would eventually pull more adventure and independence away from the boys program at an age when they grow the most from those experience. We have already seen some of that after the BSA started accepting female Boy Scout leaders. The good that comes from this experience is your daughter will grow to appreciate you for the support you have given and are continually giving her during this frustrating process. I'm at the age that I know she will hand those same gifts to her children. Barry

That is not typical of packs nationally unless things have changed in the last few years. but even the male leaders who like to camp burn out. I've seen it a lot. Still guys, marketing is not really the issue on this problem, trust me. Go out and find out for yourself by interviewing Den leaders like I did. Interview the Webelos and you will find that if the Den leader is running a fun program where the boys look forward to each meeting, they will likely crossover. In fact I found even if the den program is basically arts and crafts, but the leader still makes the meetings fun, they scouts will crossover because they believe the troop will be as fun as the den. If the meetings are boring, the scouts presume that is how the troop program will be as well and they look for a chance to break from the program. Crossover is that easy break. The local fix is to find the burned out leaders and help them out. Not as easy as it sounds. Barry

We've had this same discussion many times over the years. 45 to 50 percent is the typical average for crossovers nation wide. In short, adult burnout is the cause. A volunteer run program can hope for at best two years from their average volunteers. After two years, the volunteers are burning out. The Cub program is FIVE YEARS LONG. Yep, raising my voice there. Even if a parent wasn't a leader during the Tiger year, they still are two years in before they reach Webelos. Adding to the problem is that the average Cub leader is a mother who doesn't camp outdoors or understand Boy Scout Skills. Either the Bear leader reluctantly takes on the more outdoor style Webelos, or she quits and the pack finds a reluctant replacement. Either way the boys have an unmotivated leader for two more years. I did a lot of research in this and I'm guessing that between 65 to 75 percent of non crossovers came from a Dens with unmotivated burned out leaders. The numbers can be improved, but the real problem is the five year Cub program. This is why I believe the Tiger program needs to be moved or merged into a pre-Pack age Scout program. Four years is still too long, but it's a start. Barry

Thanks TAHAWK, That is very good. Barry

Exactly! Three scouts have giving me the credit for them becoming engineers. I wanted to ask them what they saw in me that motivated them to make that choice, but just asking the question seemed self serving. I honestly can't say where I influenced these scouts, and sometimes it scares to think of how much influence we have on boys. Good and bad, our every action is watched. Barry

For me it's plumbing. My kids know this well and speak of it to my embarrassment. Barry

When a scout didn't get the position he wanted, that experienced was coached as another opportunity to develop respect and growth by taking on other responsibilities. This happens often with young ambitious scouts wanting to try their hand at leadership in a mature patrol. Some scouts take it hard. But like qwazse, they are guided to show their ambition by taking on responsibilities that give them experience and exposure. Many of these scouts grow more from those tasks than from their POR positions. Barry

Adults set the example. What ever excuse you allow yourself, the scouts will use themselves. Not just with swearing, but everything. I asked the adults to never yell for any reason beyond warning someone of some danger. It wasn't long before our scouts also used a quiet tone during the business of taking care of their scouts. There is one place I would turn my back on scouts swearing; high adventure camp sites are typically very tight, so tents are set up very close. Provided they are keeping their voices low, I let them have their privacy. Barry

The NSP option failed because it didn't fit in Hedgehog's Troop design. They simply didn't need the NSP to indoctrinate new scouts into their troop. Trying something new is a normal process of working toward a better program, as is dropping the parts that drag the program down. Loosing 1 scout for every six shows their success without the NSP. They might change their new scouts policy for those years when 25 new scouts join at the same time. Barry

Off hand, I can think of a half dozen troops that grew faster than your troop. Is that really a good measure of a boy run program? And as for what your scouts want and don't want in their program, Scoutmasters' set the tone of how their program takes direction. You said it yourself, you told your scouts how they are to select their leaders. Is that Forced? Maybe, but I have never seen scouts drive their program from ignorance. Barry

This is quite and interesting post. When I listen to someone with little experience describe to folks with scars of experience of the perfect world, I think of the idealistic progressives of the seventies describing Utopia. Your post bleeds of comparisons for your Utopia with (or more fairly against) my 20 or so years of actual experience. And not just my experience, but the experiences of several forum contributors with real boy run experiences. I just don't want to have brag to make a point with your Utopian ideals. If you need the details of my experience, we can do that in private, but I'm going to try and respond with generalizations I learned from my experiences if you don't mind. No theories here. I think it's great that you imagine the ideal troop program and consider the details of your machine, I wish other scouters would. But when your perfect vision leads you to imply that the experiences of other scouters isn't a match to your lofty idealist visions, maybe you should at least consider being more reserved with your opinions of the opinions of adults with real experiences until you can compare and balance experiences. Apples to apples so to speak. Thanks for your time. Barry

You have been struggling with this for a long time Blw2. I can see it is really important for you, but I don't understand why it is important that those of us who have successful programs with mixed age patrols agree with you. I have no desire to change your mind because if mixed age patrols isn't in your heart, you aren't going to do it. I can't agree that same age patrols work as well as mixed age patrols. I've tried both and mixed age is just better. But, I want to help you through your struggle. What can we do to help you? Barry

I enjoy discussions like this because there is a lot to learn from the different experiences. But some of the contributors aren't being honest in describing there experiences. Beaver and I have been on this forum for a long time, so we have some memories of what many members have posted here over the years. Is it possible to ask for an honest discussion with being disrespectful to posters who who push to be the smartest scouters in the room? I don't know, but it is a bit frustrating. Barry

The accusation is that councils are making up their own rules. Is that correct? Barry

They can't get away with it. What councils are accused of doing this? Barry

Shaking my head. Barry

Boy, I'm not sure anyone has clear political opinions today. I would guess what you want is for the adults to be respectful. Much of the time that means just listening quietly. All our adults expect from each other is that we be the proper roll models. Typically the adults campsite is too far away on troop campouts to hear much. But I try not to let the scouts know what I've heard the night before when the tents are stacked next to each other on wilderness camping like boundary Waters and backpacking. I remember having some very personal conversations with my tent mate when I was in scouts. I try to allow them that privacy. Barry

Funny, we see this happen a lot. Once it was another troop. Very annoying. They also left a lot of garbage spread over their site. Ugly boy scouts I guess. Barry

So very sorry. Prayers for peace and healing. Barry

I've had more than one new scout urinate near or on their tent in the middle of the night because they were scared in the dark. Typically the Patrol Leaders take care of it and the adults don't over react. Actions need to be understood in context. Peeing in defiance would require a different response. Your issue Grubdad has some history and part of the complication is the adults, or adult, are still learning the right responses. All troops and adults go through the same growth, and it never really stops. What you learn from this situation will better prepare you for the next. Our troop policies are the results of a series of situations in the past and how we handled them, or maybe more often mishandled them. What's really hard about dealing with misbehavior is most new adults instinctively want to react with a compassionate response because we truly want scouts to grow from their experiences. The problem is that human nature combines our past experience with our self-serving desires and misplaced compassion gives the wrong self-serving expectations. In other words if you give a scout a yard, he will want a mile and repeat his behavior to see if he can get it. And for those adults who use the "Three strikes your out" approach; Please! What I learned from my experiences over the years is to not take a scouts behavior of any type personally. And practice holding the scout accountable for his behavior, whether it's good behavior or bad. And hold them accountable as soon as you can so that they can process their the right and wrong of their decisions. Holding a scout accountable is as easy as asking what parts of the law they used or abused in their decision. Our goals as adults is to help scouts develop habits of making right decisions. So, if we can just get them to reflect on the consequences (not being friendly, courteous or kind.....) of wrong decisions, hopefully they eventually want to initiate the habit of making right decisions. Truth of the matter is that the more wrong decisions as person of this age makes and are held accountible, the faster they learn to change. I learned that from a youth counselor long before I was a scout leader. I just didn't really respect what he said until it was applied in the troop. Up to a limit, we want scouts to make bad decisions so they learn the habit of making good decisions. What gets in the way are those few scouts who don't want to be there in the first place and actually enjoy the stress they create. I just hand those guys off to the parents and let them deal with it. In a boy run troop or patrol, the objective is to get the group thinking of right decisions so that they as a group hold individuals accountable for their choices. They may not mention the scout law, but they all know right from wrong because they continually hold each other accountable. As the scouts develop a maturity of holding each other accountable for their behavior (good and bad), the adults learn less and less about misbehavior because the scouts have learned how to deal with it or really nip it in the bud. One example off the top of my head is when I walked over to watch the scouts play Capture the Flag. I was far enough in the woods that the scouts didn't know I was there. As one of the new scouts ran by at full speed, he said a few four letter words. An older scout running near him said, "hey we don't talk like that here". The new scout said "got-it". All that happened in just a few seconds and without much thought. But the group as a whole excepted that the language was wrong and as a whole nipped it in the bud before the behavior become a problem. Sounds easy, but that kind of culture takes some time to develop. It starts with adult expectations and how to deal with good and bad behavior. You will eventually get it, we all do with a little practice. Barry

Stosh already stated that he tells his scouts to use his preference for selecting leaders because he doesn't want adult politics to get in the way. Who knows what he means by adult politics, but this whole discussion has made a bizarre turn because one Scoutmaster believes he is smarter than everyone else. Bless his heart, Stosh has an agenda going on here, so he isn't listening to any other opinions. He is so deep into the theory of stosh scouts that he can't see the big picture. In a mature patrol method Troop, "Election cycles have very little influence on the performance of the overall program". It keeps getting pointing out that if a scout is taking care of his boys as a Patrol leader (or even an Assistant Patrol Leader and Quarter Master), he isn't going to stop taking of his boys as the SPL. Take two identical scouts with the same experiences and ambitions; put one scout in a BSA Patrol Method troop and the other in stosh scouts and the career path of those scouts will be close to the same. How a scout gets into a position of responsibility doesn't change how he will take care of his boys. But stosh hasn't figured that out yet. I think because he hasn't been Scoutmaster in one troop long enough to see and understand the dynamics of scout growth during program growth and maturity. The forum had this very same discussion with Kudu. For stosh and Kudu, how a scout gets a position of responsibility is a make or break in the success of stosh and Kudu scouts. That's why they dictate how their scouts select their leaders. We just need to be patient. For me it is a test. Barry

It's the same. I used to be amazed at the assumptions parent had of scout leaders' skills and abilities for dealing with medical and special needs. I can't count the number of parents who later admitted they took their kids of medication on weekends without telling anyone in the troop. Barry

I agree with those who said that the most troublesome scouts are the ones who don't want to be there. And looking back at those scouts, they come in two categories; One, the scout isn't interested in scouting at all, but is forced to be there. Two, the scout's situation at home is the issue, not the troop program. But the scout is so distracted that they still don't want to participate. These discussions tend to go off in generalities that would suggest are the solutions to all mishavior situations. But our troop has experiences dangerous aggression from scouts in both categories above. Several times the behavior rose above the expectations of Patrol Leader's ability to control and parents had to be ask to help solve the escalating problem. In one situation, the scout had just turned into an out and out bully at home and school and was attacking scouts (in other troops at summer camp) for sport. Yes really, for sport. Something was going on at home, I don't know what, but the mother was hoping the troop would change her son's behavior. In another situation, the scout was so desperate for attention from his parents that he threatened a scout with his knife on a campout until the victim broke down from the fear. The threat went farther than it should have because the youth leaders tried to take care of the situation. But it quickly became obvious that it was above their ability. That scout, by the way, earned Eagle two years later (different troop in a different state) after considerable family therapy. So I think we have to be careful how we answer specific situations on the forum. We can certainly give generalities in how we approach misbehavior, but we shouldn't imply that all troops have the same ability to deal with all situations. I think it is naive to suggest that troops even pretend they can deal with all situations. Troop programs are not homes away from homes. The program may be the most stable and positive influence in a boy s life, but that doesn't mean it will fix the scouts struggle because he still spends most of his life away from the troop. Midnight calls from the police have taught me that. The abuse of one scouts parents was so bad that the family literally packed their car and left town in the middle of the night in fear of intervention by the authorities. My wife and often question what happened to the sad situation. I advised the Scoutmaster who replaced me to never hold secrets about a scouts behavior from the parents unless he thought harm would come from it. He admitted I was right when a parent brought a lawyer to threaten litigation. The Scoutmaster was only trying to be a nice guy and protect the scout from the parents discipline. He thought he could change the scout's behavior by himself. But these weren't abusive parents and they were upset that their sons misbehavior had gone on for several months. It took a threat with a knife by their son to bring everything to light and the parents weren't happy. I tell leaders at training to imagine that a mother approaches the troop holding a box of puzzle pieces on her son's first day in the troop. The picture on the puzzle is her dream of her future son as an adult. Under each puzzle piece is the name of one person she hand picked to help contribute in developing her son into the ideal adult pictured on the puzzle. On the back of one puzzle piece is his soccer coach, another is his piano teacher, another is her son's sunday school teacher and on the back of another piece is the Scoutmaster. See, we are not the total solution to building the mothers dream, we are just one part, one puzzle piece. We are a small part of her whole team that mom is using to build the kind of man she dreams about for her son every night. When we leaders start to think of ourselves as more than that (and many scouters do), then we set up ourselves and the scouts for trouble. The best way for a troop to handle misbehavior is to develop a culture where all the scouts few free and responsible to proactively point out boundaries of behavior before a scout pushes past the boundary. A culture of of nipping it in the bud. But there will always be that one scout who even leaves the adults scratching their head and learning from that experience for the next time. Be prepared for that one unknown. One last thing, these questions come up often and don't surprise me. The two most difficult discussions I have watched debated in my Scoutmaster Specific CLasses are Uniforms and dealing with misbehavior. Misbehavior is tough for all of us. Barry