Eagledad

>>Unfortunately only the DAM award is awarded from the district, all the rest are council or nationally awarded. Thus the reason why the knot is the only knot with an overhand knot and all the rest are the full square knot. >And the reason folks struggle with it is because of the conflict between what people think it is and what the requirements state it is.

>>To get back to the DAOM, it is called "District" not because of district service but because it is awarded by the district.

I am saddened that the discussion took this turn. After reading the defense/attack of scouters who may or may not have earn awards they may or may not deserve from posters who may or may not have these awards, I finally understand the beep beep beep backup warnings of humble narcissists. I look back on scouters whom I worked with that I knew were motivated more from the glitter of the Silver Beaver than the passion of character development and I wondered how our District or council would have been different. I can think of a couple who were the most enthusiastic presenters at Wood Badge, the loudest singers at Round table and the most energetic helpers at district events. Should we ask these more self serving folks to go home because we dont agree with their motivation? Im pretty good at reading people and Ive worked with hundreds of scouting volunteers and without meeting most of the folk on this forum personally, who can say that your hearts may not be on the boys? Does it really matter? Shouldnt we accept awards as thank yous without having to submit a two page resume to the forum list to justify what we proudly show on our uniform? I think back on a Michele who was a Scouter that got into scouting about the same time I did in our district. Ive never seen an adult get so many awards and get on all the training staffs so quickly. It was very clear that our motivations for scouting were clearly different, but in the 15 years I worked with her, she started three successful Packs, and three successful troops. She was our districts first female Scoutmaster and she was terrible. But she didnt become the SM to change boys, she did it to get the troop started then hand the reins over to next scoutmaster for whom she was searching. She has been gone for five years, but the units she started are doing well. I have never met a person that could get training staffs more excited. And she treated everyone as if she were their best friend. It took 15 years for her to get the Silver Beaver, which it was a surprise for many of us that it took so long. Everyone knew that she was in it for the Silver Beaver, but no body minded because most of the work she did turned into gold. When I look back at what I contributed to scouting and the boys, I am satisfied that I truly gave my best. But when I compare my accomplishments on paper to Micheles, I am dwarfed and I am ashamed of anything I said against her (and I said a lot). I just wasnt looking at the big picture. I dispised her and those like her and I cringe when I look back on it because I now that the next time I meet her, I will still be treated as her best friend. She never cared about my motivation, she just enjoyed working with me and anyone else who loved this scouting stuff. We all have our vision, some are more noble than others. If however we would look just a little beyond the other persons motivation and start measuring the ground being plowed, maybe we might not mind so much that their fire was fed by a different fuel than ours. Everyone is different and marches to a different beat, some folks like to show themselves off, others like to stand in the shadows. But when the day is done and we look at mountains we have climbed together, are we so different? I love this scouting stuff. Barry

>>On the flip side, discontinuing the Eagle Scout rank will get many times the press of the recent slew of Video Games belt loop articles, and due to the general public perception of "Eagle Scout" as a buzz word, the resulting PR would be widespread and would not be positive.

Our troop is much like DScouter15's troop, but the best campfire closing I have ever experienced was humming Amazing Grace with bagpipes being played on nearby hill as we left the campfire. Barry

>>Program changes were made so that more boys would be inclined to seek the Eagle and thus more boys would/could attain it. It had nothing to do with changes in thinking that Eagle was the Holy Grail of the BSA, it was only a few program changes made to entice and enable more boys to go for it

>>The difference would be in the attitude of the people, not the program itself.

A great discussion asking when do we start wasting our time helping scouts grow farther than they themselves want to go. I have seen hundreds of post on the subject of Eagle, but what if there wasn't such a rank. How would scouting be different? Would the BSA still exist? Would the program be better? What are your thoughts? Barry

I understand sst3d, but here is the tone of a few responses: >>But in my corner of the world, a lot of prestige seems to be assigned to fellas who haven't been on a camp-out in decades, have only a flimsy connection with a unit of boys, and come across as merely trophy collectors looking for the next bead and bauble. Now this assessment isn't global, but there is enough of it out there to rub me the wrong way at times.

Here is what I was responding to Gunny. >>Open toe/open heel shoes? Unless you're camping in the backyard and walking nowhere more challenging than a shopping mall, then nope - not going to wear them.

>>The lion's share of these awards should go to scouters at the unit level. This would encourage alot of current district and council types to serve in the unit instead.

>>Maybe I need to get that going, although I'm not sure how to do that.

>>Yes - we all carried a pair of boots in the car - never knew when we would be headed into the woods. I fear that kind of outdoors sense is rapidly disappearing.

Yes, but SCOUTNET has fixed most problems now. We used to average three errors on the books for each Eagle applicant before Scoutnet. We averaged an EBOR ever 2.5 months, so that was a lot of errors. But after SCOUTNET, no errors were found on any of the scouts while I was involved with the program. Now I dont know where SCOUTNET has gone in the last few years, but I think the units were putting the dates in the database. So if there was an error, it was from the unit. Does SCOUTNET let the user even put an incorrect date like completing Star in less than four months? Barry

I have done both and it is interesting to think back on. Lisabob hits a lot of really good points. Actually I remember money being a bigger problem in the pack because its harder to raise without a lot of planning and communication. Our Pack committee was always worried about having enough money just for badges each month. I am amazed how much money is required just for awards at pack meetings. I was reminded recently of this when I spoke with a member of this forum who has started a pack. Money is always a topic at pack committee meetings. With the troop, we just went out and washed cars for a couple of Saturdays and had enough money to buy just enough equipment. When we needed more money, we come up with a quick fundraiser. Its to raise money at the troop level because the boys take a lot of the responsibility. Garage sales, hamburger sales at the church, pancake breakfasts and so on all can be planned and done in matter of a couple weeks in a troop. A pack requires at least a couple months to organize. Lisa is right that the vision of the troop is harder compared to the packs, but new troop adults arent as hindered by lack of vision as the Pack leaders when they first start out. At the district level, I had to work with unit adult disputes and I worked three packs disputes to every one troop troop dispute basically because of the vision, or really lack there of. Even if the troop leaders know nothing of the program and have no vision, they still know enough to load up all the boys and in cars and go camping. All the adults can agree to that and it is one simple plan for ALL the boys. But the leaders in a pack are more broken up. Each adult basically is totally responsible for one part (one age group) of the program and doesn't have a clue about the rest of the adults. For the most part, one plan doesn't work for all the boys. They certianly don't know how their part of the program effects the other parts. So it is easy for the committee to get lost in the little stuff like training, den meetings, pack meetings, Blue and Gold, Webelos Graduation and so on. Tigers alone is the single most difficult program to do successfully in the BSA. And the loss of scouts show it. If the pack leaders dont have a vision to link everyone together, and most dont, then they can get lost rather quickly. And then, once the Pack adults start to figure it out, they move up to the troops. Sure packs should hand over their experience to the next leaders, but the far majority dont get that plan that far a head because its hard enough just to find den leaders, much less future CMs and CCs. Its not so much that Troop adults hang around longer than adults do in the packs because the cub program is five years long. But Troop leaders hang around each other a lot more (on a weekly basis) and can quickly reflect on the program performance, then change or tune it to run better the next week. I would guess that most Pack adults dont get to do that but once or twice a year. True, they do get to meet once a month at pack meetings, but they are still herding the boys, so there isnt that true one to one time adults really need to come together. So, that leaves a lot of work on the adults who make the program work. Many here would be surprised just how much work is involved to make sure that somebody has the responsibiliity to picked up the badges for at the scout office for the pack meetings. If they forget, the Pack meeting is a mess and the boys have to wait a month. Do that in a troop, and they only have to wait a week. Yep looking back on it, if I had to do it all over again, I would pick starting the troop. I love this scouting stuff. Barry

You sound like a really good Scoutmaster, so Im taking away from that at all, but I think the question is, should the SM be setting the scouts goals?. If you ask any scout at some point if they want the Eagle, they are going to say yes. Who wouldnt? But wanting and getting are as different as only 3 to 5% of scout earn it. I agree your job is to motivate the scouts to live the ideals, and their dreams. But we adults struggle not to cross the line between defining their dream and motivating their dream. Of the hundreds of scouts I worked with, my scout who had leadership skills beyond any scout I know had no ambition what so ever for Eagle. He was the great motivator of a team I have ever seen and Im sure he will be famous one day because he is that good. I learned things from him, but he left the troop at 16 because he got tired of the adults pushing the Eagle on him. I changed my style of Scoutmastering after that. I wasnt one of the adults pushing him to Eagle, but I learned a lot about motivating boys to a) seek out their dreams (b plan how to reach their dreams (c reach those dreams. I can say from my experiences that if Scoutmasters would spend their time teaching boys the skills of setting goals and the skills of reaching those goals, they would have a lot more scouts earning the Eagle than just motivating them to earn it, and the Scoutmaster would never have to even mention the word Eagle. So my suggestion to your post is take the word Eagle out of your post and replace it with dream. Guide a boy to have passion and then encourage that passion. Teach him the simple skills of setting a goal and the steps to reaching a goal then eventually he will not only reach the one dream, but a lot of other dreams. Likely not your dream, but as you said, your job is to motivate them to live the ideals. We motivate the ideals through their actions of seeking their dreams, whatever those dreams are Find what makes these two boys tick, push them to go farther and see what happens. I think all three of you will be rewarded. I love this scouting stuff. Barry

I paid my way thru college as an aircraft mechanic and their was a saying in the shop The Right Tool For the Right Job. I guess this discussion comes under using the "Right Equipment for the Right Activity". The shorts thing reminds me of my sons friend who was in a different troop. He at the age 12 vowed with his patrol to never wear long scout pants, only scout shorts, to all Boy Scout activities. His Scoutmaster thought the patrol was crazy, but the whole patrol earned their Eagles, was very very active in OA at a national level and stayed active with the troop until they left for college. And they never wore long scout pants. Barry

>>NEVER EVER leave the trailer at the COR's location. Most parking lots are isolated and no one is around at night. Park it at a leaders house.

>>Bando's report of pleasant 30-person committee meetings is more an exception than a rule eh? But such strong folks don't last. Da EagleDads of da world move on. As Bando mentioned, it wasn't always the case.

>>Incidentally, just where is the 'heart' of the Bible belt? I've always wondered where it was.

>>One Jewish parent rolled her eyes and said, "we've come to expect this kind of thing in the Bible Belt"...not exactly the positive reactions one would like.

>>"I spoke to my friend today, and the SM has sent out a correction email. He said he was wrong, and mother and fathers are equally welcome on the trips. (So, I think he DID mean "No women allowed" but now understands that doesn't work.)"

>>We put most of the parents on the Committee. Issue resolved?

>>If one is to help their boys grow and develop in leadership, I'd say it would serve them better to provide them with quality support and not stupid rules.

Likely just the Scoutmaster's way of saying that "parents" will not be hovering around their sons. Actually, I probably would have said something like it had I thought of it because it makes the point rather quickly. I don't think you should take this as a gender specific thing. Sometime in the future you might quietly suggest he use "parent" in place of "mom". Barry