Eagledad

I wish you luck Stosh because this is a time of true reflection. I believe that before anything else, a scouting program has to be fun to grow. Your "roll up your sleeves" comment kind of suggest a work first play later program and that just doesn't work with boys. Doesn't really work that well with adults either in the long term. "Leadership performance" has to be a result of practice in program activities. Program activities has to the fun part of scouting. I think most who have put the time in will agree that it takes a minimum of 5 or 6 years for a boy led program to mature into a tru

Well Ive been there and my daughter (now 19) does not look back on my SM days as a time where her brothers had an advantage with me. I do agree there has to be a balance with the family and that requires sacrifices on your part. The SM is presumed needed and wanted everywhere everyday. I was asked a lot, but learned quickly to never accept a request to join district and council training staffs. I promised that I would join staffs after I retired as SM and sure nuff the phone was ringing the day after. I always wanted to go to Training at Philmont, but never did because I limited my time away a

>>But I was never a boy scout so Barry, perhaps by your metric, those experiences didn't count for me.

I don't think it is Cub Scouts because the Cubs have been around for a long time. I think it is in the last generation of leaders who were never Scouts as a youth. Its not that they are self-centered or tunnel visioned, they just don't know what scouting is outside of hand books and leader training courses. I once had a call from a new Scoutmaster who asked me how to fill the rest of the weekend on his campouts because his scouts had done all the advancement and were tired of repeating it. When I asked what they scouts did on their free time, he said he had never heard of free time on c

I personally think its a waste of time to send a scout if somebody doesn't go for the adults side. Way back when, our council ask some questions of all the past scout participants and the Scoutmasters to find where the course was lacking. The number one complain from the scoutmasters was they didn't have clue what the scouts learned. The number one complaint from the scouts was the Scoutmasters didn't let them try their new skills. Our Scoutmaster course was a half day after that, and then we had the scouts sit with the Scoutmaster and discuss how they were going to work in the new skills.

>>In our area Scout-O-Rama is supposed to be such an expo, but it doesn't seem to get well publicized as such. The Council also charges admission. As a result hardly anyone from the public comes in and it has mostly become another campout with events

>>The problem, as I see it, is that we don't promote our actions. Scouts aren't highly visible in many communities anymore. I think we need to be more visible.

>>John Wayne were often on our TV (and Dave Garroway. Dates me, I guess). Good guys catch and kill bad guys. I "died" my share on the playground. But this is a different time.

>>We have way too much to do with our camping program, service projects, and other Scout activities to even think about adding such a stupid activity. I am with SMT224 on this one. Scouts should outdoors. Period.

>>Being marginalized by an ever increasing decadent society is not a bad thing.

Shesh. My younger son and his 11 buddies have know each other since age five when we started their soccer team. They are all in scouts, the same soccer team and in the same youth group at church. Not to mention all the other local activities like school and so on. This group of boys spent a week canoeing the Bounder Waters for their high school graduation trip. Their church sponsored the trip, but the trailer they used to haul their gear was a troop trailer and the two adult church youth leaders who went with them are also scout leaders. Their assistant soccer coach was also asked to go,

This discussion comes up now and then and I always have the same reaction: Scouting is a great until the adults get involved. Barry

Just make sure the scouts get what the asked for. Barry

>>My point is - there's a BIG difference between surfing for hard core porn on an iPhone, a scout showing up at camp with a Playboy / Maxim magazine,

Yes, those are great approaches national eventually need to take. But before that, we need to understand the source of 17% numbers. When I was involved with the numbers side while volunteering at the council level, I found that nobody really had a grasp of the real numbers because there wasn't an accepted uniform method of acquiring good data. Add to the fact that a lot of Councils and Districts were double counting some of their scouts to inflate their numbers. I dont know how big that problem was, but the clean up of that mess could be part of the 17%. Also, when I got away from that s

>>3) In my short time in the cubbie world, it has become apparent that a couple things tend to pull Web-II away from scouting. First, Jr. High is when boys get REALLY serious about sports or other school activities. Second, Webelos is a limbo rank IMHO. They are not old enough to do many of the higher adventure BSA things, but they are old enough to think the games / crafts done by the Tigers and Wolves are completely lame and boring....

>>I know that at least was part of the reason that JCPenney Co. quit selling scout stuff;they got threats from certain groups about boycotts and negative publicity.

I would like to know what the scouts say? How do you know what to fix if you don't know what is broken. Sometimes it has nothing to do with scouting, it's just boys acting badly. Barry

Officially (FAA), sailplanes are their own class. And looking at the intent of the text, Im not sure how it falls. I imagine the restrictions are based from risk. Sailplanes are not considered a risky aircraft to fly, but it has its limits not having an engine. Interesting. Barry

""Back in 2000 I was in Philmont on top of Baldy. A t-storm was rolling in and I (ASM) announced I was seeking cover and all the boys that felt it necessary were to follow me down to the tree line. About half the boys did. The SM and 2 other ASM's blew me off and laughed."" >>>Gotta love these distorted observations by those who don't comprehend the point. First of all the crew members that are not allowed to participate are those that have not acquired the necessary skills to do the job safely. It has nothing to do with "badly trained". On the contrary, the high standard o

>>Cancelin' events because of possible snow and ice on da roads? Southerners should really learn how to drive, eh?

>>"A storm front is moving in. We are well equipped for the weather but there is a 70% chance of an ice storm. The roads may become skating rinks and dangerous. We are scheduled to pack up and leave tomorrow morning. Do we leave early to avoid potential (but not certain) dangerous driving conditions tomorrow morning or stick it out?"

>>The purpose of adult leaders is to mentor and assist where needed, not run their own camping trip and let the boys flounder continually, although occasional floundering can be it's own learning experience too

Hi Sandspur I'm not sure of Stoshes point other than giving an example of a worse case scenerio of a badly trained crew. In reality I think these kinds of situations and examples like Stoshes are rare. I can only think of one situation in my many years of scouting where I had to use my SM title to force a direction and that only had to do with transportation to camp. These things are rare because most folks are reasonable. Still, you can leave it to a group, somebody has to take responsibility. Usually the somebody has enough experience and understanding of the folks involved to have

>>What a lot of scouters fail to recognize is that the basic core of what scouting is and has been for the last 100 years is archaic and irrelevant to todays youth techno centered and self centered exsistence.