eisely

I am not an accountant, but I agree that something like QuickBooks greatly exceeds a cub scout pack requirements. You may be able to use it effectively but will your successor be able to do so? I also agree that uncashed checks are a much larger problem that will not be solved by any computer program. That is downright disturbing. If your unit treasurer is unable or unwilling to timely make deposits and negotiate checks written to the pack then that person should hand off the duties to someone else, sooner rather than later. Holding checks unnecessarily is an invitation to loss or destruction. How then do you figure out who paid what and who still owes what? Note that I am not accusing your treasurer of any evil intent. I just don't know how that person can properly do his or her job sitting on cash without taking it to the bank.(This message has been edited by eisely)

A certain amount of snobbery towards Webelos comes from the scouts themselves, without prompting from adults. Adults need to set a more positive example. I concur that trainers can be offensive. My involvment in BALOO as a trainer has been minimal so I have not witnessed that degree of snobbery in that training per se. Coming back to the subject of little league, I would not want to emulate little league in scouting. I agree that minor competitions can and should be used as part of an ordinary scouting unit program, but they have to be managed.

Third degree burns from spilled coffee? Was this coffee somehow flammable?

We moved to the San Francisco bay area 15 years ago. The council governing the area where we live is the result of two councils being merged a few years before we moved. For many years the council tried to operate the two boy scout summer camps previously run by the two separate councils. The decision to close one of them was painful, but ultimately beneficial. Neither camp was on land owned by the council, so profiting by a gain on a sale was not part of the decision. One way to think of a summer camp is that it is offering a service and is part of the service economy. One of the struggles that service providers have is that productivity of the labor either never changes or changes very slowly compared to say, manufacturing or agriculture. This has the effect of driving wages up over time. It is hard enough to recruit qualified staff to operate a single camp, much less two, and very hard to justify two camps when neither camp is operating a full season or close to break even. There are some relatively local BSA properties, but these are no longer used as full blown summer camps. Anybody going to summer camp from here is facing a drive in excess of two hours, regardless of where you are going. I can understand and sympathize with the emotional investment in a particular summer camp that many feel. The harsh reality is that many camps are underutilized and ultimately face consolidation or closure.

We put in at Red Bluff, just below the diversion dam and pulled out at Big Chico Creek (at least I think that was the name).

It is my understanding that the WEBLOT syllabus has been withdrawn by national. We are no longer offering that course. We still offer BALOO which is heavily subscribed.

We did a fifty miler on the Sacramento River in June that was quite successful. I had anticipated mosquitoes, but we were hardly bothered at all. Two of our camp sites were near large rookeries of cliff swallows on concrete highway bridges crossing the river. Between the swallows and the bats, the mosquitoes were thoroughly suppressed. So if you see cliff swallow nests near your camp sites, count your blessings.

Another option if you can find it, and don't mind a little extra weight, is canned cheeses. Many moons ago, when I was in the army in Viet Nam, my father found a mail order house that would ship cheeses in cans. It worked very well and I became very popular with the other people with whom I served who also liked good cheese.

While some troops may have been pushing scouts to 1st class in a year for some time, the real push came from national 20 years ago. BSA was concerned about loss of membership and commissioned a study that included interviews with boys who had left scouting. Among other things, the study concluded that boys who completed 1st class in their first year were more likely to stick around. Now I never saw the original study and cannot comment on any flaws in its methodology. However, it is not obvious what is cause and effect regarding retention. Certainly a boy who wishes on his own to advance rapidly should not be held back. I have never met a 13 year old eagle, but it is safe to assert that such a scout misses a great deal. Anyway, the word came down that units should push their new scouts to 1st class in a year if at all possible. Also, most troops adopted the new boy patrol concept, or at least those troops in our area did so. Summer camps also responded with programs for new scouts to the extent they were not already doing so. Is scouting better off or worse off? I don't know. I like the idea of unit leadership retaining the authority to actually decide and retest skills after summer camp.

Zero tolerance for drugs at scout events does not automatically translate into immediate expulsion. In this I agree with the majority of the posts. Clearly the boy needs a conversation, and then there needs to be a conversation with the parents, with or without the boy present. I agree with the suggestion that the parents should pull back from scouting to focus on their own son. I agree that the boy likely deserves a chance to get his act together. So far no one else seems to have been hurt by his conduct, but the conduct has to stop. I also agree that there seems to be a larger problem with the adult leadership of this unit. There is much at stake. There needs to be a separate meeting with the adult leadership to make sure everyone is on the same page. Then everybody should move forward with a clearer understanding of what will and what will not be tolerated and how the troop will deal with such matters in the future.

How about the Goldent Trout Wilderness? This is still in the Sierras but it is further South and maybe is accessible now. http://www.fs.fed.us/r5/sequoia/publications/rog/golden-trout-wilderness.pdf(This message has been edited by eisely)

The subject of the story is clearly not Indiana Jones.

Let me clarify. I suppose I should have put the word scientific in scare quotes. I consider this thing to be a mockery of legitimate science.

I have to count myself among the "let he who is without sin cast the first stone" side of this discussion. I sincerely hope that afscout does not drop completely out of the forum. I suspect that he will be able to make real contributions in the future. I write as one who stopped advancing at Star rank. While I have some regrets about not pursuing the Eagle, it is a lesser regret. Not having an eagle knot on my shirt has not impaired my ability to contribute.

It sounds like a good project to me. Biggest concern is somebody looking at it as solely maintenance. I would suggest that your son break down the work into tasks and build up a time estimate from that. I am also curious about an earlier response to your query. Is there a committee in your district that approves projects or a single individual? The notion that the same committee that is the ultimate EBOR should approve the project offers an advantage, but from my own experience and comments from others on this forum, many districts do not use committees to review and approve projects. You need to know who you are dealing with. Just one person or an undefined group of people?

Assuming that the CC is not also serving as the COR, and also assuming that there are no bylaws that vest such a veto power in the CC, then the CC does not have such a power. Having said all that, the fact that the CC thinks that he (she) has such authority is itself troubling and suggests deeper issues within the committee.

The JFK school at Harvard recently released a scientific study linking fourth of July celebrations and conservative attitudes in kids. It turns out all you have to do is expose your kids to a parade or two and they become more patriotic and more likely to vote Republican. Wow!! The researchers also determined that when it rains the liklihood of celebrations on the fourth of July being canceled increases. Those Harvard guys are really smart. See link below. http://www.hks.harvard.edu/news-events/news/articles/4th-july-paper-david-yanagizawa-drott(This message has been edited by eisely)

What I am arguing is not that ASMs should necessarily attend any or all committee meetings, but that ASMs should not be systematically excluded from committee meetings. An ASM should have the same right as any random parent to attend such meetings.

We are located in a relatively affluent area in California, so everyone is used to getting stiffed, and can afford to get stiffed. A $10 camping trip is impossible. Our cheapest events may run a few tens of dollars up to over a hundred dollars. We just did a fifty miler on the Sacramento River that cost each scout $150. There was a lot of driving involved, and we had to use commercial campgrounds along the river, so it was expensive. Nevertheless it was worth it and no one complained about the price. Summer camp, on a per diem basis, is probably the cheapest thing we do. We also send a crew to Philmont every other year.

John in KC is correct. Even in scouting adults do not always play nice. How big is your troop? How are your relations with the other adult volunteers? Do you know the chairman (chair person) personally? There are a variety of circumstances where a SM should step back from the advancement process, usually when the SM's own progeny is involved. If this SM cannot be objective towards you, he should defer to another adult leader. This should not present a problem at the district or council level. I am not sure I would get your parents involved. You do not need anyone's permission to speak to the chair about anything. As an eagle you are expected to demonstrate a level of maturity and an ability to handle your own affairs much as an adult would. If you cannot get satisfication within your troop, then you should definitely transfer to another troop.

If memory serves me correctly, a scout was killed by one of these things at a BSA summer camp somewhere in the USA a few years back. That might explain why BSA frowns on these devices. I will miss receiving cannon reports from newbie campers.

This makes me wonder if we were issued expired food on our Philmont treks. I would never consider issuing expired food to anyone for an outing. If someone really got sick and incurred major medical expense, or even died, guess where the attorneys would look first. Why would anyone run that risk, particularly at a BSA national high adventure base?

It is my understanding that all the power over volunteer personnel at the unit level rests with the "institutional head" of the chartered organization, or the "chartered organization representative" if the chartered organization chooses to name one. Lacking any written bylaws governing the troop, the CC has no formal power under the BSA concept, but clearly has a great deal of influence. When I have taught Troop Committee Challenge in the past I have always made a point that the ASMs are not part of the committee. The SM is expected to attend committee meetings. I have also always made the point that it would be a big mistake to exclude ASMs from committee meetings. The SM and the ASMs are the ones doing the heavy lifting in delivering the program to the boys. If I were treated as an ASM the way this CC apparently is treating the ASMs I would tell the CC to take my ASM patch and (redacted).

Well you certainly are right about the silly part. Maybe someone further up the chain of authority decided that the boys are advancing too fast and accomplishing too much and this was one way to slow things down.(This message has been edited by eisely)

For as long as we have lived where we currently live, there has been a single individual at the district level who reviewed and approved projects. I have succeeded him as the designated sole approval authority for about four months now. I have seen over detailed proposals, and two that I did not sign initially because of problems with the scout's paper work. In the recent past, before I assumed this role, some helpful adult came up with an eagle project checklist. The checklist is well thought out and can be helpful to some scouts. However, one of the projects I initially rejected was a scout who came in with just the check list and no workbook. To me this was a clear example of well intended paperwork overkill leading to confusion - making things worse instead of better. I counseled the lad about what he had to do, and he was back in a week with what he needed. The project itself was perfectly acceptable. The other scout had a unique project, but had difficulties documenting it. I spent time with him going over the stack of loose papers that he had and counseled him too. He was very appreciative, and was back within three days with a well documented project. Reviewed and approved second time around. I for one am not looking for detailed counts of nails that will be used. I want to see enough detail that I can look through it and understand what the project is about and that the scout has thought about his project in sufficient detail to be able to execute the project. If the scout has done his homework before he meets with me the whole process takes about 15 minutes.