fotoscout

Bob,

Here is the direct quote from our Council Web Site.....

"While it is encouraged that EVERY scouter completes Youth Protection Training, it is MANDATORY that each unit has a YPT leader present on EVERY scouting event"

If you have your own version I'd like to see it.

I was referring to our first session after it was made mandatory that a YP trained leader be present at every event. For us that meant about 150 leaders crammed into a school cafeteria during roundtable.

You can only imagine the debates as the tape was intermittently stopped for discussion purposes.

Bob,

I took it last year when it was first given to the masses. I can assure you that the procedure that I noted above is what was taught. Specifically the reasons given were that those individuals would have personal contacts with the authorities, and/or access our local SEs home phone number.

In addition, the instruction to contact the Camp Director is an attempt to get a professional to the boy as quickly as possible, since the boy has chosen this time to open up.

Its always possible that we got bad information.

Bob, I think that you an I have beaten this one to death

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Sorry Bob, I left out he intricate details. I am quite sure however, that we were told that that the SE would make all the notifications, including local authorities.

As for out of council issues, yes, contact should be made with the SE of the council where the abuse occurred. The question surfaced about a scout who, at an out of council camp, revealed that he had been abused. Great debate ensued, and ultimately we were told to contact the Camp Director (regardless of time of day) and he would make all the notifications. Why, because he would have the proper contacts, or access to the proper contacts.

Now the secret society issue, if memory serves me right, it was directed at leaderless excursions where the boys might engage in some sort of indoctrination or hazing type activities, all of which is strictly forbidden.

You have repeated the phrase secret meetings often through this debate. If we do this job correctly, we simply cannot have secret meetings. You either have two deep leadership in a private meeting, OR, you have a one on one meeting in small corner of a larger occupied room. Nothing secret there. In either event, you can have a confidential meeting with the boy. In the first case, a little less confidential than the boy may want.

>

Bob, Im sure you already regret writing that. Apology accepted.

If think you fail to recognize the potential negative impact on the child if that childs situation is not presented to the parents in a proper manner, by the proper person, at the proper time. Again I remind you that I am talking about extraordinary situations here.

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Bob,

In the YP training that I took there was a common thread that said, report it to the Scout Executive or in his absence the local authorities. Whether we were talking about a predatory situation or a revelation made by a scout, the instruction was clear, we are to have a trained professional handle it. Nowhere did it say, "run to the phone and inform the parents". This will in turn happen, but not until after the boy is safeguarded. Dont misinterpret, if the boy or girl is injured as the result of an attack I would be the first one to phone. But that's not the situation we are talking about here.

I dont know what video you watched, but in this venue there certainly are secrets to be kept. Kept from the other scouts, and kept from the other leaders. For the protection for the children involve this is strictly, Need to Know territory. The Need to Know can only be breached if the safety of the other children is at risk.

Ed has the idea! There is no black and white here.

MW, what if your disclosure resulted in the child receiving a severe beating from his father who tuned out to be a closet child abuser? You had no idea about the father, but the child knew, and thats why the child came to you.

I remember talking to my Dad about why different kids & families did things differently than we did. Why was I reprimanded for things that other kids got away with, and, why were other kids reprimanded for things that I got away with. He would always say, Remember, not all families are like ours.

Of course his wisdom was lost on a young kid. But the profound brevity of his statement is something that continues to grow on me. Ive modified it slightly, and used it on the other thread. I think Ill post it again in this thread.

Remember, not all families are like yours and mine.

By the way, my Dad passed away over twenty years ago.

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Bob,

There was a portion of my posting that commented on overzealous leaders, I chose to delete it. You are correct in the thought that in these situations there is potential for over inflated leaders to get out of control.

However, in the initial stages of a life crisis, our job is not to immediately get off the chair and drive over to the parents home and spill our guts about a very profound issue that is troubling their son. Nor are we trained to facilitate the initial post revelation conversation (confrontation) between the parent and child. There is no black and white here, much will depend on how well we know the boy and how well we know the parents. Its called decision making, and its the burden of everyone that chooses to lead.

Bear in mind here that we are in the context of a major life crisis, abuse, suicide, sexual identity, and religious identity issues. The boy apparently does not have enough confidence in his parents to securely go to them. He does have that confidence in you, his scout leader, his friend, his father figure. Involving his parents immediately may well be the right thing to do, but it also may not be the right thing to do. We all have many professionals available to us.

With the right help, he will eventually learn the lesson about secrets. But its myopic to think that at this time in the boys life, that that lesson is important.

Always remember that not every home is like yours or mine. As someone else noted in this thread, I hope that Im never thrust into this type of situation.

Time out here folks,

When a child comes to a teacher, scout leader , friend of family, or clergyman with a profound thought, comment or yes maybe a revelation, its not the time to play Scouts. The character traits that we teach our children should be your guide, not the tenets of scouting.

You are privileged to be in a position that allows a troubled youth to come to you with a very personal situation. Regardless of the boys tone, he is most likely SCREAMING at you for help. The manner in which you choose to help him, may have an even greater impact on his young life than does his personal situation.

Im troubled by the comments made here about trustworthiness, vs, disclosure to the parents, vs, directing the boy to the appropriate professional. Ones personal concept of Trustworthiness should not enter into this thought process. You do whats right for the child, regardless of the hits you personally take.

Our High Adventure Comm. is a Council committee, not a unit Comm. If I understand it correctly, it is made up of the guys who run the HA training classes.

Cheer up! Spring is finally here, we actually had a day in the 70's and would you believe we saw the sun. And if its spring, its baseball season. About 98% of our Cubs play baseball. Attendance at our spring meetings is always low, probably in the 50-60 % bracket. Den meetings are the same. Its really tough to figure out whats going on with attendance at this time of year. We try to draw no conclusions from it, and chose to wait until September.

Packs in this area seem to number between 50-80 on average. We are at 68 and that seems to be a pretty good size. Maybe with your new CM, the smaller number will work in everyones favor. But with 80 kids you still have a strong Pack..

You might want to check with your High Adventure Committee. The curriculum for the High Adventure Basic Backpacking Class, has much of what youre looking for. Each session addresses a specific topic, it you can get the instructor outline sheets you might be ahead of the game.

A casual observation if I may, you guys are beginning to sound like the boys SM conference is more like a meeting with his Rabbi, Priest, or Minister.

Bob,

If the NSP remains intact after the boys make 1st Class, doesnt that in itself defeat the patrol method? We would now have a patrol of all younger boys. There would be no wise old sage in the patrol to pass down his vast experience, and no immediate role model for the boys to follow. Conversely, the older boys would not have any younger boys immeditely available to lead.

I certainly see the merits of keeping this group of boys together. But Im not convinced that it provides them the same opportunities that would be available to them if they were to be reassigned into patrols made up of older (more experienced) boys.

Convince me.

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Place him with his own age group, Boy Scouts. His delay is not of a medical nature, and you seem to feel that he has the ability to succeed in Boy Scouts.

His self esteem would be better served by placing him with boys of his own age. Serve his self esteem and everything else will fall into place.

Bob,

First, Bully for your son who told off the basketball coach that was trying to advance his own career dreams on the backs of 7th Graders.

This is a thought provoking thread. The engineer in me says that there will never be a quantitative means for measuring this.

We have a program called the Lone Scout. I think I have the name right. If we take your above senario and put it in the context of the Lone Scout, then the argument could be made that Bob benifits greatly from what limited involvement,and contact, he does have with a troop. But again it goes back to commitment, and how that commitment is exhibited.

The issue points to the fact that every boy and every family are different. We as leaders need to be flexible and respect the differences without compromising the advancement system.

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With everyones help I think that Im starting to figure this out.

Does a Venturing crew have to aspire to a yearly Mountain Top experience or can they be happy with a quiet monthly hike along some local mountain trail? Must they work toward a performance at Carnegie Hall or can they play the local YMCA each week (I guess if their core area is the arts, then music could be their focus)? Can a kid (uh, I shouldnt use that word) lets say a youth, stay in the crew and never achieve any advancement or awards?

Im getting the idea that Venturing is just a group of youths with a common interest that can organize under the auspice of BSA and pursue their common interest together.

The other part of this that I have to wonder about is what effect Venturing has on the area Troops. Are the Troops losing the older boys to Venturing?

TwoCubDad,

I like your WBS, work breakdown structure, however,in todays hypersensitive and correct world, the very first program item would have been this;

1. Draft memo requesting input from volunteers on upcoming revision to CS Books.

Of course the resulting scream could be heard from coast to coast, and, from Dallas to Guam.

In New York, at least in the work place, we are particularly fond of a phase that goes something like this.....Its easier to ask for forgiveness than it is to ask for permission.

Someone from National must have spent time in New York.

Do I understand this correctly..... You can have a Venture Patrol within the framework of an established Troop AND that that Venture Patrol can be made up of older kids and girls.

Pack2,

Dont sweat the small stuff. When it comes time for you to fill out your advancement report no one is going to ask you which book you used. Youll be fine!

Its true that he program has some very specific requirements for the boys to complete. But its equally true that the program recognizes that not everyone can bring those requirements to the boys in the same way. That includes which book you use. Some families cycle the books down to younger children. Those families will be using the old books for quite a few years to come. Den leaders need to be flexible and recognize that what we do here is not cast in stone. There is HUGE flexibility within the program, use that flexibility to make your job more fun then it already is.

Although the introduction of new books is inconvenient for all of us, it is not the first change weve seen and it wont be the last.

As for Captain Kirk, sure he got beat up, imprisoned, transfigured, lobotomized, and god knows what else, but he always did good things in the process. And in the end he was more reliable than a Timex watch, and had more energy than the Eveready Bunny

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For the record, our Council suggested that we bring along some type of chair. I did and so did everyone else. After sitting in our own chairs for a while they became uncomfortable. So we switched chairs. Then we switched again, and again. We even gave the benches a good workout. It's a long course and no matter what, it's not going to be your feet that get tired.

Look at this way, if you've ever taken a flight from New York to say Hawaii you know how uncomfortable the seats can get after the first six hours. When you reach that destination do you really care about the seats anymore?

I did take some liberty with this posting but Im sure that you get the idea.

We had the National Director of Cub Scouting speak at our Commissioners College last fall. He implied back then that new books were in offering. If I remember correctly, he thought that the new books would be available in August/September time frame. I hope you folks are right and hes wrong!

As for the old books, I understand that historically when new books have been published the Scout Shops do sell out their inventory of older books before releasing the new ones. National will tell you that during the transition year it is OK to use the old book.

Please dont shoot the messenger.

Bob White...Oh Great One,

Tell me more about the myth concering wearing uniforms while traveling. I've been told over and over again at all levels of training that the leaders and the scouts must be in uniform while traveling or attending an "away" activity for insurance pruposes.....please(This message has been edited by fotoscout)(This message has been edited by fotoscout)

Scrapper your observation is correct. Men do this CS thing differently than do woman. But not all men do it the same way and of course not all women do it the same way. My little show is much like OneHours. And as he suggested, I am the only fully trained leader in the pack. None of the women in our pack sing with their kids, and none of them yell and cheer like we do. But they are conscientious and do a great job.

Ive also noticed one other thing, if a dad is a den leader, the other dads come out to be with their sons. When a woman is the den leader, the dads seem to be more hesitant to come out with their sons. It might just be representative of our culture.

Some one may scream at me but I'll go ahead and say it anyway... We are all Leaders just Leaders. A Leader has no spare time, a Leader grows to have no Life (just joking), and a Leader has no gender.(This message has been edited by fotoscout)