fred johnson

From what I see, I fully agree. Kids are dropping out of Cub Scouts because it's repetitive over the years. I'd rather see Cub Scouts go back to starting in 2nd grade. Market it as let kids try sports first. When they are mature enough to handle the outdoors, fire, knives and fishing, then they can try Cub Scouts.

Anecdotal stories are fine, but there is a real issue here. This whole discussion started because BSA is changing the CUB PROGRAM ... EXAMPLE ON PAGE 28 : http://www.scouting.org/filestore/pr...quirements.pdf As a Webelos, your Akela is your den leader. You either earn the religious emblem (#1) or you do #2A or #2D. #2B & #2C are moot because you can do those with family and family can say it's just not that important to them. Automatic get out of jail free card on #2B & #2C. But 2A and 2D are more than show respect. It's about active practicing. 2A is plan, support

ScoutTrack & such web solutions .... Though I can think of other solutions, I can accept what ShutterbugMom and Sidney Porter say. My experience is jaded by obsessive parents who's only goal seems to be to have their son get more awards than the next guy. And recording the individual requirements is way way too painful in ScoutTrack. I've also seen problems when the purchasing gets out of cycle with the awards and scouts get awarded the award multiple times. I'd rather keep it more simple

Sidney Porter and ShutterbugMom are right. Cubs want to be recognized. If they are not recognized, it is a negative and begins to separate them from Cub Scouting. We need to attract them to the advancement program and have it grow on them. As they mature from Tiger to Webelos to Eagle scout, we do a progression of responsibility until it is 100% on them. Plus, Cub Scouts (Tiger, Wolf and Bear) is way different. First of all, according to BSA and what BSA publishes in the Cub Scout handbooks, the parents sign off on alot. "Almost all electives and achievements are done by you and

Attended a camporee recently.... The evening camp fire program was together with a Sunday service (on Saturday evening). It was okay, but it was clearly Christian with Apostles creed and several invocations / habits that are Lutheran or Catholic or evangelical in nature. And I admit I did cringe at a few of the evangelical items. But I'm sure evangelical families cringed at "the holy catholic church". .... I should admit that I did trip with the Apostles creed as I'm used to the Nicene creed and I had not said the Apostle's creed regularly since I was a kid. ... but I also still trip up on "co

I can sympathize with Karen. She asked a simple question and blew up in her face. Perhaps the hard part about Karen's question is there is no right or wrong answer. It really depends. I know our pack has a cost of about $140 to $155 per scout per year. But we also don't cater meals ever. Pizza yes, but not a catered meal. We rent out some pretty expensive facilities at times, but we try to keep events FREE to all scout family members ... unless it's a not a big open event. Such as, scouts have to pay per person for summer or winter camps. But, our pack also hosts some "cheaper" free c

Your being argumentative or just wrong. In BSA as also in my personal life, "reverent" starts with doing my Duty To God. Every time BSA explains the Scout Law "reverent", it starts with Duty To God. We've all heard it at virtually every Eagle Court Of Honor too. http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/BoyScouts/AdvancementandAwards/MeritBadges/relig.aspx In a scouting setting, we can discuss one without the other. And, asking a scout to sit through a religious service of another person's faith is more politeness than reverent or Duty To God. I've sat through Lutheran

Calico ... You are dead on right with "faith friendly". Faith friendly means we can find a common working ground with schools and others. "Faith based" means we need to silo off into our own little church based units. Heck "faith based" means no one will be satisfied except LDS units. Calico ... Also I'm sorry you did not receive your Eagle. It sounds like you earned it but were not recognized as such. You have my sympathies.

We're playing word games now. My point was I can show respect for other faiths, but I can't do my Duty To God by attending a faith service for a faith that I don't believe in. Perhaps it is my old school herritage, but reverence in a faith context has a deeper meaning than just "deep respect". There are dozens of articles on this. When you combine Duty To God and Reverent, there is much more to it than deep respect. Heck, I have deep deep respect to philosophers and writers who expose atheist views. But I in no way feel "reverent" when I show them respect. Nor do I feel like

... You can be respectful of others faith, but you can't be reverent toward others or reverent torward the faith of others. You can only be reverent toward your own faith. No. A "requirement" means judging. Did you complete the requirement? Someone judges. "If the boy is doing his duty towards hs religion" ... "if" ... that's judging. What "if" he is not doing his duty? Who makes that decision? Also ... are we only for youth in organized religion? Many families profess faith, but are not affiliated with a church. Their duty is effectively leading a g

Say's you. That's your faith. If your going to be accepting, then you need to accept that others are more strict. Other families are less understanding. Heck, I have a big time problem attending interdenominational services ... especially when they start refering to the "great scout spirit in the sky". I do not have my kids attend them. I find them worse than meaningless.

BSA has been repeatedly in the news for kicking out atheists. Now, it feels like BSA is kicking out non-practicing Christians. If this continues, who's going to be left in the end? How do we work with each other? Plus ... BSA is asking for more. It's more than just "okay to ask". BSA is emphasizing practicing faith. Webelos Duty To God requires the emblem or 3 of 4. Of those four, two are explicitly including a practicing element (planning / helping with church service, practicing faith for a month). So we either blow off and not take the requirement seriously or it becomes a new

Not often I agree with you, but I think you are dead right about this. I also fear those who have "new evangelical faith" and feel an obligation of their new found faith to use their scout leader position to share their faith. I've seen it happen. In their well meaning ignorant naivete, they try to teach lessons to my sons that is opposite of what my church teaches. Does this mean that I need to keep my children in a Catholic faith as LDS keeps their children in LDS units? ============================================ The issue is that packs and troops recruit from schools and ha

There are no good options. You can ask, but my experience is there is no reliable way. And, you will get a 30% response rate. Parents are already dealing with too much homework from school and competing activities. I'd look for giving the scouts the best experience possible in the den and keep them active and getting new experiences. If a scout missed a meeting or two, maybe they don't get that specific advancement. But I'd look the other way when it comes to the rank badge. Effectively, if a scout was at all active in the den, I'd do my best to see they got their rank patch

That scares and saddens me. Scouting has always been the safe ground between a religious program and a secular program. It's the same as the pledge of Allegiance. Kids all over the U.S. say it in a secular environment. That's scouting. It has been the safe middle ground where faith can be expressed without shoving it down someone's throat. ... and ... one thing that I like is that some kids actually feel safe to start thinking about faith because they are in scouts. But if we shove it down their throats, they are just going to leave or never join..

The opposite of what you call hiding under a rock, I call shoving it in another person's face to piss them off. Except LDS/Mormon, effectively all cub scouts are recruited through organized recruiting structured around their elementary school. Other than a passing comment or statement, I've never seen structured recruitment at a church. I have my faith and I love my Church. But this will only hurt membership in the long run. =================================== Scouting has always lived in the space between secular and organized religion. And, that's the place scouting needs

My oldest son joined Cub Scouts three months after Dale vs BSA and I've dealt with the ramifications of that for the last 14+ years. Kicked out of schools. Teachers throwing away flyers. Scouting became the bad guy. It has not been fun being the on-the-scene representative of a politically unpopular organization. Finally though, it has been changing. This fall's recruitment brought a smile to my face. 20 new cubs. It was exciting. Principal let us put posters up in the school again. Had someone in the cafeteria with pinewood derby cars to talk with cubs. I think the

The first thing I would do is talk with another parent or two in your den who SAW what happened. Make sure your view of what happened is the same as theirs. Odds are they will have suggestions on how to deal with it too. I am hesitant to say wait it out as these types of situations always have side effects. Please note ... as a den leader ... you have every right to say you are not comfortable with a specific scout or a specific parent. If they will not act with appropriate conduct, you can ask them to leave. Peter

Actually ... It's not 100% that clear cut. Often scouters don't know their actual registration because a membership person takes care of that. I've seen it happen. A WDL was registered as a DL or even still a TDL or a committee member. Just no one ever switched their registration. "IF" you were the recognized leader by your pack for that position then I've seen the council give people credit for that. The decision was made by the council director of advancement. Plus, you still had to do the time and get the training and meet the other criteria. The only big big no-no that I'

MattR ... Also note, you only update advancement reports from TroopMaster. You don't upload a complete scout advancement history for the scout. As such, the official record is in ScoutNet. My fear is after seven years of updating TroopMaster will the data be correct.

MattR ... If your group finds it useful, go for it. I get the scout's advancement record for ScoutNet (aka the council resource). I get the training report from either our council custom site or now the new http://my.scouting.org. Service hours are easy to compute as we know who attended through the SOAR attendee list for each event. I just want to minimize the data entry. Years ago, we used to keep TroopMaster records up to date religiously. We'd print out a stack of paper before each meeting. Now, we can quickly get into the official systems and it is less work in the long run.

Okay. Calmer day now ... I find SOAR extremely useful for calendar, roster and managing events and communication. I agree though with blw2. I don't see much use for web based advancement tools. Only exception is to help the advancement person coordinate purchases. But then, web based solutions only move the problem from getting emails to entering data. Not a big difference. I see no value for troops. Official records are the merit badge cards, the Boy Scout Handbook and BSA ScoutNet. Troopmaster ... packmaster ... and other electronic systems are just redundant and at

It's the only model that I've seen work locally. All the other crews pop-up and then die after three to five years. In a sad way ... it's almost like ... "an explorer post"