fred johnson

Old_OX_Eagle83 ... I agree this thread is a perfect example of the problem with the attitude toward Eagle Scout. Too many people infer too much on Eagle. It's rightly respected and very well hyped, but it is only a rank. You do the requirements and earn the rank. Too many people think it's more than that. It is scouting that teaches character and it's being a scout that we should honor. Eagle just means requirements were completed. If the kid completes the requirements, he's earned Eagle. People who talk about "the award is cheapened" are way off base and are protecting the award instead of protecting the scout. As for the rest.... This scenario is way way too common to call it a major screw up or to question the scout's moral character. Pot is so common and so many kids have it that there will not be a police investigation or anything like that. The police would find nothing more than what you found when you investigated. Your scout had it and provided it to his fellow scouts. That is bad, very bad, but that does not make him a drug dealer. So what will happen is that the scout is going to face some immediate challenges. The court will scare him and give him an intervention program that usually works. Odds are this is the first time he's had pot and it is a crime of ease, convenience and peer and societal pressure. ----------------------------------- As for finessing the rules.... From what I understand, he has a few merit badges left. If he completes those merit badges, there is little to stop him from submitting an application to be recognized as an Eagle Scout directly to the district and request a disputed Eagle BOR. His troop doesn't even need to be involved. As long as the court issues are resolved and he can demonstrate the requirements are complete, BSA will award Eagle. The only thing that can stop that is the scout not knowing his rights and his troop's adult leaders not telling him about his rights. This exact scenario has occurred many times. We can be all self-righteous and try to deny him his accomplishments, but then we are not following the Scout Law ourselves because we have to hide information from the scout to get our way. IMHO, that's way more shameful than the mistake the scout made. Our duty is to protect all our scouts (thus membership issue) and to support our scouts (that's why you tell him about his rights as a scout and the procedures he can use). Anything else and we're not doing our job as good leaders.

Old_OX_Eagle83 ... I understand where you are coming from, but I have a different view. Scouting and being a scout is about character development. Eagle Scout is about completing requirements. If the kid did the work and met the requirements, I'd be fine with him getting Eagle ... after everything is resolved from the incident. I'm not so sure I'd want him to stand in front of the troop for an Eagle ceremony. But that's always a family choice. Membership ... I'd have him move on after receiving the rank. IMHO, the kid tripped at the finish line. Help him cross it and have him move on. It gives him a reason to be proud of himself and a value set to live up to. We all need that and especially those of us who have screwed up in the past. ------------------------------------------------ perdidochas - I've heard people suggest gear inspections in the past. I'm not a fan. They are never consistently or comprehensively done. You search gear. How about the clothes he's wearing? Pat downs and body searches? His friends? They might carry it for him? How about vehicles he's riding in or the troop trailer? Plus it means the incident is not in the past and basic trust is broken. I'd have a real hard time having him continue in the troop. ------------------------------------------------ AND ... I'd also try to be a friend in that I'd let him know it will be difficult for the next few days or weeks, but time will pass. We've all screwed up. But those screw ups are in the past and don't define who we are now. None of us are perfect. And ... I'd let him know that I will always be glad to greet him with a smile, shake his hand, hear how he's doing and talk fondly of our time in scouting together.

This will be an incredibly hard life lesson for this scout. QUESTION - How old is the scout? If 17, how many months until he turns 18? -------------------------- Eagle ... Would not be my biggest concern. ... But I would hate to see him not get Eagle because he's already done everything for it but a conversation (SMC) and a board of review. He's done the work and has tripped and fallen at the finish line. So if he got Eagle, I'd be fine with it. But I fully understand your not willing to sign off on the SMC. --- If he was a month or two before turning 18, I'd be tempted to send him to the district advancement chair so he can get his Eagle without a SMC. But he will have to explain to the BOR why there is no signature. --- If he had more than two or three months before turning 18, I'd tell him to come back to me in a few months after he gets everything resolved and evidence that everything is resolved. Then, I'd sign. -------------------------- But the real issue to me is his membership and protecting your troop. If he offered it to a similar age "friend", that is bad and unacceptable. Offering it to a younger scout, that's worse. How many other scouts do you want to lose over this? What example do you want to set? Will other parents hold back their kids because they don't want their sons going on weekend camp outs with another kid who has brought pot in the past. I would be kind and understanding ... but I'd immediately have a hard conversation with this kid right now and let him know his behavior is not compatible with scouting and he will probably need to look elsewhere for places to spend his time. -------------------------- I do have compassion for this but also a hard line. Pot is everywhere and easily available in our local high school. Plus, society is beginning to accept it. Youth is for learning and experimenting ... and making mistakes. So this one mistake does not make the kid a bad kid and it's a mistake many kids are making. But it was a very poor judgement call and reflects that his current mindset and interests may not be compatible with scouts right now.

You can only keep an achiever idle for so long before they leave to find somewhere else to achieve. From what I saw, a scout that completes everything early wants to complete things. If scouts stops offering things to work on, he'll move on. Even if he doesn't have Eagle. Even if they stay, it tends to poison their experience.

Old_OX_Eagle83 is right. Scout leaders talking about "too young" are not serving the youth. You serve the youth by putting on a good program and teaching and working the skills, the program and the requirements. As for advancement, that's an individual scout issue. Talking age is the wrong focus. IMHO, a scoutmaster planning to not sign off on a scoutmaster conference is mean and contemptible. I would hope the scoutmaster would have the spine to be honest with the scout instead of leaving the scout out in the wilderness thinking it's something he did. "Sorry Johnny. I know you've completed all the BSA Eagle expectations and officially per BSA you could become an Eagle Scout, but I just feel 12 or 13 years old is too young for Eagle. I know you are expecting a sign off now, but I just can't do it. Let's talk about this again in two or three years. If you want to pursue this further, here's the contact information for the district advancement chair. Also if this makes you upset, here's a list of other troops that you may want to transfer into." IMHO, scouting is supposed to excite, motivate and open opportunities. When we talk about delaying a motivated scout, we've lost focus and we're promoting the importance of the rank instead of the importance of the scout. Sorry ... this is a hot button topic for me. I've seen it happen.

Stosh ... Your "carry this logic further" are exactly right and very real. A CO can, through directing the unit leaders, choose the summer camp, popcorn sales, camporeees and other activities. Only when the scout can directly sign up (council high adventure for example) can the scout avoid CO dictates. The other option a scout has is to switch troops. You said it yourself. A CO could direct the troop leaders to not hold OA elections. Without unit level elections, scouts can't get into OA. Effectively, the CO banned OA for their scouts.

RememberSchiff ... The discussion in the Senate hearing was fascinating. https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/Digi...06466NCJRS.pdf I only read pages 19-30 and piecemeal of the first 10 pages. The 1986 law expanded to remove the commerce requirement. It made it illegal to solicit or advertise the material also. I guess that leverages the commerce clause without actually requiring a sale or exchange of material. I didn't see any of that in statement made to BSA about Challberg. Even then BSA could have refer it to police. But if they don't know of a crime having occurred and the family doesn't want to involve the police, it's hard for the BSA to go forward with a report to police that is essentially "we're reporting creepy behavior". IMHO, BSA was removing leaders before the laws had made it illegal. Please note that I have very different opinion on this stuff if it happened later when the laws were improved and people were more enlightened. I don't have a strict date, but anything 1995 onward (last 20 years).

RememberSchiff ... Still reading. The evolution of the law is always fascinating. I am having vivid memories of my college constituational law classes. ------------------------------ The 1977 "Proection of Children Against Sexual Exploitation Act" leveraged the commerce clause of the US Constitution. As such, it required "commerce" and "interstate" activity ... or the activity happened in the District of Columbia, a territory (Guam, Puerto Rico, etc), maritime waters, a federal prison or similar. From what I understood, Challberg had pictures he took. There was no discussion that he traded, sold or transported the pictures. Or that he transported the kids for the purposes of pornography across state lines. Page 28, middle column ... https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/Digi...93129NCJRS.pdf Fifth paragraph ... http://www.nytimes.com/1994/03/01/us...raphy-law.html ------------------------------ The best summary of these laws is here ... on page 4 ... http://www.law.umaryland.edu/marshal...2_07132012.pdf ------------------------------ It is interesting that from 1977 to 1982 no one had been prosecuted successfully based on the law. https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/publicatio....aspx?ID=86631 ---------------------------------------- Still reading ...

RememberSchiff ... The 2002 conviction was based on more current laws. Laws passed in 1988, 1996, 2002, 2003 and 2006 to address it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_p..._United_States From best of what I read, before the 1980s and in the early 1980s, child pornography was not illegal as the laws were missing or lacking. During that time obscenity laws tried to ban all pornography outright and the US Supreme Court held pornography was a first amendment right. But the USSC did hold that child pornography was different. So in this case the BSA had statements about actions in 1986 or earlier when from what I can see it was not necessarily illegal. Laws have changed. ======================================== RememberSchiff ... I'll fully agree with you on your last point. BSA is supposed to be the preeminent youth organization in the United States. They could have done more as an advocacy group. As a research and teaching group. Instead, they chalked it up to perverts and wanted those guys out. They could have done more. But then again, we could say the same thing about churches, schools, YMCA, etc etc etc. In fact, I get very upset that we have schools like Harvard, Princeton, Yale, etc etc etc that have whole colleges dedicated to teaching teachers, to teaching medicine, psychology ... AND THE LAW. Why did it take until the late 1980s and 1990s to understand the nature of pedophiles???? ???? ???? Why did it take until 1988 or so to start establishing effective laws ?????? I do wish BSA would have done more earlier. But I also wish all of society would have done more earlier. ======================================== AZMike ... My dad used to tell me stories about that too. His high school had pool times for each gender and each gender (male or female) were not required to have swim suits. Here's an interesting article on that with some good points. https://sites.google.com/site/histor...es/jumper-swim ---- Until 1962, the American Public Health Association pool management guidelines recommended male nude swimming in every edition. It was about keeping pools disinfected and disease free. Previous decades had polio and typhoid and other diseases to worry about. Filtration and keeping water clean was a big issue. ---- Schools followed suit (no pun intended) because they were following recommendations of the best authorities. ---- YMCA and Boys Club Operations manuals also followed the APHA guidelines. ---- Nude male swimming also became a patriotic response to the WWII need for cloth. During the war years, camps had nude swimming. ---- In 1962, APHA dropped nude swimming recommendation. I guess that's why I never swam nude at the YMCA as our YMCA was built in around 1969 and I remember swimming there around that time. ---- You could find pictures in Life Magazine and others about male nude swimming. I don't know if the pictures showed anything. The point is that it was common knowledge and accepted practice. ----- Here's a big one that I had yet to make the connection. Plumbing was not always available for bathing. People would go to streams to bathe. Soap was advertised as good for indoor and river use. I myself remember doing that at cabins in the 1980s. We'd make sure we bought biodegradable soap. Then early in the morning or late in the evening, we'd go to the lake and wash up.

I keep trying to match today's outrage with the good people who had those roles back then. So I keep trying to read and learn. A few curious things I read recently. - In 1953, Alfred Kinsey wrote "it is difficult to understand why a child except for its cultural conditioning should be disturbed by having it's genitalia touched." ... A concept so ugly to us now was not a red flag back then. That really surprised me. ... in another words ... not everyone considered certain acts as child abuse ... Page 226 ... http://www.futureofchildren.org/futu...ication_detail .... This triggered memories of poet Allen Ginsberg and his early advocacy. Again stuff that is incredibly ugly given today's knowledge was advocated for by a respected public figure back then. - "Child Abuse" of the 1970s was "The Battered Child Syndrome". I found some fleeting discussions of sexual abuse but that was about incest. Laws were about physical abuse and cruelty and mainly focused inward at the family. Discussions about when to take the child away from the parents, foster homes and adoption. - "Child Abuse" of the 1970s and 1980s did not any references to pedophiles. - Really surprising ... the legal definitions of child abuse often did not include showing the child pornography or taking pictures of naked children. Laws were amended to include that. (Really hard to find dates ... but from what I saw, I believe it was later in the 1980s or 1990s that laws were changed to include images). ... The nearest law I found was the 1988 Child Protection and Obscenity Act. It required having proof of ages for those taking pornographic images. - Clergy were not mandatory reports until 2003 or later and was triggered by the Boston Catholic church articles that won a Pulitzer Prize for the Boston Globe. - Time limits existed on mandatory reporting lawI found references to two years from the incident for some cases. http://lawweb2009.law.villanova.edu/...rown_Final.pdf 1994... http://www.futureofchildren.org/futu...ication_detail ============================================== So I just re-read the complaint. Given today's knowledge, Challberg is a pedophile and a predator. Given today's law, how he would be charged. ... But with the laws of 1986, what could Challberg have been charged with? Contributing to the delinquency of a minor? Providing beer and Bacardi to minors. Showing porn. (one reference in statement) ... I know many parents who let their own kids drink and parents who hosted let their kids have drinking parties. From the accusation statement, it is pretty clear you could not charge him with rape or anything like that.

RememberSchiff and packsaddle ... Hindsight is cheap. AZMike ... "Deference". Well said.

Knowlege was different. Laws were different. Parents, police and public behavior was different. It was a different world. In 1986, it was still hard to believe a coach or teacher would sexually abuse a student. Back then, we were still talking battered child and stranger danger. No one was talking about those we trust the most. David Walters wrote in 1975 "Virtually no literature exists on the sexual abuse of children." In 1977, Henry Kempe described it as "another hidden pediatric problem and a neglected area." The 1970s focused on child abuse as the battered child era. http://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/publishing/insights_law_society/ChildProtectionHistory.authcheckdam.pdf ------------------------ I really believe it was common for parents to want the leader gone, but not want a public trial that kids and adults in the city would tie back to their son. The issues were not understood as they are understood now. Back then as still happens now, I'm sure the parents and public often put some blame back onto the accuser. ------------------------ Back then, the statements were "battered child" and "stranger danger" and watching out for a guy driving around looking for a lost puppy. Now we talk about imbalances of power and grooming. ------------------------ Plus was BSA a mandatory reporter? It's only recently that clergy was added as mandatory reporters. And I'd bet that's true of youth groups. ================ It's cheap to blame those in the past. Things have evolved rapidly over the last 30 years and mostly in the last 15 to 20 years.

GeorgiaMom hit it on the head. "Silence is consent." Bad behavior needs to be addressed and clearly communicated that it is unacceptable. That's part of saying that the camp rules are the Scout Oath and Law. Parents send their kids on scouting events because it's about developing character and values. If I then heard my son was bullied, I'd be livid. mattman578 also hit it on the head. "you have a very limited time to correct the behavior before they forget what they did." Discussions and corrections need to be done quickly so that it's associated to the bad behavior. I've said this before. I do not believe in the statement "if any kid needs scouting that kid needs scouting." I'm okay if the leaders can control the collateral damage. But what I've seen is that one problem kid is poison and will drive five or more scouts away on their own. Plus in our troop, we need to be able to trust the boys to work in a positive way with each other. We won't be there every minute and we don't have the volunteers or the training to deal with behavior disorders. Bullying is abuse and it's not acceptable. No kid is perfect and every kid experiments with the boundaries of bad behavior. But that's why we are there as leaders. We need to quickly nip it in the bud. ------------------------------------- Sports have an advantage. The structure and control of sporting teams and events minimizes the opportunities for a bully. Take the field. Sit on the bench. Run sprints. Push ups. Learn your position. Stand here. Do that. etc etc etc. Scouting has much more independence and less structure and oversight. Because of that, scouts must want to behave and work together ... and bullying behavior is more visible. I'm not trying to start a sports versus scouting debate. It was raised earlier and I've thought about it.

Two quick comments.... --- Our troop really isn't into suspensions. Either you are a welcome member of the troop or you are not. If things change in the future, we'll welcome a scout back. But our troop doesn't really do time-outs, suspensions or the like. It's more like if you can work within the bounds of scouting, we are glad to have you. If you can't, then you need to look elsewhere. if things change, we'll be glad to have you back though. --- Troop guide ... should be for your best scouts, ... your quality OA scouts. I would not put a problem scout into that role. In fact, I would remove him from that role. All that situation can do is teach younger scouts bad habits, bad attitudes and give them bad experiences. Save it for your scouts who are friends to all and glad to pitch in when needed. IMHO, never have a problem scout as troop guide. First see if they can do EDGE with younger scouts in a positive way or a scoutmaster project. But troop guide is only asking for trouble

Should be another voting option. Like "Never heard of this before.". Glad our camps don't do it. Only had it happen once at Sea Base. And it was a staffer and it went really quick. Phones and consumer cameras are very good these days. We take our troop photos ourselves during one of the morning in-camp flags before breakfast. Plus people are already pestered with enough ways to spend / waste money. While it is "nice", camps already have enough bottle necks with health form checks, swim checks, beach talks, safety talks, bear talks, etc, etc etc. If I was a kid and just sat through a two+ hour drive to summer camp, I'd want to just get moving.

Scout's choice. Initially, usually a new den forms of the scouts that just joined. But scouts can switch patrols at any time given that the new patrol accepts them into the patrol. It's as easy as the scout and the PL letting the SPL ... and hopefully ... the SPL lets the SM know. IMHO, the patrols work the best when the scouts never change patrols. That's how they develop ownership and pride in their patrol. And if that patrol becomes just two or three scouts in their 7th year of scouting, fine. And if the patrol dies when those scouts age out, I'm okay with that too.

What is a "PTB" ?

twocubdad ... Good luck. Sounds like you are handling it. My only comment is never wait for the "come to Jesus" moments. If bad behavior exists, always make it clear that it's not acceptable in scouting. Let him know that you value and like him. But that if he wants that type of behavior he should look elsewhere. I always hate seeing behavior problems discussed at advancement SMCs and/or BORs. Why wait? Problems must be dealt with in a timely way. Unresolved problems ( ... uhhhh .... BSA president Gates are you listening ...) only fester and create more damage than the incident. Over ten years, we've had several scouts like that. With the first two, we waited way too long before the come to Jesus moment. They drove good kids away. Good kids don't want to be near them and it damages your troop. Now, I'm very willing to discuss with the parents and/or the scouts the boundaries of scouting and that if they don't want to value and work within those boundaries they should consider other places to spend their time. It's as simple as that. You want to be a scout. Here's what we value and what is needed for us to be successful. You don't want to work in those boundaries, then move on. If you can work in the scouting boundaries, then we'd love to have you. king ding dong ... Your experience with GTA BOR advancement on a kid who didn't do his POR sounds right. The SM and his ASMs should have dealt with it. The committee members on the BOR are administrative and not fallback ASMs. Committee members should be working on infrastructure and not know / see enough of the boys to judge if they did their POR. I know it's not always this clean. But if you are not the SM, then you need to trust your SM or educate and improve your SM. I know things are not always that ideal, but its unfair to a scout if he was to get approval for specific requirements from the designated unit leader that works with the scouts and then to get reversed by someone else.

Mark Hancock ... Before I forget ... I should mention I sympathize with you as your earlier posting of your experience reflects my families experience with the local YMCA. The memory was triggered by reading Trail's Life core values document. The original YMCA seems to reflect many of the same values as Trail's Life. But today's YMCA is very different and it is an organization I find hard to support ... mainly because the organization does not hold the same values as it held when I grew up.

Mark Hancock - Where are the membership standard documented? I just read the core values. Just interested.

Peregrinator ... We're playing word games and we are off topic. I believe I used the term "trademark" correctly. Perhaps I should have said it's a "trademark issue" instead of just "trademark". BSA has individually registered trademarks in Boy Scouts, Cub Scouts, Varsity Scouts, Eagle Scout, Sea Scout, etc etc. And the congressional charter does come into play. Choosing "Hacker Scouts" was to be muddy the waters leveraging the long good history of scouting in the USA and also claim a more "edgy current" name. Given all the new technology merit badges, I'm not surprised BSA is trying to overlap in this arena too. Perhaps it's best to just say it's an intellectual property issue. You either defend your intellectual property or you surrender it. Confusion ... I very much disagree. The name promotes confusion and degrades the other BSA intellectual property. As Cub Scout parents have little understanding of Boy Scouts and how it works, people that only see Hacker Scouts would not know enough to not realize a difference or that that it is not part part of the scouting movement or that something larger existed that was "scouting" world wide. The name was chosen to leverage another entities good will and muddy the waters.

RememberSchiff - Hacker Scouts is a completely different issue. "Scouts" is a BSA trademark. If BSA doesn't consistently defend the use of it's trademarks, it loses the rights to those trademarks and then they become public domain. It's a legal rights issue and not reflecting a desire to not work with others. Plus Hacker Scouts choose that name to leverage the goodwill and history of scouting in the USA. It was chosen on-purpose with the intention to leverage the goodwill of the trademarked name. Here are those trademarks. http://www.scouting.org/sitecore/content/Licensing/Protecting%20the%20Brand/Boy%20Scouts%20of%20America%20Trademark%20Listing.aspx

Mark Hancock ... Well said and I respect your words and approach. I'm sad you won't be with BSA anymore. You represent Trail's Life very well. For me and my family, we're sticking with BSA. In our life, faith formation is through attending mass and religious education. Scouting is about adventure and character. Other than people getting upset about changes, I have seen zero effect from the May 2013 changes.

Okay ... final one ... Advancement transfer in Microsoft Excel worksheet lists essentially every BSA award for use in transferring advancements. http://www.traillifeusa.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/Transfer-Module-2013-12-01-beta-13.xls Wait wait wait ... a few quotes "... we believe that the men and boys left behind in the BSA ..." .... or .... "... in explaining our program, its origins, or differences between TLUSA and the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) there are times where it is both necessary and appropriate to make reference to BSA and or its policies." Not a competitor? My Chihuahua it isn't.

... Didn't read enough ... Not a competitor? Open these pages from Trail's Life site and store. Advancement --> http://www.traillifeusa.com/faqtab/a...trail-life-usa Advancement graph --> http://www.traillifeusa.com/wp-conte...13/10/BSA3.png """ TROOP """ Flag --> http://traillifeusastore.com/product...ial-troop-flag Referencing BSA --> http://www.traillifeusa.com/faqtab/guidelines-communications-referencing-bsa/ Trail's Life may be a good program. I don't know. Just don't try to blow smoke. Trail's Life is a re-branded BSA program with a Christian emphasis and other smaller tweaks. The only sad part is that 20 years from now there will be adults that say "I earned the Freedom award." and it will always be followed with "It's like Eagle Scout but for the Trail's Life program." It happens now with Venturing and GSUSA. It will happen with Trail's Life too.