fred8033

Zip lock. But if a few are destroyed, fine. We can work with the scout to fix that.

John-in-KC wrote: "WHO CARES about the MB application beyond the Troop? " The scouts should if they knew enough. Commonly, troops screw up, fall apart or volunteers just make mistakes. If a troop collapses or someone forgets to submit the advancement form, the blue card is proof that it is complete. As some troops have a mass of extra MB and then re-fill the stash with those just earned, I can understand why some people might be missing advancement credit in ScoutNET. It's common for a scout to go to a new troop after the other collapsed and his scout records are a mess. Having

John-in-KC ... Good catch. Those "exact" words don't exist, but it is still effectively correct. I even found it documented in BSA advancement news November 2011 on page five. http://www.scouting.org/filestore/advancement_news/512-075_Nov_WB.pdf Now, I'm going to need to keep searching because I really thought I read those exact words (or close to it) in a BSA published document like the GTA or ACPP. BUT the statement is still correct. The only "BSA" (read as national) MB card is the blue card. Other forms of MB evidence don't have to be accepted by other troops, other cou

OGE hit it on the head. Our emphasis should NOT be on correcting or controlling the scout. We should focus on correcting the people providing the program. The scoutmaster is still in the loop and part of the process. If scouts don't want to follow the BSA process, then a heart to heart about being in the troop is in order. But it's NOT an approval. We've seen it even in this discussion thread about SM's still having approval authority (which he never really had) or others indicating their troop would just keep going as they have been and ignore the clarification. The key is th

Using a parent as a MB counselor generally defeats the purpose of the MB program unless the parent really has special expertise in the topic. I'm not against using a parent as a MB counselor any more or any less than using the same MB counselor for more than one or two merit badges. IMHO, the benefit of the MB program is only partially in each topic. The bigger benefit is learning to reach out and work with people. Followed by learning to complete requirements and chase/close-out obstacles to completing something worthwhile.

I'm still a hold out on whether "scout accounts" are illegal. It really depends on the "how" it's done and IRS interpretations. What is clearly illegal per IRS documentation is holding a unit fundraiser and then portioning the $$$ to those who worked the event. Non-profit dollars must be used to serve the non-profit purpose and not targetted to benefit specific individuals. So effectively, you can use the $$ to reduce the cost for everyone, but not for those who worked the event. Similarly requiring members to participate in a fundraiser as part of membership in the non-profit i

Fix this BEFORE the Webelos cross over. It's not their issue. Families that were members when this happened own the issue. Remember that exisiting families BENEFITTED from lower costs and reimbursed expenses. Remember that existing families could have helped the treasurer or brought up the issue or changed reimbursement policies or cared enough to know what is going on. #1 Make a list of who owes money. Review it. Decide who you want to collect money from. Call them at least twice. Follow up. Monitor it. Track it. Decide when you will give up. #3 Audit what happene

Eagledad ... strong response for a topic that you assert 90% of the scouters wouldn't care less about. Counseling and advising is great and the full purpose, but it is very different than being a road block.

Okay. Sometimes you learn "secrets" years later that should have been obvious and laugh because it's either so rediculous or you should have known it. Last night my son and I had a private going away dinner for him as he leaves for USMC boot camp tomorrow. One of his old patrol mates joined us. The scouts in his patrol bonded and are still good friends. They still get together at times. So I heard a few stories. One that should have been obvious was his patrol name, Wolverine. They were proud of it. During many late night capture the flag games I'd hear the cry "Wolverines !

koolaidman wrote: "I know this "development" may deflate some SM egos in my area." Alot of scoutmasters need their egos deflated.

Our house is littered with the lower leggings of switchbacks. Trying to match sizes and leggings gets to be a real pain. We are now in the mode that we just never remove themm or we never put them back on. Sure we unzip partially for venting if it's really hot out, but we never fully remove. It's just too easy to lose and just too hard find the right set to get them ready to go again.

JoeBob raised a good point. Our council copy of the national training data has been horribly hit and miss. They will have some, but not others. It's like national has a data feed to the council that runs nightly or weekly. And it fails now and then (i.e. read as September & October). So what I saw is training done in July or November is showing up right now. Training done on MyScouting.org in Sep or Oct was not showing. Very frustrating. Hard to take the whole effort seriously when the data quality is so poor.

This is what I've done. For the next committee meeting ... or the next time you see them ... make sure you have WiFi ... bring a laptop. As soon as they show up, pause for a moment and get them signed into myScouting.org. If they have trouble signing in, get their password reset and get them connected to their email to get the password. If still can't get in or they don't show up, call their house, go visit and wait as they complete it. Their seeing you show up at their house will help them realize how important it is. Hopefully, they won't be such a pain two years from now.

Does Patrols in your troop stay together for a long time, or are the members moving around a bit more? ... Long time, six to eight years. Do you feel like this is a good thing for your troop or not? ... Very good. What does your troop do with an inactive or disfunctional patrol? ... We would reflect on the troop program, offerings and scout retention. Patrol organization is a scout matter. Who does it? The SPL and PLC or the Scoutmasters? ... None of those. Scouts organize their own patrols and choose their patrol leaders. ..... Age based patrols. New scout p

duplicate.(This message has been edited by fred8033)

Beavah wrote: "Yah, but apparently da inference was right, based on what yeh report above. Yeh have zero experience with troops that don't run NSP, and zero experience with troops that run mixed age, stable patrols" Are you confused or just wanting to confuse. You did not ask about new scout patrols and it was not mentioned once in your post. You asked "Have yeh ever had any real experience with a mixed-age patrol troop?" I did list my experience with mixed-age patrols as an ASM. I did not itemize my outside experience as it didn't seem necessary but I've done the WB bit (bobwhite),

Beavah - How quick you are to infer ignorance or lack of experience by someone else! That's pretty small. You may have more years of experience, but more years doesn't make it right. It just makes it entrenched and one-dimensional. ===================== Yes, I've been involved in both stlyes of troops. My oldest joined in a troop that had scouts start in a new scout patrol. From there, the scouts could change to other patrols if and when they wanted. Most stayed together their entire scouting career. My son and his patrol buddies did not know each other before boy scouts, bu

I'm amazed how people assert things such as "Same age patrols tend to have an environment of slower scout growth..." or "Mixed age patrols should encourage the patrols to recruit new scouts every year to keep ages balanced". Some very authoritative statements are made that are opposite of my experience. Perhaps it all comes down to Your milage may vary and do what works for you. I'm comfortable with similar age patrols and letting scouts choose the patrol they want to be in if they want to change. It works well for us. I like the environment it creates. Scouts get to start prac

We've done that before. Many scouts said it was the best camp out of their scouting career. - Really think. What do you want to accomplish? What you want to keep like a summer camp? What you want to keep like a normal troop / patrol camp out? - Choose specific specific badges to work on. We choose fishing, motor boating, water sports and canoeing. - Choose a good location. We choose an issolated state park group camp site that had a nice short walk to a small store that the scouts would visit to buy treats now and then. - Variety - Have plenty of activities. We did day trip

We've done that before. Many scouts said it was the best camp out of their scouting career. - Really think. What do you want to accomplish? What you want to keep like a summer camp? What you want to keep like a normal troop / patrol camp out? - Choose specific specific badges to work on. We choose fishing, motor boating, water sports and canoeing. - Choose a good location. We choose an issolated state park group camp site that had a nice short walk to a small store that the scouts would visit to buy treats now and then. - Variety - Have plenty of activities. We did day trip

chaoman45 ... Just ready the scoutmaster handbook on The Boy-Led Patrol and you will do fine. http://www.zion412.org/Library/BoyScoutLeaderHandbooks/ScoutmastersHandbook1of3.pdf -------------- chaoman45 ... You've hit one of the big eternal debates: How to structure patrols? People will look at the exact same situation and see diametrically opposed interpretations. Some want older "experienced" scouts to lead these groups. Others are okay with same-age scouts leading each other. In the end, most people just defend what theyve always done as the right answer. IMHO, read

IMHO, so what if a patrol dies as scouts age out. New scout patrols work well as they have enough members. I've seen three scout patrols of 16 year olds that seem to work fine. They just happen to also then be the scouts that often take up troop leadersihp positions. IMHO, the real key is let the scouts work it out and preferrably, let the scouts choose what patrol they want to be in. If each scout chooses such that it becomes age based, so what. At least the scouts get to experience the decision process and the results of their decisions.

Merlyn_LeRoy .... Merry Christmas.

My experience this year was ... my home town YMCA ... which was connected strongly to the city churches when I was young. Now, the title is just "The Y" and the sign says "Happy Holidays". They are trying to market Christian and Christ out of the equation. Under history on their web site it says: "The Y was founded in London in 1844 by George Williams and a small group of his friends to help young people find a positive foundation for their lives. The YMCA came to America in Boston in 1851, and quickly spread throughout the United States." Positive foundation? It was a Bible

Sentinel947 wrote: "... mentally challenged ..." I think we've all said it. I just want to be careful. It's not the mentally challenged ... or the physically challenged. They do fine in scouting. In fact, they are often the best scouts in the troop. It's the scouts with EBD, emotional behavior disorders. - Scouts that become majorly fixated and then can't listen to direction. - Scouts that are quick to lose it and don't handle stress. - Scouts once they do lose it, swear, hit, throw tantrums and potentially hurt others. - Scouts where these behaviors are "clinicial