HICO_Eagle

I stopped supporting UW ever since some chapters of the United Way stopped supporting Scout units during the Clinton administration. There have been numerous allegations about both UW and CFC diverting financial support to "underdonated" organizations like Lambda Legal Defense. Regardless of the veracity of those claims, I'd rather donate directly to the organization than go through a pass-through.

I have a very good friend whose brother has absolutely no interest in attending Wood Badge (he's 50 something). Why should he go?! Afterall, he's an Eagle Scout. End of conversation. Well, let me clarify. I have never taken a "bad attitude" into training with me. I have, however, developed a disdain for courses after they ended and it was clear I had wasted my time. I got nothing from Scoutmaster Fundamentals or Trainers Development Course that I didn't already know. The sharing with other Scout leaders would have been helpful if I hadn't already been getting that in spades from Scout

Lisa -- Good on you for doing what you felt you needed to for your son. My point was that you don't need to go to WB to talk to other Scouters and get suggestions. I got it at summer camps by keeping my eyes and ears open and talking with some of the more grizzled Scouters but you can do some of the same at Camporees, Roundtables, etc. although (truth in advertising) many Scoutmasters will send surrogates to Roundtable. At one troop we had a direct conflict between Roundtable and troop meetings, in another, I just didn't have time for both. I highly suggest WB and other training f

Fantastic! It's great to hear some good news these days ...

One thing I liked about Wood Badge was that it is the only place, save perhaps this board, where I got to spend real time talking about scouting with dedicated scouters. Um, I got that in my first year (and beyond) as an ASM by sitting down and talking with other Scoutmasters at morning coffee and cracker barrels at summer camp. The other Scoutmasters were frequently old-timers (as evidenced by the number who proudly continued to wear their ODs or forest-green uniforms instead of the de la Renta uniform). Wood Badge won't make a crappy leader into a good one -- but it might make him

When you are preparing for a big expedition like a week-long trek, how do you do that? It is one thing to say "have practice hikes" and another to have a sense of what those practice hikes are like? Are your practice hikes tightly controlled or are they just hikes for the sake of getting miles under the belt? Yes, we do practice hikes or practice campouts. Usually, the hike or campout is very clearly advertised as such with specific goals. Those goals may be specific skills like low-impact camping or simply to get used to trekking X miles with 40 pounds on their back. You seem to h

It has just seemed that it is harder to get the Boy Scouters to go to training. Cub Scouters tend to know they need it so it is not as hard of a sell. Of course, doing the DL training again and again gets old. We do have a training chair. It seems to me you may have some self-selection bias affecting your sample populations. My experience has been that adults involved in Cub Scouting are far more likely to NEED the training. There seem to be far more adults in Cub Scouting who were not involved in the program as Cub Scouts and even those who were have dimmer recollections of what it was

I don't remember the Red Berets being "beloved". I grew up with the flight cap or baseball cap -- the campaign hat was impractical and the beret was just an idiotic European affection. I can't even remember seeing any Scouts wearing it except for out-of-towners who usually dropped it within 6 months after moving in-state. I don't mind Sliwa, NYC needed something to protect people when he started the Guardian Angels, but the berets were just stupid regardless of who wore them. They have got to be the most impractical headwear ever devised; they don't block sun or rain from your eyes or

I grew up hammock-camping and never really saw a need to go beyond 3/8" rope with a bowline or eyesplice on the hammock O-ring and a few wraps around the tree trunk to finish back off at the O-ring with a tautline and two extra half-hitches. That's an interesting knot there but I like the added value of showing the Scouts the versatility of the knots they need to learn for advancement.

We've been doing mostly car camping lately so we bring it with us but when backpacking I use a mixture of packing it in and a filter with iodine as an emergency backup. Iodine or PolarPure are great for killing obnoxious organics but won't get rid of chemicals or "floaties" as some of my boys called them.

No kidding True Believer! It amazes me how society doesn't want to let these young men grow up until they're magically Voting Age. Some of my boys' eyes bug out when I remind them that just 100 years ago they might be the chief wage-earner in the house at their age. I had always learned that you can call them boys or Scouts since it is the Boy Scouts but never EVER call them "kids". I never really thought about it until now but I think the fact our adult leadership was frequently absentee during a lot of troop/patrol activities was a growth factor for a lot of the boys in our t

Not only is the patch ridiculously large, but the logo on it is silk screened or some other similar process, meaning it'll eventually get trashed from repeated cleaning unless you get the shirt dry cleaned. This prompted a thought. On a recent visit to the local Scout Shop, I looked over the uniform parts and patch bins because I was curious about the Centennial uniform and looking for uniform parts for my newly-Webelos nephew. I was dismayed at the cheap look and feel of the new patches, even the red troop numerals but most importantly, the American flag patch! I'm flabbergasted t

Why is it that when you attend a Wood Badge course you are separated from your friends? I thought the best way to align patrols was putting all the Scouts in a room and letting them form their own gangs as boys do? It seems to me that this is an example of dividing a troop into patrols; instead of having patrols that make up a troop. I can't tell you the book answer since I haven't actually taken the course or taught it. From what I can tell, there's nothing in the course that I didn't get already as a Scout or after that in the military. However, I would venture that the

Lisa, I'd disagree with that idea of how boys (or girls) become popular. I've seen an incredible number of slack-offs and leeches become "popular" because they were "fun" to be around. Being "fun" by the way doesn't necessarily mean doing what he is supposed to do -- especially with teenage boys. In fact, the boy who is conscientious about keeping the campsite clean, working on program or service projects instead of playing games, etc. is quite often less likely to be popular than the gamer who lets his patrol sleep in, pulls pranks on the less-popular scouts, etc. OA can be a very goo

You taxes support every church in the city, county & state you live in! Whoa! This is the same major fallacy that half the country appears to labor under. Your taxes do not support an organization simply because they are tax-exempt. Taxpayer funds are NOT expended on them, ergo there is no tax support. This is directly analogous to President Obama's proposal to cap tax deductions for charitable giving, saying "it's not fair" that someone who makes more money gets to deduct "more" for giving the same amount. You are taxed on the portion of your income that exceeds various expe

If the boys are 15 - 16 year old scouts, they're not going to change units at this stage of the game. I don't know where you get this but I've seen plenty of boys change troops at that age and not just because their family moved. Sometimes their friends or role models have moved and they have realized the troop is no longer meeting their needs.

Unless National is revising the requirements, the HB still has to have the same basic material. Sounds like more of a packaging and presentation strategy. Well, my problem with the 11th Edition is that it DOESN'T have the same basic material. I sure hope the 12th Edition brings back some of the material that was deleted from the 9th or 10th editions in favor of useless white space on the margins or glossy photos that don't add substance.

I'd like to know how the BSA's e.g. litigation over the Cradle of Liberty building is supposed to "help the community" I'd like to know how the ACLU and other groups' continued harassment of symbols of traditional American culture like BSA as illustrated by their attempts to eject Scouting from the Cradle of Liberty is supposed to help the community? They could of course attempt to set up an alternative youth organization that did for the counterculture what BSA does for Rockwell's America but it's far easier to attack the BSA.

Sorry for raising another sore point Lisa. It sure sounds like your troop needs what we used to call Junior Leader Training or Patrol Leader Training. If the adults want the boys to demonstrate better leadership they need to 1) show them how to do it and 2) give them the room to exercise it. For that matter, your adults seem to need some basic review of traditional Patrol Method. Good luck!

You know it's a sign of the times when someone has to complain about having 5 adults for every 3 Scouts on an outing. Most units I've been associated with have had a tough time getting 2-4 adults on a trip. The Boys should be allowed to work their program -- with 10 adults going, I'd say 2 adults could go with the Scouts for safety, the other 8 should form up an Old Goat patrol. Perhaps you could have a discreet word with your Unit Commissioner who could say something to the Troop Committee?

I wouldn't allow the Scouts or Adults in debt to just continue vouchering. That's exactly like what our federal government is doing today. I prefer the clarity of using camperships (with or without sweat equity depending on situation) specifically approved by the troop committee. Not all Scouts or adults may be able to work out a sweat equity solution -- the troop committee hopefully will know and understand what's appropriate for his/her specific situation -- but you don't want to encourage a "welfare" attitude either (as far as I'm concerned, that's a part of the 9th point of the Scout Law

I think this particular thread was spun as a result of my statement in the original thread about just letting the troop raise its "fair share" without having to go through the rigmarole of the FOS pitch. I'm not in favor of more mandated fees, that sets up yet another rigorous structure that we don't really need and reduces the flexibility we have to take care of less fortunate Scouts. I don't mind FOS, we need to pay for services, insurance, etc. What I DO mind is losing time at a meeting or court of honor for a pitch that no one (in our troop) really wants to hear anyway. I'd

Reread them Merlyn. All the citations I provided you were about trying to deny BSA the use of public facilities. Are you now changing your story again to say you didn't mean access to classrooms, access for recruiting, etc.? I disregarded cases like the one in DC where Queer Nation recruited a dormant Eagle Scout to volunteer to be a SM or ASM so they could try to sue when he was denied. I disregarded that because Queer Nation's goals had nothing to do with what you asked for. Face it, you asked for something, got a truckload of it with little effort and then changed your story on wha

Okay, so we've moved from intellectual dishonesty to outright misrepresentation. Let's review shall we? DanKroh said, "No one is trying to stop scouting from using public facilities" I responded with, "Most of the participants in Scouting pay taxes. They are therefore as entitled to use available public facilities as any other citizen group, whether it's the school band or a chess club or drama club. However, AUSCS and *sexual lobby groups have taken it on themselves to deny Scouting that right rather than create their own groups" Merlyn then comes back and says, "Cite even ONE

Fundraising is a necessary evil. I accept that. What I don't need is them sucking up 20-30 mins of a meeting (or God forbid, a court of honor!) dropping a guilt trip on our parents. One of the troops I've worked with finally had it with FOS so we told the council to let us know what our fair share was and we'd get it done internally but we didn't want the FOS presentation. The committee then let the troop parents know what our goal was and how much we'd gotten thus far. We covered our tab, saved our courts of honor and were much happier.