IM_Kathy

having been a girl scout for a few years in my youth, belonged to a high school church youth group, and been on many softball and basketball teams... and as an adult been involved with coaching softball, baseball, basketball, and soccer... and as an adult still help my old church youth group... and as an adult been involved with Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, and Girl Scouts... I will say the following...

sports wise: unless you are one of the best players on the team you will not get much leadership experience there because if you do say something other players will be like "whatever"

church group wise: while there are a few chances at leadership, it usually isn't until your last couple of years of high school that you get that chance... and that also depends on the youth group you are in. The one I was involved with the Juniors and Seniors planned and put on retreats for the 7th and 8th graders. And then the seniors and college students planned and put on the retreat for the rest of the high schoolers. we also did a summer service project, but while they did a lot of learning about how to do different skills the planning is done by the adults we volunteer our time and skills to.

with scouts: it's as good the child and leaders allow it to be. My girl scouts (9th graders) are the oldest active troop in our unit and they do a ton of helping the younger troops from leading games to teaching skills. My son who was for so many years more of a "follower" has really blossomed in this last year and has done a great job at assistant patrol leader and as a helper with the troop guides that his Scout Master recommended him to be a Den Chief even though he's a year younger than they normally have their scouts be. I've sat in on 1 of the meetings he was working with (actually I was more in the next room because I had so much stuff to do that I needed a big table so I stayed in there but could hear all that went on) and I wish I would've had a den chief that could back when I had a den.

the other advantages to scouting is that it is so nationally known and respected... you put down Eagle or Gold Award on a college or job application employers and admission councilors know exactly what all you did to earn such an award. where as if I put down "member of St xxxx youth group" they have no clue.

1. Introduce yerself

IM Kathy - duh LOL

2. Say a lil something about your involvement in Girl Scouting and any other scouting programs

for Girl Scouts:

* former Moingona council - now Greater Iowa

* was a helper for a couple of years

* was a co leader for a few years

* now I'm leader for a group of 4 Senior Girl Scouts (all in 9th grade) whice I'm very proud of... I've been their leader for a few years now and this is the first troop in our unit that has stayed active into high school years and they all plan to stay until they bridge to adults.

* I'm also the SUM - it's a small unit with just 8 troops, but our troop sizes have increased and the troops have gotten a lot more involved that they use to

For Cub/Boy Scouts:

* my husband was den leader for tiger and wolf

* I was den leader for Bear and both years as Webelos (my husbands work started to travel a lot more)

* I'm currently a Troop Committee member for my son's troop

* I'm merit badge counc. for Swimming, Life Saving, Family Life, Cooking, Sports, & Astronomy

3. You can include an update on your current Girl Scout program

my girls haven't decided whether they want to work on the new Journey program - since they have been doing it the "old" program for so long I've left it totally up to them. They have started their prerequisits (sp? it's too early to spell correctly LOL) for the Gold Award and a few of them have come up with a few different ideas of what they may want to do for their final project.

this coming summer the girls are planning a trip to South Dakota. they've picked out lots of things they'd like to do there and now have to do a couple of fundraisers to find out if they have to drop any of them. This is really our last "big trip" since the next year they will all be turning 16 and will start having jobs and a couple have plans of working at camp so I don't want to even attempt scheduling around all of that. But the girls have already discussed having a big final campout when they bridge out to celebrate.

my girls spent a lot of this fall helping out some of the younger troops by leading games for troops to have a parent meeting. They also led a meeting for all new scouts to teach them how to do a flag ceremony and how our unit does "line up" at beginning of our unit events.

they are also helping me in planning something new to our area - we're trying to organize a county wide encampment (camporee - what ever you want to call it) for juniors and above. It'll be much like BSA does their district camporees.

I would love to get things to mix the 2... especially around the holidays time of year because it can be very hard to schedule everything for familys that have both boys and girls.

there are few things that keep this from happening here...

1) tighter rules with girl scouts

2) girl scouts goes through high school so if you're doing a true mix it would be best to get cubs, boys, and girls... and to get 3 groups to mesh is very hard to do

3) my son did cub scouts here in this town, but left the boy scout troop due to a whole lot of crap and inactivity and is now happy in a different town, but in doing that let's just say the SM would not be interested in working along with me (although it's interesting because his wife is a troop leader for GS and will work with me as I'm SUM, but there are times when I can tell she's also got some hostility towards me - oh well)

we did try to work our december caroling with the cubs this year, but with our unit events they are assigned to different troops to organize, plan, and run... I tried my hardest to make it happen, but it wasn't my call... the leader for the troop in charge of event said she didn't want to do it together... so guess we're each going our own.

oh yeah, and I have to share my sons best design he ever came up with.

it was a "Pizza Boat"

he painted the bottom of his boat (milk carton) brown crusty looking... then took a piece of the milk carton and put in hole for the mast to go through. then he put on cheese and pepperonis - stuck in mircowave just a bit to melt it up and then covered with contact paper to make sure nothing fell off during his races. on his mast he did a Pizza Hut design but changed the words to say Pizza Boat.

turned out looking great... had to take several pictures of it because using food products that was the only keepsake he could keep for it because I wasn't going to grow any future science experiments

when my son was in cub scouts we did our raingutter regatta a little different than many that have mentioned.

we had the boys register their boats based on level and had judges vote for 1,2,3 place. those boys got ribbons stating such. every boy got a participation patch or ribbon. Then the boys were free to race who ever and as often as they wanted. we didn't do brackets or winners/losers for race. they did sometimes have to wait in line to get a chance to race, but it went very well.

make sure you have the gutters well supported because the boys will bump into what ever you have them set on and if not on securely could make a very big mess.

I love this program, but am wondering if it is approved by BSA or GSUSA? I'm involved with both and would like to take this to them, but if it's not approved then the scouts would not be allowed to wear their medals on their uniforms.

my son started really camping when he was a webelos... my daughter's girl scouts a year ago. the 3 of us each has our own equipment we store in our camping backpack so that all we have to do is add needed clothes and grab our sleeping bag and go.

* flashlight - if setting up tents at night a headlight is best

* poncho - duh

* handytool - but if cubscout he needs to earn his whittling chip to carry a pocket knife

* flint

* waterproof matches

* toilet paper - take some and wrap around a wood craft stick and stick in a baggy... sometimes you'll be some where that doesn't have TP or even a toilet... also if you're at a place that has it the TP can be used to help start a fire when everything around is wet

* small package of kleenex

* mess kit with hobo set (silver ware) - get metal incase you ever have to use anything to help with cooking... both my kids have the fit together set that can be used to cook for individual also.

* duct tape

* personal first aid kit

now in my gear I have a few extras that I keep in my bucket sit upon that I need when my girl scouts go camping since we don't have a trailor like BSA's do...

* shovel

* wisp broom and dust pan

* fold up saw

* extra tent stakes

* rope

* larger 1st aid kit

* mallet

in cold weather camping we always throw in some hand/foot warmers. when we throw in clothes we also pack for the weather, making sure we have layers, and pack extra socks.

gloves that I love to use when weather is just a tad cool are batting gloves - they allow me to still grip things. I use to work outside in the winter here in Iowa, and most of the time that's about all I ever wore unless it got below zero and then I just put those stretchy gloves over them.

shoes - a cheap pair of water proof hiking boots... don't need to get anything fancy until you're going on a long hiking trip like philmont - then you want to spend a little more and get perfect fit etc.

our troop made a quinzee last winter on a campout. Thankfully it was a cabin campout so the boys had somewhere warm and dry to come into when it got too much for them. They did the piling the night we got there and then did the digging out the next day. It was a lot of fun to sit back and watch.

we also had a tent outting where the next day they went skiing, snowboarding, or tubing... they enjoyed it so much they decided to do it again this year. Although after 3 injuries of snowboarders we are restricting snowboarding to those that are profecient in it.

we also have a cabin outting where the new scouts get to work on their fire chit and totem chip.

I don't use this - I make my own spreadsheets and do it myself... but this url is either the one my sons boy scout troop uses or is close to it...

http://www.youthrecordkeeper.com/index.lasso

I love Liz's idea of how to run it and award winners.

I'd do that with setting up tents, fire building (without lighting - racing for fires often ends badly), first aid splinting, first aid support carries, strecher building and transporting, lashing a tripod, tying knots (square, tautline, two half hitch, and maybe bowline)

you could set up a basic orienteering course - have the scouts teach compass skills and get them to learn their pace count. then have them run the course - which ever team gets closest to final point wins.

you're serving lunch... what about having the webelos help the boy scouts cook something basic with dutch ovens.

When a scout has more than 1 position which patch should he wear? My son is an assistant patrol leader and is now becoming a den chief for a webelos den.

I know for adults they wear their Highest position, is this the same for the boys? and what ranking would a chief be? is it okay to wear his troop position badge (what ever it is) and then just wear his cord?

Astronomy

Cooking

Family Life

Lifesaving

Sports

Swimming

Oh man, this sounds all too familiar. My son moved up from cubs to boys almost 2 years ago. He was so excited to be able to hear all the things he was going to be able to do that he heard so often in cub scouts "When you're a boy scout you'll get to........"

We joined our local troop and found a mess... older boys being disrespectful, campouts being cancelled, SM only involved if it benefitted his son.

A few of the adults tried everything to make changes, but SM wasn't accepting of any of it. My son told me he wanted to quit scouts, and I asked him if he wanted to quit scouts or that troop. He said that troop, so we set out to find one that did the things that he liked and that enforced good conduct from all the scouts. I was his den leader in cubs and when he moved troops the other 2 that I had as cub scouts and 1 boy that was a year older moved over as well. The oldest boy in the troop actually wanted to switch too, but he was so close to eagle he thought it would be hard to switch so he decided to stay and suffer through until he got his eagle and then he was done with scouting.

pretty sad when it gets like that. But, now these 4 boys that switched troops are really loving scouts. They attend almost all troop meetings and only miss a campout if there's a conflict. Only reason for us having occassional conflict is from different school districts, but it works out. It is a bit more of a drive, but I'll tell ya what - it is sooooooo worth it!

Just a quick intro...

I'm Kathy. Girl Scout leader for Senior Troop and SUM for them as well. Boy Scouts I'm a merit badge councilor for several badges and just a general all around helper where ever they need me.

This was one of my biggest questions with Girl Scouts and with Cub Scouts. Here in the midwest there are a lot of activities that you really need the warm summer days to do.

With Cub Scouts the pack would have an event each month, but many of the boys who were in dens that didn't meet during the summer didn't even know about them. I was lucky in that I didn't work during the summer and all my cub scouts were able to get to meetings during the day, so they would meet at my place after lunch once a month and they'd work on their outdoor skills and would be informed of all the pack activities.

With Girl Scouts when my daughter was younger I was just a co-leader and went with what all the other troops did and what the leader wanted to do. I was asked to step up as leader a few years ago and while we don't have "troop meetings" we have troop campouts during the summer. Our unit use to have just a few events through out the year and I would hear from all the girls who had brothers in Cub Scouts saying how they wished they were in Cub Scouts instead of Girl Scouts... so, when I was asked to be SUM I jumped at the chance. Our unit now has an event every month except August.

So, I guess what I'm saying is if you don't like the way things are done then step up and voice your opinions, and if that doesn't work then step up and volunteer and make it happen.

As for having to wait for leaders in Girl Scouts to get trained... there is a way to get around that policy that our unit does... there needs to be a trained adult with CPR/1st aider there. That person does NOT have to be "the leader" We have currently trained leaders sit in on the meetings for the new troops until they are approved and trained... it is a great way to see their "style" and make suggestions as well. For example I've sat in on 2 troops this year and they both had great leaders, but I highly recommend in meetings right off the bat to go over fire and tornado drills, bathroom policies, buddy system, and the like.

Another thing we have done that has helped new scouts get right into the swing of things is having an older troop host a new scouts meeting. They invite all scouts who have just signed up with the unit. There they learn the quiet sign, Girl Scout sign, and handshake. They also learn how we do line-ups at SU events and how to do a flag ceremony. Then they play a fun game or two. We ask all adults to stay at that meeting, we have the Daisy parents sit together and talk with their leaders so they can discuss meeting times and dates as well as to get to know each other.

ok, I've rambled on long enough LOL