JerseyScout

Alright, so my new question to throw at district will be how do I get Climb on Safety Instructor training. I was told by them that we needed climbing certification to do anything with a rope.

How and where do you get COPE trained? No one in my district or council seems to have any idea, they are sending me in circles.

I've got two former climbing instructors in my troop alumni that would love to take the kids climbing on a trip, but we got chewed out once already for letting the kids climb on a rope that was THREE FEET above the ground because no one was cope certified.

Its a good thing no one was around to chew me out as a Scout for lack of certiciation, we have 15 foot high gateways, 8 foot high rope bridges, and used to go rock climbing without any gear (very, very stupid, but we all survived!).

Do the two newly recognized leadership positions (Troop Webmaster and Leave No Trace Trainer) count for Life and Eagle? I'd imagine that they would, but I'm curious.

My problem is that it is called "Boy Scouts", not "Hetrosexual-Religious-Only Boy Scouts". The program is to help boys, and homosexual and/or atheist boys would, in my mind, need Boy Scouts even more than some Hetrosexual-Religious boys. Gays, especially in high school, can feel very alone, left out, and lost. Scouting would give them a group to belong to, an automatic support network, a place where they wouldn't have to worry. Athiests are not beholden to an automatic moral code like religious people (very much in theory) are. A code of behavior and moral, such as that presented by the other 11 parts of the Scout Law, are a heck of a code to live by. If EVERYONE lived by them, war and lots of other terrible things simply would not happen (paraphrased from Lord Baden-Powell).

FOR THE BOYS, Scouting should include everyone who is not a danger to the other boys (the idea of Homosexual leaders, especially ones that were not Scouts themselves, is a completely different debate).

As a private organization, Boy Scouts of America has a right to exclude certain types of boys from their organization, this was upheld by the Supreme Court, and I have to qualm with that. But being right does not make it right. And, as sad as it makes me, that could limit some ways in which Boy Scouts reaches out to kids, whether it be that they are unable to be chartered by public groups or maybe even that they might have issues meeting on public grounds such as schools (as is the debate in Philadelphia right now). The is a bitter pill to swallow, but it was the obvious extension to the arguments made in the Supreme Court.

Boy Scouts is at least 95% a totally great, awesome, and rewarding program, one I feel should be open to all boys. Right now, there are untold numbers of gay and atheist Scouts in the program, even Eagle Scouts. I know, I came through Scouts with several Scouts from both groups, some of whom became Eagles, all of whom were fine Boy Scouts. The fact that gay Scouts/former Scouts who get thrown out of Scouts fight to stay involved is a sign that Boy Scouts is obviously an excellent program that they believe has a lot more upsides than down. Hopefully National will eventually work that one out for themselves.(This message has been edited by JerseyScout)

Great article. I work with kids for a living, I've had to read countless articles about how they tick, and this guy still taught me a lot.

When I was a Scout, my troop ran up to about 100 boys. We happened to have a great group of leaders who managed us very well. We couldn't split, no one wanted to leave. So we went along with trips having between 40-60 kids on them. What does that mean? More patrol boxes, more food, more equipment, more trailers, more ASPLs, more everything. Otherwise, it all worked the same, and it was a great couple of years.

We tried to camp at wilderness campsites as often as possible, as there were are rather large boundaries at most of them. For some trips we'd split up into "crews" to avoid numbers problems on the trails, etc. If you set everything up right, the trips themselves work out just fine.

The first step is pretty important. I have a Scout that I was worried about alternate requirements for, and I thought that it was silly that I should have to wait for him to do all his requirements before applying for alternate ones to complete a rank.

It turns out that he did not need a single alternate requirement for Tenderfoot despite one of his arms being almost useless, he managed one arm push ups and even figured out how to tie the knots one handed. I never cease to be amazed at what a kid can accomplish.

$50 - Yearly dues

$250 - Weekend trips (cost between $10-$30, average about $25 - 11 trips this year). This includes food for each trip

$220 - Week long summer trip

$30 - Ski Trip discount pass

Total - $550 if a Scout does everything. The troop usually supplements one higher-cost trip each year (Whitewater Rafting or the like) from the troop funds.

The adults will get together and sponsor Scouts whose families can't afford all the costs.

What is the purpose(s) of District Roundtables? What should be going on at them? I recently attended my first one and it seemed to me to be an absolute mess. I suspect that its either because a) I've never been to one and don't know better or else b) my district is in more trouble than I thought.

But I don't know what I'm supposed to me attending, maybe it was run perfectly.

I'm sorry, my emoticons don't work and I was only following jerseyscout's lead. I do like "1776".

I didn't think it was very funny, the tomatoes killed three members of my family.

Problems with year round schooling:

- My state has an entire region (the shore) that is based around the summer season. Take away summer vacation and a lot of people are now out of work, and alot of small bussinesses just died.

- Your taxes will go up. Why? You are paying for airconditioning for the schools (and possibly installation), teachers/principals/custodians/secretaries/support staff salaries will go up by 1/4 (you now have three extra months to pay them for)

- Without summer, when are you going to maintain the schools? Summer is the time to fix rooves, recarpet, repaint, install new toilets, rewire the entire building for the internet, bring the fire alarm system up to code by completely reinstalling it (that was the big project where I worked at this year)

- Many teachers will quit, especially in "needy" districts with lots of problem students. Teachers, even amazing teachers who love kids and do a great job with them, need time to recharge their batteries, which is why many teachers take jobs that have nothing to do with children over the summer. Already half of new teachers burn out in their first five years and go into a new line of work because they can't hack it, that rate will surely go up if teachers work for 12 months with children.

- The prementioned date showing that Americans already spend more hours in school that countries that beat us in days attended. Why do you think other countries do that? Because kids burn out too.

Our schools have major issues, but year round school is definately NOT the answer.

Don't worry about filling every minute with planned activities. The cubs make up plenty of activities on their own. Their favorite seems to be running and screaming around the campsite looking for holes to fall in...

Joebob, you must have been on my Pack campouts almost two decades ago.

Other popular activities:

Finding weird bugs

Poking things with sticks

Tag (especially near the tents)

Yelling that I definately wasn't tagged

Digging small holes with sticks

I second that Scouts do not need six hours to learn EDGE, ten minutes and knot should inform them splendidly.

To be honest, most kids will somewhat instintually know EDGE, even if they never heard of it. Why? Because the same concept, usually labeled "scaffolding", has been standard in the education field for forty bazillion years. That means most kids have been exposed to the same teaching method for almost every school lesson they ever had starting in pre-school (unless they had all crap teachers that just talked at them). When I took over running my troop, many of my Scouts who have never heard of EDGE (I think the one kid that attended NYLT was the only one, I hadn't even ever heard of it until last May) already use it instinctually, and the rest caught on to the same concept (although we didn't call it EDGE) real quick.(This message has been edited by JerseyScout)

Good job to Boy Scouts of America on this one. After all, it's the International Scouting Movement, isn't it?

If I didn't have to take the Scouts camping this weekend, I'd drive them up to Bethlehem for this. All the best wishes for your Scout there OldGreyEagle.

Our troop had a crew attached to it (founded by one of our leaders who wanted to get her daughter involved), I was even a member for first two meetings (I then had to drop out because Boy Scouts, hockey, and playing in a band were eating my time up). The crew went along in spurts for about eight years until it finally collapsed last year, much to the dissapointment of the girl running it (who was 15) and really killing herself to try to hold it together.

Our biggest problem was that most sucessful venture crews seemed to be based around offering a high adventure alternative to the regular Scout program, and we had a high adventure Scout program starting from the get-go when a kid joined at age 11. By the time most of the Scouts made it to high school and Crew, they did not have a whole lot of free time (they all had music, sports, homework, etc). The majority of Crew members ended up getting their high adventure fix from the troop, and skipping the "extra" high adventure opportunities with crew. The 1-3 girls didn't have that option, so they would get frustrated at having to cancel activities.

The eventual "solution" that someone came up with was to make the crew into a club where they saw movies, had pool parties, and shot pool. This killed it within a year, because teenagers can do all of that stuff anyway with the same exact people without crew advisers along for the ride.

The girl that ran crew is now attempting colorguard instead, and not really enjoying her new activity. The part that kills me is she is tougher than some of the guys her age and, if not for her being the "wrong" sex, would make one helluva Boy Scout. There are two younger sisters of kids in the troop now (one in 3rd grade, one in 4th grade, each of whom I've known since they were five years old) who I can already see are going to have the exact same problem.

Despite the headaches, extra amounts of training, and paranoia that it would 'cause me, there are times that I wish that the Boy Scouts of America, like Boy Scouting organizations in some other countries, would allow girls to join.

Lashing is definately not outdated. Want to impress the heck out of the Cub Scouts? The Scouts can lash together a monkey bridge. My mother has a picture of me climbing across one of these as a WEBLOS scout when visiting a potential Boy Scout troop. Guess which troop I joined?

Want to show up the entire council/district what can be done with rope, poles, guts, and some planning? The Scouts can lash together some of the most ridiculous gateways and towers known to man. As a Scout, we had one of two results from every gateway we we ever built at a camporee. Either a) we got first place or b) we were disqualified because they didn't think that the boys did or could build it (we planned an executed every gateway ourselves). Know what happens to my boys now with the same troop? Exact same results. We had one of the founders of our troop, now in his early 80s, stop by last year. He told a bunch of stories, one of them being how the kids had their gateway eliminated because "they couldn't have built that" back in the mid-60s. The more things change, the more they stay the same =)

I haven't seen one yet, I need to pick on up.

I've only heard good things so far. The people putting it together looking at childrens books for ideas on how to produce better, more eye pleasing layouts? Genius! They really thought this one over.

"... torn jeans and a 70's tank top shirt with "I Brake for Tenderfoots" hand painted on it..."

That's a really good shirt, where can I order one? =)

Here are some other movies to consider/stick in a file to recommend to the Scouts, although I think most are too long for your purposes. Many are rated R for language/violence/both, so they would not be for every Scout. I didn't list any of the fine films already listed before (Glory, Gettysburg, anything by Ken Burns)

- Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee (2007) (I also highly recommend the book for anyone who has never read it) (133 minutes - No rating?) - the story of the Sioux Indians

- Gangs of New York (2002) - R. 167 minutes. Nominated for ten Oscars, a microcosm of the clash in the United States between older "Native" population and the thousands of immigrants pouring off the boats each day in the mid-1800s.

- Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier (1955) - G. 93 minutes. This was already mentioned, but it was my favorite movie as a kid (and I wasn't born in '81, I must have been a strange kid). Its historical accuracy is terrible, but the Scouts could easily pick it apart. For the record, I still love this movie.

- Tombstone (1993) - R. 130 minutes. The Earp Brothers and Doc Holliday fight the Clancys at the OK Corall.

- Tora! Tora! Tora! (1973) - G. 144 minutes. The attack on Pearl Harbor, although you average Scout would probably poison you if you had them watch this movie. I refuse to recommend "Pearl Harbor".

- Sands of Iwo Jima (1949 - 100 Minutes), The Big Trail (1930 - 120 minutes), or a host of other John Wayne movies.

- Saving Private Ryan (1999) R. 170 minutes - Won Oscars, Tom Hanks, I'm sure we've all seen and enjoyed this movie.

- A League of the Their Own (1992) R.

and the finest of all modern documentary, historical films...

- Godzilla vs the Sea Monster (1966).

Troops can also solicite donations of Scout uniforms from alumni or Scouts who outgrow theirs and then pass them out to newer Scouts. We usually have several "Class A" shirts lying around our meeting place that can be loaned short or long term.

The 13-year old thing didn't line up for me either....

● Youth Leadership

 

Boy Scouts of America believes that homosexual conduct is inconsistent with the obligations in the Scout Oath and Scout Law to be morally straight and clean in thought, word, and deed. The conduct of youth members must be in compliance with the Scout Oath and Law, and membership in Boy Scouts of America is contingent upon the willingness to accept Scoutings values and beliefs. Most boys join Scouting when they are 10 or 11 years old. As they continue in the program, all Scouts are expected to take leadership positions. In the unlikely event that an older boy were to hold himself out as homosexual, he would not be able to continue in a youth leadership position.

At this risk of getting myself in trouble here, that last sentence is pure BS (and I don't mean Boy Scouts). I came through Scouts with at least three boys who later "came out." They were all fine people and fine Scouts. None of them made it to a very high youth leadership position (like many in our troop, a demanding school/sports/school activity schedule limited the time they could to devote to Boy Scouts), but all three were well liked and well respected by their fellow Scouts (while none of them had come out yet, it was pretty obvious). If they hadn't been respected by their fellow Scouts, then I would have seen that as a serious breech of Scoutliness by the rest of the troop.

I can understand the arguments again having homosexual leaders in the Boy Scouts, I have never seen the wisdom of excluding homosexual Scouts as long as they abide by the same sort of code of conduct I'd expect from any Scout. Gay teenagers are often troubled teenagers, and, to me, Scouts has the greatest potential impact on youth who are troubled and "at risk". Why push away those who (if they are pose no violent danger to the other Scouts) need Scouts the most?

I echo those who say "don't rush!" Enjoy Cub Scouts, its not about the destination (Arrow of Light), its about the journey, the friends, and the memories, and its a good time to boot.

Boy Scouts will be waiting patiently for you when you are 10 1/2, and you'll be able to zip through the ranks then if that's your goal.

We are not a uniform troop (they generally come out for our annual Court of Honor and our Eagle Courts of Honor), but well impress on the boys that jeans are never acceptable. Boy Scout pants are nice, but cost extra money, money that some of our kids (especially lately) just don't have. A pair of kackis or church pants will do just fine, and (if its one of those kids that never dresses up) are much easier to borrow from a cousin, neighbor, or fellow Scout.

GOOD! Skipping recruitment for a year is probably not a good plan.

There are tons of things you could do and invite recruits along:

- have a picnic at the local park

- have a campfire/weenie roast

- go on a haunted hayride and send flyers out at schools inviting parents to bring their cub-aged kids.

- have a water day

Really, plan any activity that your boys love to do and then send out invitations at the local schools. Kids will have more fun (and be more interested in Scouting) if they are doing something fun rather than the boring ol' "come meet the Cubs at the local rec center" recruitment drive. Once the kids are there and having fun, you can ply their parents with the wonders of Cub Scouting.