JMHawkins

Unlike Santa who brought you toys and... But Scoutfish, Santa Clause is real. In a sense. The spirit of kindness and joy, of generosity. The pleasure of doing something to make another person happy, the optimism of festive decorations in the middle of bleak winter, and the respect for traditions and remembrance of days and friends gone by. That silver bell still rings for me, I still hear it. Oh sure, some people get carried away, turn it into a self-paradoy, but we can't discard everything that someone takes a little too far. So maybe there's not actually a fat guy in a red suit wh

This is the sort of nonsense that allows a young man get to Eagle BOR and profess he has been an atheist all his life. I am not saying black balling him, but I am not saying rubber stamping him thru either. I'll ask again, what's the worse outcome: 1) letting a boy who says he doesn't think there's a God but otherwise lives up to the Scout Law stay in Scouts for several years on the chance he changes his mind (nah, young men never do that...) only to have him profess his atheism at his EBOR or 2) run him out* ASAP at 10 1/2 and tell him there's no place for his kind

A mans religion is not what he professes to believe, but rather the actions he performs. Same for a boys religion, probably even more so. At 10, he may not have the abstract reasoning capability us greybeards have, and he may have a hard time conceptualizing God as something other than a scary guy with a long beard whos supposed to be good and all powerful and runs the world, but still lets all sorts of bad things happen. Not every young man is going to understand he saw God in the sunrise some do, but some havent connected the words with the feelings yet. Give him a break. Watch his

The current Varsity program guide has a section on tomahawk throwing under the Frontiersman activity. Looks like it would be really cool and fun. But to get to FrankScout's comment, I think he's perfectly justified in asking how he can verify his District is doing this responsibly. Obviously we can't just turn a bunch of boys loose chucking axes back and forth. If nothing else, we'd have to take away all their Totin' Chips. Besides, I'd like to know what requirements somebody has to pass to become a certified Tomahawk range instructor so I can go pass them! Hopefully Frank gets a

Tents? Or do you ask scouts to bring their own? You have "cooking set" but it might be a good idea to expand that into separate items (e.g. 12 qt pot, 12 inch pan, etc.). Same thing with utensils. That way whoever is assembling the gear can know if they have the right items.

I suspect Gunny has me beat, but my worst was Garbage Man one summer. This was back in the day before hydraulic lifts. I rode on, more like clung to, the back of the truck while Maniac Mike the driver sped along the road trying to shake me loose (branches that overhung the road were a particular favorite of his)*. He'd stop at a house and I'd jump off, grab the cans, dump them into the back of the truck, then try to get the cans back and the lids on in time to jump back on the truck before the maniac sped off again. But that was the fun part of the job. The dirty part was back at the y

Seattle, Absolutely, I think Scouting can be more attractive, we just need to emphasize low-cost, fun-filled activities. With lots of volunteer effort. I've always thought summer activities are a great opportunity for Cub Scouts especially to provide thriftier alternatives to summer camps. Unfortunately it's difficult on the volunteers to put that together and staff it, but if they can, I think it would pull in kids who's families are cutting out or cutting back on various other summer camps. A lot of packs shut down for the summer, but I think they could recruit pretty heavily if

Basementdweller is right - the biggest impact is going to be on the overall financial status of the families and communities. $4 gas is causing food prices to rise, and $6 gas will make it even worse. Other prices are rising too - high gas prices drives inflation. The overall economy will suffer significantly from the higher prices. Families will have less disposable income for Scouting, and the community will have less available for donations and fundraising. Being thrifty will be more important than ever, and not just in your driving plans. Expect budgets to be tighter all the way arou

So, a big "never mind." The boys figured it out, elections went well. Now the real fun begins as the boys start to run the show themselves. I think the answer to my original question "how can we help them take this seriously" is: take them camping. Get them outdoors doing scout stuff, and the boys really come through. Hmmmm, maybe that Baden-Powell guy was on to something...

I think that requiring that the SM be considerably older than the oldest Scouts in the troop is less likely to cause confusion as to the perception of whether he is truly an adult, or just an "older kid." I think that perception is important both to the Scouts, the adult in question, and the parents in the unit. I think there's something to this. Perception is a funny thing. Any of us old fogeys ever have this experience? At your 20 year High School reunion you hear about Mr. Hammer, your old gym teacher, and how he coached the basketball team to the county finals. Your first reactio

If a Venturing Crew isn't palatable, there's always the option of a new Troop if the old one is (or starts) losing boys. It's some work, but sounds like you have enough energy to get it done. I wouldn't do it simply to spite the old troop or to continue your Scouting experience, I'd only do it if boys really are dropping out of scouting because of the dysfunction. And of course, there are other existing units in your district that might welcome some energy. Regarding the notion of young vs old and seeing black and white, I will say there is one very imporant area that a 40 year old is

Let individual families and citizens choose their services. Yah, you won't like what some families choose, and they won't like what you choose. Get over it. Years and years ago, when Bill Clinton was President, a coworkers was livid one day at lunch. Not at Clinton (though this was during the whole Monica affair). No, my friend was a somewhat liberal Democrat, and was unhappy that a school district somewhere in The South was apparently going to vote on whether or not to teach Creationism in school. My coworker was adamant that the Federal Government needed to mandate curriculum at a n

In my old Troop when I was a scout, the SPL and ASPL were de facto PL/APL for the "old kid" patrol (we'd call it a Venture Patrol these days). It was basically the High School kids who were still in. The patrol ate and camped together on Troop outings, and planned its own HA trips too. We didn't have any official JASMs, but they would've been members of that patrol.

Let me rephrase. Tell me stories about your first troop elections! Tell me about how the boys came to realize they really, really were going to be running things. Tell me about the boys who were discouraged at first but you helped coach them on to success.

Who said anything about a disaster? Of course it's not going to go smoothly, and the boys are going to learn a lot from their mistakes. I'm not looking for how to make it perfect, I'm looking for ideas on helping boys through their first experience with this level of responsibility. (probably need to help the parents through it even more, but that's another story). Allangr - yep, let the boys do it, that's absolutely the plan. Shortridge, eventually yes, longer terms, but this is the first election for the troop, kind of a trial run like temporary patrols. Make the boys first

We have a brand new troop, and our first elections are coming up after our first campout. We'll elect a SPL and then 3 PLs, for initial 3 month terms. Most of the boys are 10-11 year olds (about a third are Webelos cross-overs) with a smattering of older boys, but the only boy with any previous scouting experience doessn't seem very interested in taking a leadership role. So far, some of the boys really get it and are leaping at the chance to have more responsibility, but several are just acting like a bunch of, well, 11 year old boys. In particular, we have multiple class clowns. W

It's just like emb021 said ... these "nicer" shirts have always been around for the pros and "national" level volunteers. Well that's a relief. Our parents kind of blanch at the cost of uniforms as it is. Adding to their dry cleaning bill wouldn't do much to help. Still, a dry clean only scout shirt... it just feels wrong.

Camping 300 feet away from other Patrols is the monthly ADVENTURE that creates the demand for the practical skills... Good Point. Can we save at least one E to stand for "excitment" or "enthusiasm?"

I went through the ARC WRFA 16-hour course, and thought it was great. Packed with information and practical, I think it was a worthwhile course and would recommend it. I don't know how anything could be shorter and still be effective though. There was very little fluff in the 16 hours, and we had a 4 or 5 to one student to teacher ratio. The only way to shorten it would be to cut out the scenarios or just leave off some material. As it is, I think it's just the start of being competent. More practical examples, more practice, maybe some reflections aftwerward to help retain the key skill

He did say that while it is not "required" he recommended that the shirt be dry cleaned for it to look the best. A scout shirt that should be dry cleaned... French cuffs for those diamond cufflinks too?

The solution to the problem of Eagle Scouts not knowing basic Scouting skills isn't to just to require any training method, but the solution might be to require a training method that can be shown to actually work. Actually KC, I think this highlights an important problem. The solution to poor results (assuming Eagles not knowing how to tie a square knot is a poor result) isnt' to make random changes to process, but rather to tighten up the feedback loop and let feedback drive process improvements. If we don't want Eagles who don't know their stuff, we need to be more demanding in the

I understand some families can give more than other (heck, since I'm self-employed, my family can give more some years than others). But my critique is that a FoS presentation aimed at securing donations from the families who can afford more is misdirected and counterproductive. Especially when units have "goals" to meet. Please stick with me a bit so I can explain. In an earlier post, I already mentioned my concern about multiple asks from the families, of which FoS is yet one more. It comes across as constant begging or nickle-and-diming families, neither of which is a great selling

FOS is a necessary evil b/c if we actually charged what it costs for scouting, few could afford it. So why are we making the FOS presentations to the families then? If they can't afford it, where do we expect the money to come from?

Try the American Heart Association (google "American Heart Association CPR *your city here*"). If that doesn't turn up anything, maybe contact your local fire department or EMS and see if they know of any public CPR classes. A local business alliance group might also, since many businesses like to have get CPR training for their employees.

I don't think the messaging is the problem. It's the structure. BSA faces a set of problems common to non-profit, volunteer-heavy, service organizations, it's not exactly unique to us, but perhaps the "franchised unit" structure adds a level of complexity. But unique or not, we shouldn't ignore the concerns. The unit leaders ask families to volunteer their time. We also ask them to pay several mandatory fees (unit dues, camp fees, adult registration, training fees, etc.). We ask them to buy official uniforms from BSA at prices that don't certainly qualify as "thrifty". We also