JMHawkins

I'm in favor of mandatory liability insurance for every firearm. Policy limit could be determined by magazine size at $250,000 per shot, or something similar. Of course, this would only affect legal and responsible gun owners and not solve our real gun problem which is illegally possessed hand guns used by the average criminal.

So why advocate it then?

Seriously.

The problem isn't law abiding, mentally stable people owning guns. Even "assault weapons?" So what possible value is there in advocating laws that don't apply to the people who in fact are the problem? Does it make you feel like you're "doing something?"

I can't solve the real problem, but maybe I can solve this fake problem over here and fool myself into thinking I'm being responsible?

If your response to this crime is to call for more gun control, I'd like you to take a deep, honest look into your heart and ask yourself if that's your motivation. It's a perfectly human failing.

The moment someone is labeled, you start to think differently - now the kid is "not quite right in the head". Stop thinking that way and start treating the lad as the individual he is and things will be much better for all.

I complete agree.

But...

"Treating the lad as the individual he is" has to actually mean something. If the individual he is is a dangerous and unstable one, you've got to treat him as such. And by "you" I mean "us - all of us." And if we don't have labels conveniently applied by someone else (who then is reasponsible for any mislabling), then we have to make those decisions ourselves.

They're not comfortable decisons.

Labelling a kid something doesn't make him that, but declining to label him doesn't make him not that either. We owe kids the respect of treating them as individuals, but that goes for the non-spectrum kids too. If we're too busy treating the kids acting out as individuals instead of lumping them into a group labelled "misfits", we might actually be forgetting to treat the other kids as individuals and lumping them into a group labelled "don't bother me kid, I'm busy keeping Kenny from melting down."

Or worse, lumping them into the group labelled "targets for Kenny when he snaps."

I wish the world wasn't that way, but it is. All we can do is the best we can do. But CalicoPenn is right, abdicating responsibility to someone else, waiting for them to officially label a kid, is not a brave decision.

The right to bear arms is in our constitution. I suggest as a start, this country should consider strongly regulate the ammunition and ammunition supplies for reloading etc

Disingenuous and in violation of the spirit of the law. The 2nd Ammendment isn't an obstacle course you're supposed to cleverly weave your way through. If you think guns are bad, then advocate repealing the ammendment, don't try to weasel around it by claiming the right to keep and bear arms doesn't guarantee the right to load them while chanting "Ha ha, clever lawyer found a loophole..."

So let's look at the second amendment. In this case each additional restriction on the right to bear arms is feared as a way to get to the complete negation of the amendment itself...

Which of course it is - that's the approach the people who favor gun control take. After banning one type of weapon, they then argue (as folks here are doing) that it's inconsistent not to ban others. While of course simultaneously using the specter of the already-banned weapons as a boogyman to scare folks not paying attention with.

As to what is reasonable? I think a far more important, and relevant, question is asking what laws are reasonable for institutionalizing the mentally unstable. It's not an easy question. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest was inflamatory and exaggerated, but not entirely so. The abuses were real. But, lax control of unsable people is far more dangerous than lax control of firearms. The anti-gun crowd is aggitating for the wrong debate.

Secondly, the vast majority of Scout leaders are not qualified to make judgment calls about financial aid.

The most certainly are qualified when it's their money being given out.

Two lessons here:

One, people who make rules should have a great deal of humility, because it's very easy for the rules to have unintended consequences. For when that happens, it's important that the rules have ways of being bent in order to mitigate the unintended consequences. Usually that boils down to trusting someone's judgement. If the rule makers are unwilling to trust someone's judgement in bending their rules, then...

Two, arrogant rule makers deserved to be removed from their positions of authority, and shouldn't be entrusted with any other positions until they've done something to prove they've learned better.

Both of those are great lessons for guys to learn early, becuase it's easy to fall into thinking "I'm the boss, what I say goes."

There seems to be a theme throughout the troop where the older scouts (15+) want to have little to do with the newbies (under 13), unless it is required for credit on their POR.

Well, at the very least, the SPL and ASPL - as part of earning credit for their POR - need to intereact with the 13 yo PL to help him learn his job. Then the 13 yo works with the 11 yo's to help them learn their Scout skills. I'd sit down with the older Scouts and ask them to provide leadership for the PL. Also, he should have an APL right? That's the guy who should fill in when he's gone. If the APL is one of the new Scouts who needs to learn, well, there's another argument for ditching NSPs. What's the deal with the APL? Can he lead the patrol in the PLs absence?

Bottom line - lots of fun when the patrol DOES have a meeting and with ad hoc patrols on campouts. But, very slow progression on advancement...

If they're having fun, then it's not an emergency. 8 months and haven't reached Tenderfoot? Meh, not a biggie. Sure, encourage the PL to do better, but if the Scouts are still having fun, then there's no reason to worry about them losing interest in Scouting because they haven't gotten a rank yet. Unless the adults are making it an extra-big deal to the Scouts. If they're learning the skill and doing the things that will get them signed off, then whenever they do remember to bring their books, they can get a boatload of requirements signed off very quickly. Remember that T-2-1 requirements can be worked on simultaneously, they don't need to be Tenderfoot to get 2nd Class reqs signed off on.

I agree, if you have one patrol, then you don't need, should not have, a SPL. Just have PL elections. There's literally nothing for an SPL to do if you only have one patrol. Like Basementdweller said, your troop meeting are patrol meetings. The PL should run them, with help as appropriate. If he's overwhelmed, first see if he can offload (aka delegate) some work to the APL. Then if both of them are still swamped, as SM do a little back-filling (or better, sit down with the two of them and coach them through the things they are having trouble with. Even if you end up doing most of the work with them as little more than puppets, they at least are going through the motions and some of it may stick for later when they find their own initiative).

You also don't really need all those other positions. All you really need are the Patrol positions - PL and APL, and optionally you can have a Patrol Quartermaster and Scribe, but I wouldn't consider them Troop level PORs.

And as far as "working on advancement", since none of them are First Class yet, nobody needs a POR for advancement, so don't even worry about it.

Add positions only as there is a need for them. Don't create them for the sake of somebody wearing a patch. That teaches the absolute wrong lesson - it teaches them that holding a leadership position is some sort of trophy - "Yay I won!" - instead of a duty their fellow Scouts have entrusted them with.

I dunno. Is the patch made from sustainably harvested materials? Free range polyester farms perhaps? Or shade-grown dacron?

On a serious note, I'd assume the only change would be to make the WCA the same thing: either Sustainability or E. Science.

Desertrat77, I hear what you're saying about the image adult scouters convey. It's a difficult message to convey while still being kind, but I think you did a good job there.

I'm conscious of it. I try to keep myself in decent shape and convey a sense of competency. At summer camp last year, all three of the adults with our troop did the High Cope course. I was kind of surprised at how proud the scouts were of us when the staff called us up to give us our patches, but I learned something from it.

When a pro focuses more on getting a raise than having a quality, thriving program.

In an ideal world the only way a pro would get a raise would be by having a quality, thriving program. A part of the problem may be that BSA isn't "selling" a service that people directly pay for in the way that, say, AAA sells roadside assistance. Instead, BSA sells mostly an image that they use for fundraising.

One of the big problems in any large organization is when the external feedback loop get's longer than any of the important internal ones. External feedback is when people external to the organization give you money (or stop giving you money, if it's negative). Internal feedback is how people get raises, promotions, and increased authority (or get fired if it's negative). I get the impression BSA's external feedback loop is measured in decades, that they get a lot of money from people with fond memories of the troop of their youth four or five decades ago.

When a pro will do whatever it takes to meet the money and membership goals. When a pro is only focused on being #1 in the area,or region.

This is a reminder that it's really a management and leadership problem. Any system you put in place for rewarding people can be subverted, intentionally or accidentally, and any incentive, review, or evaluation process will have unintended consequences that need to be managed. You have to have a system that tries to reward the right things, and then you need managers who make sure the spirit of the thing wins out.

Good Luck. I hope someday I can put some of your thoughts on Venturing to use in my neck of the woods.

So, I do use my real name on here, and I try to write posts with the idea that the parents of Scouts in my unit(s) will read them. Now, like Beavah said, without the intonations and body language of an in-person converstaion, sometimes it's difficult to get the words across with the right tone. For writing to do that generally requires more words, and I'm long-winded enough as it is. You folks don't get college credit for reading my posts so I should keep them shorter than the Great Russians... Well, at any rate I suspect I often come across harsher than I intend, but there it is.

One thing I've learned from a career marinated in email, computer security, and DOJ anti-trust litigation is to assume anything you write will be brought up out of context by someone of questionable morals trying to score points with someone else by making you look bad. After a while you get used to it and write only what you really believe, because that's the only thing worth getting raked over the coals for if it ever comes to that.

The problem I have with what you did is the depth of learning on a single weekend....

True, like I said, they do have to keep practicing. But it's also not like that was the first time we did anything like that. In fact, the Scouts mostly already had the skills, what the weekend was about was putting them to use in practice scenarios. First aid skills aren't really hard, but keeping your head in the situation where you need to apply them can be.

Depending on how well the class is laid out, it could be great. Here's what we did this fall, in partnership with a neighboring troop. (note, our Troop SM and myself are WRFA instructors so we have experience putting on this sort of training - if the Red Cross folks you work with do as well, then you could have a good experience):

We had a joint campout with the two troops, Friday night to Sunday morning. The campout was basically run like a WRFA course but primarily focused on First Aid MB skills (though also including some WRFA topics like Stay/Go, Fast/Slow, etc.). We would have a brief topic lecture, then the Scouts would break up into patrols and do a skills practice session (with mentoring and coaching) while our moulage team made up some victims for a scenario. Then the patrols would go off on a "day hike" (of about 50 feet), find the victims, and do a semi-realistic first aid scenario. Repeat throughout the day (and night - we had two scenarios in the dark which added to the atmosphere) with breaks for meals and goofing off.

The way we organized the weekend, if a scout worked through all the sessions and was able to demonstrate all the skills in the skill sessions, then all that he had to do after the weekend was make an appointment with one of us (the MB counselors) to show us the home first aid kit he'd ade and he was done.

There were several older scouts from the other troop who already had the MB, had gotten it at Summer Camp, and said they learned a lot more in our weekend than in the summer camp class.

I was pretty happy with the way it worked out. The scouts got a lot of reinforcement, had to apply their skills in the context of an emergency, and still had to take some initiative on their own to get the MB after the campout was over. The progress they made from the first scenario Friday night to the final one Sunday was impressive. Of course they need to keep practicing the skills or they will forget, but most of them came away from that weekend thinking First Aid was fun, so hopefully it won't be hard to convince them to do more of it.

Edit: I should add that a bunch of the "victims" were Webelos we invited to come along on the campout, so they got to get made up with fake blood, broken bones, sucking chest wounds and what not, which was pretty fun for them. So bonus points for a recruiting tool, if you're looking for one. Talk to the Red Cross instructors about adding moulage to the class.(This message has been edited by JMHawkins)

I wonder how much the paperwork hurdles have weeded out the woodsmen adults in favor of the patient plodding bureaucrats?

Bureaucracy Scouts of America. Slogan: "We don't let youth cut down trees to make pioneering projects, but we slaughter entire forests for the paperwork we fill out!"

In all seriousness, JoeBob is right about that - it's not just the applications, but the paperwork for going on outings too (which properly considered also includes the paperwork associated with verifying required training, etc.).

Yep, that's because da Cubs and Boy Scouts are separate, different programs for adults. That's what makes da transition hard, eh?

I get what you're saying Beavah, but I actually think the programs should be separate. And while a bunch of Boy Scouts could probably run a PWD, I think it's valuable for the Dads (well, Moms and Dads) to do it. Cub Scout age, it goes fast, and with my son a Webelos II now, I'm starting to feel the first stings of him growing up and wanting to be around his friends more than around his dad. Maybe I'm just reacting to that particular phase I'm in right now, but I really think it would be a shame to reduce the father-son interaction in Cub Scouts. You don't get that opportunity for very long, when your son is old enough to do some thinking but young enough to share it with you.

Seattle

Like a lot of things in Scouting, if this "one unit" idea is adopted by national, individual units will probably have freedom to decide whether or not they want to adopt that model or remain as two units.

Yep,that exactly what we have now. Aside from BSA streamlining some paperwork, I mean. It's just a matter of what BSA presents as "the right way" to do it, sort of like NSPs vs mixed-age patrols. Really there's nothing to stop a group of adults from running mutliple programs, from being a "One-Unit" outfit right now. BSA doesn't prohibit dual registration for adults in multiple units. People are entirely free to adopt this solution right now. But by and large they don't. Maybe it's because there aren't Program Helps for it, or because the UCs and on-line training don't guide them towards it, but I'm inclined to think it's because the folks running units don't feel like combining units will help them solve any problems, and would in fact often just create them.

We have a lot of overlap between the various units in our area right now (e.g. I'm a Pack CC and a Troop ASM. Another ASM is CM for the other Pack in town. The husband of the Pack Treasurer is a Troop MC, etc.). We also have the typical personality conflicts in any group of folks. The CM of the Pack I'm CC for doesn't get along with a couple of the committee members in the Troop. One of the ASMs doesn't get along with the CC of the other Pack. Nothing idiotic or juvenile, just folks who's personalities don't mesh well. By having separate units, these adults can contribute their talents happily without constant drama. The youth don't get whipsawed by it. We have good cooperation between the units, in part because we don't force adults who don't get along to work together. If we were all "one big happy unit" that wouldn't be the case, and I don't think we'd be all that happy.

Which gets me to fred's comment:

In a one-unit approach, the adults know each other because they've been working together for years, building friendships and learning from each other.

Building friendships is the glass half-full outcome. Building animosities is the other possibility. A one-unit approach is more of the utopian approach, where interpersonal conflict is amicably resovled and things always land shiny side up. The current approach accounts a little better for the people involved occasionally being human beings and making human mistakes, for the toast landing butter-side down.

I think of this idea very parrallel to local sports associations. Cities often have soccer, swim, gymnastics, baseball associations that provide programs for all youth from the very young thru high school (or until high school sports pick it up).

Fred, I gotta say, that's a great example, but I think it proves the opposite of what you think. The folks who ran the Little League - and just the Little League - I played in as a kid sure seemed to have done a better job putting on an organized program than the consolidated organization I see today.

Now, I have to be fair and aknowledge there were probably lots of issues I never noticed or was never aware of as a kid that I do notice as an adult. However, I do know that as a kid, we had more practices, more access to the fields, more stability in coach tenure, and I don't recall ever having a scheduling foulup where our team and another team were double-booked for game or a practice field. Also, we played in the late spring and summer, when the weather was most amenable to baseball.

My son dropped out of little league. Coaches came and went, there were very few practices, we constantly showed up for a game or a practice to find the facilities closed, locked, or another team there thinking they had the game/field reserved. And the season started in February with snow still falling and ended in early June before the weather got decent. Half the games and practices were cancelled or rescheduled due to rainouts. We live in the Puget Sound region - it rains here A LOT in the spring. Playing baseball that time of year is idiotic. It's done to fit into the larger program of All Stars, Regionals, etc. Because of the needs of the 'advanced' programs, the basic program is displaced into a dysfunctional slot. The result is kids like my son are droopping out before they learn the skills to be in the "advanced" program.

I think two basic problems stemming from the unified approach are killing youth baseball. One, in tune with what I've been saying about it being harder to run a bigger program, the caliber of adult volunteers available to run the uber-program is not adequate the the challenges. Scheulding four or five leagues worth of fields, recruiting and retaining 5x the number of coaches, managing 5x the fundraisers, it's all too much for volunteers who have day jobs. Simply, it's easier to find 5 volunteers capable of running 1 program than it is to find 1 volunteer capable of running 5 programs. Running 1 program is relatively easy. Running 5 is really, really hard.

Two, when the programs are combined, the programs are in direct competition for resources. Well, weren't they before, when they were separate programs? Yes, but they were co-equals and each program was empowered to find hte best solution for their needs. As a combined program though, that's no longer the case - the individual levels are assigned solutions, usually by whoever is the most passionate about things. That means the Sports Fanatic Families with a huge desire to see their sons be althetic heros (my brother and his wife were this) run the show, which is why the advanced programs win out, because that's where these folks see their kids. It's like a Venturing committee running the Troop and Pack too, and short-shrifting the Pine Wood Derby because it doesn't help anyone summit Rainier.

Beavah,

There's definitely something to what you say about reducing the number of overall committee members to reduce the adult interference. However, there's a difference between the programs, eh? A Pack needs a committee that does quite a bit. A Webelos scout, even with a couple of Bear Cub assistants, isn't going to plan the PWD. It's necessary and appropriate for a Pack Committee to have adults highly active in lots of things. It's at the Troop level where it can be a real problem when TC members take too big a role and step on the youth learning process. As far as a Crew committee, I've got no experience there, but I have to imagine it should be even less work than a Troop (though maybe Ships with an actually ship might add some complexities).

We've had lots of threads here about the difficulty some adults have making the transition from Cubs to Boy Scouts, about the (perfectly natural and understanable) tendency to continue doing the same things and unconsciously running a Webelos III program. I've heard from Venturing folks with successfull programs that one of the keys to succeeding with a crew is to not run it like a Troop, that the Advisor is not a Scoutmaster, and that Scoutmasters have the same difficulty shifting to a Crew Advisor role as Webelos DLs do becoming ASMs.

So, when two of the most common problems are about adults fumbling their transition from one level to the next, I'm inclined to think unifying the programs is heading in the wrong direction. That's one reason I'm sticking with my contention that the Uber Chair position (whether there are sub-chairs or not) is still an order of magnitude harder to fill effectively than the current CC positions. You're running multiple different projects with different needs and objectives, in your spare time. Outside of BSA paperwork, which could (and should) be solved in other ways, there's no real economies of scale to unifying. The Pack I am CC with has Den Chiefs from three different troops. The Troop I'm an ASM in sends Den Chiefs to two different Packs. You don't need the share a CC or COR to work with other units. Considering that the Pack/Troop combined unit in the next town down the valley from us just had the Pack fail, maybe it's even easier to work with units that don't share a committee. Our troop was willing to offer help to the Pack, but there was a big Kabuki dance necessary to avoid stepping on toes. If they'd just been another random Pack in the neighboring town, perhaps we could have done more to help.

Though wouldn't that mean that all troops should just be patrol-sized?

Ha, well, we're talking about the adults here, but the situation where a Troop is just a collection of Patrols is generally going to be better for the Scouts than if the Patrol is just a subdivision of a Troop. And from the entire leadership development POV, a PLC is a good way to introduce scouts who have mastered (to Scout-aged levels anyway) the skills of a PL into the world of 2nd level management.

The one-unit approach is the federated model...

No, it's not. It's the consolidated model. "Federated" means separate units with their own leadership having a loose affiliation with other units. "One Unit" is combining and centralizing the leadership of serveral units, which is what you have described.

The difference is infrastructure and how units working together and support each other. You have a central committee chair and then maybe sub-chairs...

Right Fred, but you skipped over my main point- the Central Committee Chair position is a much harder one to perform effectively. Being a "manager of managers" is not just a little bit harder than being an manager, it's significantly more of a challenge. And the people with the ability to do that are in significantly more demand throughout society.

Let's say you have a troop, two packs, and a crew in your town. Let's say the Troop has a good CC and SM. One of the packs has a functional CC and okay CM, but the CC for the other pack is really struggling and the long-time CM is stepping down with no replacement. The crew has a great Advisor, and between him and the older, more capapble youths, they don't need very much from their committee. Not an unreasonable hypothesis for a small town or suburb, right? Perhaps even better than a lot of places have.

So you combine all of them into one unit, and the former Troop CC becomes the Central Committee Chair (must resist temptation to make joke involving "Da, Comrade"...). Now you have to find a new subChair for the Troop, and the old Chair has to manage four subChairs running three different programs (or four, if the two packs don't run identical programs which, maybe, parents might like). Suddenly the woman who was a good Troop CC is struggling as the uber-Chair because it's a much harder job. The MC (let's say he was the Advancement Chair before) who stepped up to replace her as subCC of the Troop isn't as good as she was, and his replacement as AC takes some time to get up to speed, and the SM of the troop suddenly finds he has much less support than he used to, all while he is expected to contribute to three other units (which have programs he has zero experience with, since he was never a Cubmaster or Crew Advisor). Meanwhile, the CM of the good Pack is redirected to help train someone from the struggling pack, and his pack suffers during his absence. The Crew Advisor drinks more coffee and tries to explain to his youth why all this is going on...

Yes, I know, there is also a scenario where combining the units saves the struggling Pack and makes all the other units stronger in the process. Either can happen.

My contention however, is that because of the higher level of leadership skill required to run a larger organization, the odds are that the combined unit will be overall weaker, that the scenario I laid out where the strong units struggle and collapse is more likely.

Many people have lost faith in the UC system, and probalby for good reason. But it is still the right method. It needs better execution perhaps, but replacing UCs with Central Committee Chairs and Group Scoutmasters would create more failed units than it salvages.

What the current model does is place the future of units at the whim of "parent" preferences. You can say scout, but it's really parents. The result is that troops often bend over backwards toward Webelos instead of just focusing on a solid program...it's a huge distraction to the troop

It's only a huge distraction because the leadership is going about it all wrong. You recruit by focusing on a solid program. You also retain by focusing on a solid program. And as I've said before, Troops should not limit themselves to recruiting Webelos. They should focus on recruiting Scout-aged boys. Webelos are part of that, but they're not the only part.

I know change is scary...

As a helplful and friendly observation, that statement could be taken as a condescending one. If someone disagrees with your proposed change, you may want to give them the courtesy of assuming they disagree with you on substandtive grounds instead of irrational fears. I'm sure you didnt' mean it that way, which is why I wanted to point out the unintentional connotations of it.

The only solutaion I can think of for that problem is to have a better alternative to a "brand new application" that is a more obvious transfer form.

Yes, this is exactly what I am suggesting. And the designer should remember to include a "Please leave me registered with my current unit(s)" checkbox as well. When I became an ASM with the Troop, the council processed my application by removing me from the Pack that I was still CC for, prompting me to need, you guessed it, fill out yet another form to continue being CC of the Pack when it came time to recharter.

I'm 110% against it.

In general, I favor Federation over Consolidation. Please note, the following is something I believe applies to pretty much any human organization, be it a Scouting unit, a business, a government agency, charity, etc. In theory, if you combine two things into one, you can get the best of both outfits, realize economies of scale, provide mutual support, etc. Experience tells me though, that you are at least as likely to get the worst of both, overcomplication, misdirected resources, infighting, finger pointing, etc. The bigger an organization is, the more talent it takes to successfully lead it. That's one reason we want patrols to be 5-8 Scouts, because asking a 14 year old to run an outfit of 60+ Scouts is a bad idea. There are rare gifted kids who can do that, but for most of them it would be setting them up for failure. Instead, the PL runs his 8-Scout unit, and the SPL runs the 6-8 member PLC. That's achievable.*

Likewise, there are certainly adults with the ability to successfully run a good One-Unit program with, perhaps 200 scouts from ages 7 to 21, and maybe four dozen adults leaders, the group organizing and engaging in activities from PWDs to dump camps to backpacking to summitting the friendly local glaciated volcano. But most adults are going to struggly mightily with that job, and likely fail. The bigger the program, the higher the quality of volunteers needed. Not necessarily recruited, but needed. Like Cambridgeskip said, if you already have that person, it helps formalize how they work, but it doesn't produce the necessary talent.

Consolidated organizations are prone to decay and rot. The weaker elements draw support and help from the stronger ones, but absent the gifted leader who can combine that support with accountability so that the weaker elements improve and get stronger, then you just end up with the effective people subsidizing and bailing out the ineffective ones time and time again. Which burns out your effective folks. It gives the appearance of improvement, because the weaker elements of the organization have fewer visible fiascos, but the organization itself is getting steadily weaker.

On the other hand, a Federated approach looks more chaotic, but ultimately encourages greater growth and stability over the long run. Stronger elements can still support weaker ones, but there is a greater incentive on the weaker elements to use the support in order to improve, not just to get by. Support and membership will tend to flow towards the outfits that do the most to learn and get better.

Fred:

I see too many packs in trouble that would thrive with a bit more guidance. And my apologies to the UC corps, but I just don't see the unit commissioners cutting it.

Where will that guidance come from? Organizations with the people who can provide it would certainly prosper, but organizations without it would stuggle even worse than they do now. The guidance necessary to run a Pack is less than the guidance necessary to run 2 Packs, a Troop, and a couple of Crews. One-Unit would mean a handful of exceptionally strong units got stronger, and the rest got weaker.

I really really believe that Webelos troop shopping is a counter-productive model.

Again, I disagree. "Troop shopping" is a healthy thing. Who do you generally get better service and value from, the grocery store or your local Cable monopoly? And what recourse do you have when either outfit fails to meet your expectations? The ability to "shop" is the difference.

* - note that this is the Patrol Method, vs the Troop Method that has the SPL running the entire troop. Troop Method usually requires the unit be a lot more adult-run for this reason - the average SPL can't effectively manage 60+ people.

Yeah, so I think the main source of multiple registration numbers is BSA's dumb fixation on using the same form for new applications as well as change of positions, compounded by their insistance you fill out a complete new form for every change. The Bear DL has to fill out a new form to continue being the Webelos Den Leader? Brilliant.

So all theese new forms come in to the overloaded council office and it's just a guarantee to have screwups.

Adopting a "change of position" form that had a spot for your current registration number would go a long ways towards solving this problem.

I'll stick with my ENO, bugnet and tarp. That thing seems more gimmicky than useful.

Doesn't look like you could get an underquilt on that either.

Speaking of the evolution of the hammock, I was listening to the audiobook of Samuel Elliot Morrison's bio of Christopher Columbus this weekend. Apparently hammocks became the way to sleep at sea when Columbus' sailors saw the natives of Long Island in the Bahamas sleeping in them.

Maybe you should revisit the decision that has you "stuck in Cub Scouts" for the next 7 years. The Pack certainly needs leadership, but so does the Troop. Would it be easier to recruit someone to take your job in the Pack, or someone to get the troop functional?

We tried a no-cooking trek once, but almost everyone picked as a "thorn," the strangely depressing lack of a cooked meal at the end of the day.

We encourage a no-cook lunch and a fast cleanup breakfast, but I'm going to have a hot dinner after a day of burning energy on the trail. And we'd like the Scouts to develop the skill to feed themselves something enjoyable and nutritious at the end of the day. It's up to them, of course, but we try to set an example. Of course, lay days are a great time to have an elaborate breakfast.