John-in-KC

Cubs on Expedition (Lewis and Clark anniversary) (current year)

Cubs in Camelot

American Adventures (post 9/11)

Cubs Around the World

Barnyard Adventures

What can you tie in that's related to Hawaii???

If he's the Trading Post Commissioner, I'd add in...

1) Making sure the Reservation HQ replensishes inventory constantly, right up to the last day of the last session. There's nothing like running out of T-shirts for the last session (something MY council manages to goof up on annually).

2) Making sure the Trading Post staff are up on the supply of ice and cold drinks (including the slushees). Yes, I know they are a profit center, but iced water in the camp sites goes down Scouts and Scouters throats faster than warm stuff. The slushees also go down faster.

3) When he does circulate to camp sites, ask leaders if there is some inventory item the staff overlooked. If there is a similar answer from several troops in several sessions, it may be time to talk to the business manager.

My thoughts. Others will have other thoughts.

Excuse me...

It seems to me that this stone has rolled far from the path of OPEN DISCUSSION of the PROGRAM (how do we work out the 12th point in our units, districts, and councils). It sure looks like a discussion of the ISSUE of belief in a Godhead being a condition of membership in the BSA.

May y'all take this to Issues and Politics please?

Respectfully, John

Truncated post again (This message has been edited by John-in-KC)

Post deleted, sw truncated it. JWP(This message has been edited by John-in-KC)

The BSA unit JLT kit has POR descriptions & expectations(This message has been edited by John-in-KC)

Laurie and all,

I can see one reason tour permits were denied: Specific safety TRAINING on the part of leaders in T376

Part of trip planning is identifying trained individuals. In some cases, like shooting sports, that person can be from outside the unit while a registered Scouter provides the 2 deep.

There are adult leader needs for aquatic activities (Safe Swim Defense/Safety Afloat)

NOTE: THESE NEEDS ARE A MUST HAVE IN THE UNIT.

There are adult leader needs for shooting sports (NRA isntructor qualifications!)

There are adult leader needs for climbing sports (ARC Standard First Aid and CPR).

Here's the G2SS website:

http://www.scouting.org/pubs/gss/toc.html

John

a BSA Lifeguard (among other trainings)(This message has been edited by John-in-KC)

I'm not a RTC. I'm staff, on the Boy side.

Many of the ideas listeed in previous posts we also do. Others include:

ONE STOP SHOPPING for unit serving Scouters. Every month, our Roundtable has:

- OA Chapter meeting (OA owns)

- Eagle Project review and approval (Dist Adv comm owns)

- New Leader Essentials common core (training comm owns)

- Youth Protection (two certified YP trainers own)

- Merit Badge Counselor (training comm owns)

- Professionals Corner (big district, 3 pros)

- Venturing Corner (Venturing RT is quarterly, VRTC attends Scout RT monthly with her mailboxes and info))

That's before we talk about the programs of either Cub Scout RT or Boy Scout RT.

SURVEY SCOUTERS ANNUALLY: We survey Scouters every year at program fair. We incorporate what Scouters want/need into the coming year program.

Bottom lines:

- None of this is new

- All of us have day jobs; we bring the same CUSTOMER SERVICE attitudes from our work to our Scouting support.

- We look to have fun

We're blessed to have experience in depth in those who are our roundtable commissioners. They do the good groupthink! One did his Commissioners doctoral thesis on improving roundtables.

John

This thing cut off my message again (This message has been edited by John-in-KC)

Nope, not here.

God Bless Them for the hell they went through.

If you have a young Life Scout seeking an Eagle Project, collecting the oral histories of these great men is an ongoing project of the Library of Congress. Your local American Legion or Veterans of Foreign Wars posts will help you find the Veterans:

http://www.loc.gov/folklife/vets/

YIS John

This weekend, those of us who are soldiers or are Veterans honor our comrades-in-arms who fell "supporting and defending the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic...", who fell because they were told to "take that hill" or "knock out that machine gun nest" or "keep the Japanese from taking over the Phillipines" or ...

I'll shed tears for these heroes, men and women alike, who gave their all for our Nation.

John

I wanted to thank John (Eagle in KY) for his support: That saved council my atrocious printing!! It's worked like a charm, cutting and pasting from one work product into the report!. Thanks again!

I also wanted to close this thread out. Overall, about a man-week of evenings went into the records audit.

I have a total of Four Advancement reports ready for program leaders signatures, then they go down to council:

- One is for the next Eagle up... his crew advisor is spending quality time with the young man checking the app. I've given them an updated Troopmaster individual history as well as an amended advancement report.

- One covers all the missing items. Doesn't matter whether the troop gave inaccurate data or the employee keybanged errors. The information is missing from ScoutNet, and its a unit responsibility to make sure Council gets the data to add in.

- One report covers the changes. I went back to the merit badge cards here (we retain the Scout and the unit copy as a business practice).

- The last report covers the deletions, where the Scout never earned the item, we never reported it, but shazaam, it was there. Again, not important how it got there, but really important that we get the data right for the current boys and the future.

From now on, at recharter time, I'm going to ask for a ScoutNet advancement dump.(This message has been edited by John-in-KC)

post deleted, it cut off 90% of my writing again(This message has been edited by John-in-KC)

Three comments here...

First, going into our District Day Camp, many of the areas have elements of Achievements and Electives as elements of our program. Our PD had to take my proposal and crosswalk it against Tiger, Wolf, Bear, and Webelo books.

Second, Wolf is easily doable in just a few months. These newly arriving Cubs, be they new recruits or graduated Tigers, have a year in front of them. There's plenty of program for parent/child as well as den and pack in those Cub Scout books

Last, July 4 is coming. Cubs LOVE to walk in parades! The dog days of August are coming. Cubs LOVE family nights at the park, with the pack grilling burgers and doing raingutter regattas. Before you know it, they'll be all grown up. Enjoy the journey along with them.

John

Part of this goes back to a lesson I've just

packsaddle write,

"We go through a painstaking audit to reconcile these records well before every eagle BOR or at least once per year. However, I have noticed that the troop, at least, seems to be able to keep these records intact and accurate. This means that approximately each year, we use our records to recreate and correct the council records. We accept this as routine."

AMEN. It's part of the learning curve. I will do this annually at recharter time going forward.

FOG, wrote:

"In this world of advanced computer systems that allow you to do everything on-line from ording cheese to doing your taxes, one would think that it would be possible for unit advancement chairs to submit advancement reports on-line."

I've told my SM and VCA that they don't just do hardcopy advancement reports anymore: I will give them a ScoutNet compatible floppy of the advancment report along with the hardcopy

FINALLY, TO EagleInKY, A PUBLIC THANK YOU!!!! (he shouts) Private message enroute to you.

John

We discussed this at PTC last summer, in the conference I attended. Granted, my conference was during Relationships Week, but...

As I recall, we pretty well agreed: Anyone wearing this knot deserves to get his dues remitted by Council, and invited never to return to Scouting.

As a parent, ensuring my child understands the facts of life fall solely in my lane. WITHOUT MY EXPLICIT PERMISSION, it's not for my childs' Pastor, Scoutmaster, coaches, or schoolteachers. Does that mean I go it alone? No. I evaluate what his Church, Scouting, athletic organizations, and his schools are going to teach. Then, I give permission.

That's a line in the sand. Anyone who crosses that line (and wearing the "rainbow knot" crosses that line) will be the subject of a call from me to my local Child Protective Services; in the case of Scouting, to my nearest professional.

John

Rest purged. Not worth my time to urinate and defecate in public.

THE NEED IS STILL HERE: HELP!!! DOES ANYONE HAVE A WORD BASED VERSION OF THE ADVANCEMENT REPORT??? If I have to, I'll build one independently, but I'm a lazy cuss, and using other people's work is always useful

John(This message has been edited by John-in-KC)

While the immediate nned is to see if someone has a 4403 in WORD format!!!....

The work of advancement, which the Scouts should never see, is a shared responsibility.

Program Leaders (Cubs: DLs/CM)(Boys:SM)(Ven:Adv) share responsibility with advancement coordinator for unit level data entry and production of reports for Council.

Council has responsibility to accurately enter the data. Seems to me the best way for the long haul is for units to send ScoutNet compatible electrons to Council.

Unit have responsibility to double back around, check what's entered, and make sure mistakes get fixed.

Otherwise, you have the train wreck a'comin I described above: Eagle candidate whom the unit thinks is ready, and ScoutNet says isn't ready.

John

Two comments:

1) Maybe, just maybe, Packs can get a huge "hand-me-down" uniform closets going ... and loan for the Tiger year these shirts, pre-done with unit numerals and CSPs. That way, parents don't have to fork out for a shirt that'll be outgrown waaaayyy too early.

2) Ditto on all other Cub and Scout uniforms (I've already sent to the local closet my son's first two Scout shirts, one pair of shorts, and one pair of trousers.)

John

Need some help.

Short version: I have the BSA 4403 pdf file. Bloody thing is locked from direct input using Word (or like the IRS, typing data in on the form itself).

Sooo... does anyone out there have a home-made shell of a 4403 in MS-Office format? If so, either tell me here, and I'll hit you in private message, or hit me in private message, please.

Long version...

(Per a private message with BobWhite, the hits that are fair on Council's are annotated, as are the hits that are fair on our unit):

Among my other jobs, I'm the advancement coordinator for my Troop. I'm in the process of checking what ScoutNet has on file for our young men against what the unit has in Troopmaster.

Surprise of surprises (not): They don't agree.

- There is data, SUBMITTED ON ADVANCEMENT REPORTS, that Council failed to post! In particular, one boy, who is just about ready for his Eagle BOR, is missing his advancements to Life, 1st Cl, 2d Cl, Tenderfoot, Scout, as well as one Eagle required and three regular merit badges!!!

- There is data, SUBMITTED ON ADVANCEMENT REPORTS, that the data entry clerk fat fingered (ScoutNet date to Life for one boy is one month (6 v 7) earlier than the date on the report, and one mon before he got the last Eagle required MB he needed to actually go to his SM conference and BOR) (oh yes, the last MB and the advancement are on the same advancement report).

- There are advancment reports that slipped by me.

- There is DATA, SUBMITTED ON ADVANCMENT REPORTS, that show one boy missing a merit badge he earned, and ScoutNet data showing a merit badge he didn't earn AND WE DIDN'T REPORT. ... since it's my own son, I know he didn't earn the mb Not only that, I have our MB card files as source documents!

- Finally, from our Troops' first year of existence, there are plenty of camp earned merit badges where ScoutNet and the Advancment Reports agree, but two predecessors back advancment coordinator input a bad date into troopmaster.

LESSONS LEARNED:

1) Ask your professional, at least every couple of years, to dump off what ScoutNet has on your unit. Crosscheck and reconcile unit records against Council records.

Also, as you get used to the option to submit in electrons form for direct posting to ScoutNet, start using it. I'll be learning this option over the next few weeks.

John(This message has been edited by John-in-KC)(This message has been edited by John-in-KC)

NWS...

0

Our Council had been doing a Council-wide Good Turn day for some years.

For many years, the standard Good Turn was Scouting for Food. As a Council, we literally collected tons of goods for the pantries in our metro area. We abandoned the practice about three years ago ... gave units the option of "Do a unit Good Turn, any Good Turn..."

This year, Council went back to Scouting for Food, but did it a bit on the cheap: Door hangar cards instead of shopping bags we could drop off. The neighborhoods we canvassed three years ago gave, when weighed out, about 1 ton (gross weight) of food. This season, we got about 400 pounds.

Suggestions:

1) With Scouters in visible support of Scouts (YP in practice at strange residences), don't just do door hangars, do a neighborhood canvass and knock on doors, door to door.

2) Use bags, not pieces of paper, as the door hangars.

Done right, this is a great program opportunity for Second Class, Star, and Life service hours

My two cents. Others may have different pennies.(This message has been edited by John-in-KC)

Having listened to my Council's professional CPA staff CFO at Commissioner's College ...

The requirement (in this part of flyover country) for a tour permit begins when the travel crosses a District boundary.

That said, the PROCESS of planning a trip using the Tour Permit method is always viable and valuable.

John