Lisabob

OK am I the only one who thinks the SM was asking for trouble by having an actual ballot? I mean, really? Maybe it is my inner-political scientist, but he's just begging for manipulation, here. I am in no way shocked that attempted manipulation is what he got. Even holding the vote is manipulation of sorts so he can hide behind "what the youth want" instead of just saying NO. Look, we should absolutely listen to youth voices when it comes to who they are/aren't comfortable with. We should NOT be ceding decisions about whether to have more ASMs, or how many to have, to youth. Those decisions get made by the CO or, in their absence, probably by the CC & SM. As for your over-eager parents: give them something to do that isn't ASM-like. You need something hauled, stored, picked up from a store, taken to council, etc.? Grab Mr or Mrs Helicopter and ask them to do it. Ask them enough and either they'll prove to be useful, or they'll get tired of running errands for the troop and back off. When pressed by adults who want to be helicopter ASMs, you could always just smile and say "we've got our positions filled right now, thanks." Or, "it is nice of you to offer." And walk away. (On the flip side - I am reminded of a recent thread about troops that turn away young adults who offer their assistance, and the consensus was that that was nuts. So I guess there does need to be some balance here, too. Turning away all comers is as bad an idea as making all new scout parents into ASMs.)

One thing about boy scouting - sometimes, things the boys decide to do, don't work out perfectly. Part of the learning curve is learning from those mistakes. That requires a very patient set of adults (and parents, especially). So - since the SPL is apparently ok with this idea, I think there's a very limited role here for parents. Not to say that I agree at all with what you've described the troop as doing. But rather than YOU & your partner going full-bore here (or quitting), I'd say, have a quiet conversation with the Committee Chair about it (by quiet, I mean - really quiet - not a demand for change, but more a question/concern about whether the boys fully realize the implication of this policy), and then encourage your son to do what others have described here (tell his PL, go to the next PLC, talk to his SPL, bring it up at his next board of review, run for a position himself and advocate changing this policy). See where that takes him, and the troop, before you take more dramatic action. All that said, if someone were to ask me, I'd tell them that I think it is a lousy idea to make a troop Christmas party off-limits to some members of the troop. Not exactly in keeping with what we think of as Christmas spirit there! And likely to make excluded people feel unwanted in their own community. Changing the name of that event would solve at least that one part of the problem.

Question: Are there rules about who is allowed to teach these courses? I can see a pilot program being exceptionally well run because it is small and hand-picked. I cannot see allowing some 16-17-18 year old counselor to "teach" these classes to other children, though. But we know how many camp programs are staffed (by available bodies), and that would worry me.

Venturing is a place for older teens to hang out without (as my son's crew affectionately calls them) the "ankle biters." Since adult involvement is also minimal, it is an in-between space for late teens/early 20s to stretch their wings a little bit more than in many troops. It is a social space with a different vibe than a troop, in part because of the girls. It could be a place to chase "high adventure," or in this over-scheduled and high-paced world, it could be a refuge and just a comfortable, fun place to be. In some ways it is a looser affiliation because of the less structured nature of the program and participants' personal schedules. On the other hand, there are relatively few other spaces for kids that age to be together in as innocent and relaxed atmosphere so it might also be a more tight-knit group, depending on the members.

"His project meets my approval for an Eagle project, that's my scout's first step... when he's ready with his workbook, which he's not working on currently because in his words "..it's winter, I'm not doing any work on that during the winter its going to have to wait..." when he told me that, I just told him that "I'd like to see the completed workbook this year, but I'm not going to twist your arm to get it to me, you have to want to get it done." I left it at that.... " Three thoughts. 1. If his project meets your approval, then that's a pretty good step and shows he is engaged and making progress. That's a totally different bird than the kid who just doesn't care. In other words, you have a lot to work with here. 2. He may have good reasons for his schedule. You may not know or understand them. Case in point: there's a boy in my son's troop who is a full time college student at age 16. The kid is suddenly consumed with school work - he has final exams to study for, papers to write, etc. He & parents decided he needed to back off of scouts for a few weeks. One adult in the group isn't getting the message and giving him a hard time about not taking on more leadership roles or attending more events in Nov/Dec. The boy got exasperated and ended up being a bit too blunt about it, which in turn led to a complaint that he wasn't sufficiently respectful of this adult. Sigh. 3. If he has a couple of years til he turns 18, then you have time to exert influence. (So what if he doesn't get the Eagle workbook done right now. Don't be pushy.) Also, you've been SM for 1.5 years? So in total, you'll be his SM for 3+ years by the time he ages out. That is a very long time in the life of a young man and you'll have many opportunities to help him mature into the sort of young man of character that you hope he will become. Not every boy has it all together at age 15-16, but you'll probably see a great deal of growth over the next year or so. Focus on that big picture, not on nit-picking the kid today. And by all means, teach him to tie a clove hitch, too.

When my son was in cubs I paid attention to this because he sold a lot of popcorn. For a few years he was the pack's top seller, coming in between 1500-2500 or so. All door to door, hardly any to relatives (who all live out of state). It was an ENORMOUS commitment of time to sell that much popcorn to strangers. Gotta admit, I was relieved to learn that most boy scout troops around here don't push the popcorn sales. District-wide and Council-wide, the top sellers were typically in the multiple 10s of thousands. Story is that most could sell via parents at work, often parents who work at HQ or at the main warehouses for major companies in the region.

I don't see a problem here, as long as the work meets the actual requirements. As someone who has been a counselor for the citizenship MBs and communications MB, I've had many boys share with me work that they've done in their classes, no problem. Either a note from their teacher or the scout showing me the project he did for school will typically suffice. From the opposite end - I teach political science at the college level and my students who were also boy scouts and who earned the citizenship badges nearly always have an advantage in my intro-level courses because they know a good bit of the material from the badge requirements. So, when there are obvious connections, why wouldn't we allow the scout/student to take advantage of that?

Well it is clear it wouldn't happen. But if it were up to me, I might keep SOME advancement and ditch OTHER advancement. I'd keep most merit badges. Kids enjoy them, they explore new interests, and when done well, they learn a lot. I'd probably keep some form of T-2-1 ranks. Or other way of certifying the point at which scouts have demonstrated proficiency in the skills and traits we expect to see in a 1st class scout. I'd divorce merit badge completion from rank. Maybe some merit badges are pre-reqs to participating in certain aspects of the troop program (1st aid, for example). But I'd leave that to the troop level to decide. I'd probably radically pare down or eliminate Star-Life-Eagle and all the make-work that goes with them. That doesn't mean I'd stop expecting leadership and personal growth. It does mean, I'd cut out the formal advancement programs at that point. And I sure wouldn't coerce scouts into doing merit badges they don't care about just to earn ranks that are way-stations (also not cared about) on the way to Eagle. Or maybe I'd return to the day when Eagle was awarded in a different manner. Not sure. From the scouts' end of things, I don't think it would change all that much for many of the boys. A lot of older boys aren't especially interested in advancement anyway (like my son) and don't see much need for a ribbon to prove their rank. Those that are could still pursue prestige and status in other ways, as some have pointed out, such as patrol and troop leadership positions. In reality the boys know who the leaders are and it has little to do with the rank patches on the kids' shirts.

If I felt the way about the leaders in my son's troop that you expressed, Eng61, my son would be in a different troop in a heartbeat. Given your attitude, I must say I think it would be hard for you to integrate yourself into this group of adults even if they're the most welcoming folks in the world. Not because you've never been a scout (which is irrelevant), but because you are so negative about what scouting is/should be. That is under your control, though. Learn the program and get involved anyway, or move your son to a unit where you trust the leaders more, or else you have nobody to blame but yourself for your mistrust and concern.

Hey RichK, not sure where exactly you are in MI? But there are a handful of us on this forum from the state and I venture to say most of us would run far, far away from what you are describing (ugh!) Say so, if you want to find some kindred spirits.

To be fair though, some families are both time- and cash-poor. What do they do? If you are a single parent, working 3 part time jobs to get by, in an area where family networks and community ties are thin and most others are also poor, then relying on family or neighbors to support fund raising is a heck of a challenge. So is just writing a check. Same with the family where one/both parents lost their job and are going through foreclosure. Units in comfortable suburbs tend to forget this fact, although recent studies confirm that most of the newly poor are located in suburban areas - they are just not that visible. Units in inner cities and poorer rural areas seem much better attuned to this fact, perhaps due to long experience interacting with the reality of American poverty. Or anyway, that is my observation.

Having rope isn't the same as preparing a teaching aid. I'm a teacher. That's like saying that I use chalk as a teaching aid. Yahuh. To do what? Set the bar higher than "I brought some rope."

Admittedly I am doing this on the fly, not looking at the requirements right now, but I thought there was a requirement that the boy prepare some kind of teaching aid - so what did he prepare? He should be able to show you or explain it to you in detail. Similarly, how did he present the material? It is one thing to say "I told them how" and another to explain how you led the boys through the process of learning the lashing. Part of that conversation might be about whether he felt the boys were learning, or how he knew if they were learning the material. If there was a lecture component or direct instruction ("I stood in the front of the room and talked or demonstrated") then what cues was he looking for to see if his audience was with him? Body language, for example? Not all communication is verbal. What about managing group interactions, how did he do that - did he feel that worked well, was it difficult to keep people on task, etc.? So I guess - if he can talk it through with you in detail, I might be inclined to say ok. If he can't then he has gone through motions without actually completing the intent of the badge (which is to work on and improve communication ability) and I would say not quite yet. In the latter case, perhaps he could offer to do a reprise of his performance for some new scouts, a webelos den, etc, after having worked with you on this a little bit.

Eagle92, I'm trying very hard to provide support without pushing - though for me, I hate leaving things unfinished so yes, it bothers me some, esp. the mostly-finished merit badges. But I'd rather it be his choice, than try to force him (and anyway, he's as stubborn as I am, and that's saying something). Actually I think he is quite tired of all the concerned & caring folks "chatting" with him, though he knows they mean well. He just isn't buying what they're selling. He told me tonight he felt a lot of the things people were telling him about what Eagle will "do for" him, or how it will make him feel about himself, are sounding pretty hollow to him. I couldn't argue a whole lot even if I wanted to. Most kids aren't going to get most scholarships, be accepted to most colleges, get most jobs, or generally make it in life on the basis of being Eagle scouts. And if they do, it won't be because they have the rank; it will be because they've internalized the ethos. This is not a knock on the rank - but these external motivators are probably poor ones for most of the kids, most of the time. When we over-sell these external rewards and kids figure that out (dang it, they're smart!), they discount everything else we say after that. Scoutson is just one young fellow and this is merely anecdotal evidence. But I've spent a lot of time thinking about it, and as I have, I've reached the conclusion that advancement needs to be a) understood as one, not the only, method of scouting and b) it needs to be built into the program so that it happens naturally, and c) it needs to be meaningful in demonstrable ways so that they build faith in the process. Failing those, it becomes the goal rather than a natural outcome and it becomes about the outward symbol and what adults want (and may be seen as a joke or a product of adult coercion), rather than a token acknowledgement of inner growth and something the youth value from their experiences in scouting. Hey, who knows, he helped start a Crew. Maybe he'll start fresh and work toward one of the Venturing awards at some point. Or not.

Had this conversation (again) in the car on the way home from a troop meeting tonight. Scoutson is almost 17.5 and almost Life. He has been Star for years, was 1st class for years, was 2nd class for a year+, was Tenderfoot for a year+. Advancement never caught his interest. I really wish he would care more about earning Eagle but at this point I am not holding my breath. He is getting a lot of push back now from other adults and even some boys in his present troop. So he was venting about it in the car on the way home. In his former troop: boys were advanced despite having limited skill and terrible attitudes/behavior problems. It disgusted my son. He felt that badges were more about showing off and adults bullying each other into giving out awards like candy. If any jerk can get rank as long as mommy & daddy threaten to make a stink, then who wants it? My son concluded that he didn't need (or want) to advance to get something out of his scouting experience. In his current troop (which he joined a year ago): advancement recognizes more worthy character traits and achievements so it is baffling to members of this troop that my son isn't interested. But old views take a long time to change, if ever. Or as he put it, "I kind of flipped that switch off in the old troop and I don't think I need to flip it back on again, now." Anyway he has until the end of December to earn Life if he still wants a chance at earning Eagle. I'll be surprised if he decides to do it, though I wish he would. He no longer views advancement as a joke but now he seems to view it as unnecessary.

T2Eagle, I doubt that you would be able to sway a parent who starts out with such a deep mistrust as E61 indicates he has. You can't please all the people, all the time, no matter what you do. And in bending over backward in one direction, you run a real risk of irritating others, in the other direction (there's only so parent-friendly you can be, before you start encroaching on boy-led. How much hand holding is enough?) Frankly, I am not at all clear on why E61 has his child in scouting, or why he frequents scouter.com , considering his low opinion (based on limited knowledge) of the program and those of us involved in it. And I don't mean that as a slam against him, but I just really don't get it. Most of us tend to walk away from the things we don't enjoy - not hang around the fringes and second-guess them. At the very least, I would say that if he and his wife/ his son's mother really don't trust the present troop's leadership, as he has indicated numerous times, then perhaps they should locate a different troop.

I think there's an underlying assumption (expressed in some of Engineer61's other posts, too) that parents CANNOT trust scout leaders. It is evident that this is the case for Engineer61 and that he can't imagine how come many others here don't share his distrust. So let me explain how I came to trust the adult leaders in my son's current troop. Fundamentally: I got involved, and I communicated. When my son was in cubs, I was a cub leader. I did this in part to be involved in his life (cubs is a wonderful family program) and in part because other adults weren't doing it. Someone needed to so I did. Over those 4 years I got to know other parents and other scout leaders in the area, by attending events and by participating in training, roundtable, more training, etc. Perhaps because I had done all the training, read all the literature, and gotten my facts together, I knew about YPT, having done it myself. I had also explained it to the parents of the boys in my Webelos den on numerous occasions. I never questioned whether YPT alone is adequate though, because without trusting the individual leaders, YPT is useless. The real question isn't "what's the process?" The real question is "do you believe people will follow the process?" By the time my son was ready for boy scouting, I knew probably 70% of the leaders in every troop in our district. Some, I wouldn't trust with a block of wood, let alone with my child. Some are nice people but lousy scout leaders by temperament or by skill level. A few are probably good scout leaders and nice people but not the role model I wanted for my son, or their value systems are too far away from my own. Again- it isn't/wasn't about whether I trusted YPT - it was about whether I trusted these people to follow (among other things) YPT. The first troop my son was in, when he joined I had gotten to know and trusted the leadership. I knew who was trained and who wasn't, who had which skills, which temperaments, etc. But also, I used common sense - spent some time at a few outings, hung around the back of the room at troop meetings, joined the troop committee and got to know more folks, or know them better. And I kept open communication with them and with my son. If I heard things that sounded strange, I asked. I sought input from other adults that I trusted - and sometimes I offered my input to them, if I had concerns. Communication is a two-way street. Over the years leadership changed in that troop. And to be fair, my son grew and changed, too. Toward the end of his time in the troop there had been some incidents (not abuse, but unpleasantness) that eroded my son's and my trust in the common sense and values of the present leadership. After being unable to work that out, my son chose to leave the troop and I supported that decision. When he went looking for a new troop, we again evaluated what we knew about the leadership of potential troops. He ultimately chose a troop where the leader was known to him from other interactions, where he trusts and respects the adult and youth leadership. Incidentally, I've known his present scoutmaster for more than 10 years and I felt completely confident in his judgment. Not because he has taken YPT (he has), but because I've spent time with him and around him and I think I know what his moral compass is and how he reacts to different situations - including some difficult ones. I don't have qualms about how he would interact with my son. The same goes for most of the rest of the adult leadership in this troop. The ones I didn't know, I've made an effort to get to know. That plan of action - get involved, know the people you are entrusting with your child, ask questions & communicate regularly - seems to work pretty well. I wouldn't advocate that someone just drop off their child and hope for the best, but I wouldn't encourage people to be irrationally afraid, either. This is the advice I give to parents whose boys are crossing over into boy scouting. Seems to work for most of them, too.

Fair point, OGE. You're right that McQueary shouldn't be blameless here. To be honest I have tried not to know some of the more graphic details because it is so sickening. And so I haven't read the indictment. Perhaps that turning away is unacceptable and I need to think some more about that response. I appreciate that you've caused me to do so. The notion that a college-aged Eagle scout should be rejected based on his age because a relatively younger individual (not as young as I had thought, granted) at PSU didn't take stronger action in the face of obvious violence against a child, is ludicrous, though. The PSU situation, like so many other scandals of a similar sort, does reflect the fact that older people in positions of authority certainly aren't inherently more trustworthy than younger people. (And maybe are less so, given that they've internalized the idea of protecting institutions at the expense of protecting individuals) And there, in fact, I think this scandal really flies in the face of what Engineer61 is saying.

This stuff can be purchased (legally) at gas stations and corner stores where I live. No age limits because it isn't regulated (yet). My understanding is that this is being dealt with by the state legislature, but in the meantime...it is out there. There's always something new on the horizon. Schools in my area have started sending out email updates on the latest psuedo-drug (are they psuedo?) crazes so that parents will be better informed. But to my way of thinking, the better thing to do is to try to raise children who aren't strongly tempted to try any of this stuff in the first place, rather than respond to each new thing with a new alarm. The frequent alarms can de-sensitize people or make people feel overwhelmed to the point of throwing up their hands. And kids tend to see it as adults freaking out needlessly over every little thing. (Or so my son & his friends tell me. They just roll their eyes at all of these school-report updates on the newest drug crazes. That's despite the fact that a number of young people in their schools have died in the last couple of years due to drug overdoses. Their view is that some kids will do anything, but that most kids won't and most parents are over-reacting in ways that make their children less likely to talk with them openly. I'm not saying I completely share this view, but that's what I hear from my late-teen son & his friends and theirs is a perspective worth considering, at least.) Easier said than done, though. And I grieve for that one young man's family.

I think a simple attempt at reaching out is both the human thing to do, and not necessarily the same as getting involved in someone's messy divorce. If the boy has been part of the group long enough to get to first class, it is just weird to "not notice" when he then disappears. Scouting is a social activity. Wouldn't you want your friends to notice & touch base with you, if you suddenly disappeared from your social circle? A brief call or visit (agreed - not a letter) saying something like "hey, we've missed Johnny lately & would love to see him again" is not over-stepping the boundaries. Parents will respond however they want to, which may include "MYOB" but that doesn't make it wrong to voice the fact that you've missed Johnny & would love to see him again.

I don't see it that way, Eng. The 20 year old didn't do the wrong thing. All the pics I'm seeing of the perp and of the head coach, the athletic supervisors/directors, the university president, etc. (all the guys who are being fired/arrested) show older men. Looks to me like they're the really scary group here. In fact I think we might say that the situation would have been better handled by a bunch of 20 year olds, than by all these old dudes who felt a need to cover up such a heinous crime.

I'm an outsider to OA and have only my son's reports to go off of so my views may be off-base, but I am not so sure you need more adults. My son's perspective: when he did his ordeal and the few times he went to chapter meetings, he said the other youth were fine (mostly) but all the adults were a major pain in the neck. Some felt entitled (one who wouldn't shut up during ordeal, some who went on about how being selected was their due). Others hovered and helicoptered, or tried to run things. These are the same types of adults who drive a lot of older boys seeking authentic experiences away from scout troops. OA doesn't need that.

Scoutfish, I think what people are responding to is the ham-handed way that BSA tries to do things (like this new JTE requirement), without seeming to have really thought through how it will work, how it will impact existing leaders, and how and when it should be communicated. Given the BSA's woeful history of poor quality training and awful record keeping related to training, this comes as no surprise, I guess, but I still would have expected better. People just get irritated when they feel that their time is being wasted or when they're treated like imbeciles.

Whether summer camp is fun or not seems to have more to do with the attitude and level of camaraderie among the boys in the troop, than with the camp program . Last summer my son's troop went to a camp that he had been to before, with a different troop. The camp has a very weak program. Their merit badge class quality is notoriously poor, camp-wide evening programs were designed so that a few people participate and everybody else watches (snooze), and use of "free areas" were unreasonably restricted. The first time my son went to this camp (with a former troop) he had a lousy time and so did pretty much everybody in his troop. When he came back this summer from the same camp I was expecting to hear more moaning & groaning about how bad it had been. Well the program wasn't any better than it had been previously, and he hadn't bothered to finish most of the MBs because he said he knew more about most of them than the kids "teaching" them. But he had a GREAT time. Why? The attitude of this troop is markedly different. They used the camp facilities as a backdrop to make their own experiences and fun. Other troops expected the fun to be provided by the camp program, and were left wanting.

It is one thing to keep up to date so that (for example) we don't have leaders teaching boys to dig trenches around their tents or some other seriously outdated ideas. In that, I can relate to Scoutfish's examples. In my line of work, too, we are expected to maintain some level of professional development and stay on top of the latest developments. (Of course, I also get paid for doing that.) It is another for BSA to twist itself into contortions and come out with "new and improved" versions of trainings every few years, where the change is in the form and not really in the content. It is sillier still, for BSA to say in one breath "your old training is still good" and in another, "but it isn't good when it comes to JTE." I don't have a lot of patience for leaders who beg off with the old "if I have to spend my time in training then the program suffers due to my absence" argument. But I do have a good deal of sympathy for the people who are now raising an eyebrow and saying, what, again? And of course, this new BSA policy (like so much else) wasn't communicated in a very helpful manner. And while we're at it - if the training was poor quality, as it routinely is where I am located, then expecting me to do it again, again, again, again, is just not going to work very well. It will simply cause more people to find "outs" or ignore JTE, or fudge the record somehow - or quit scouting. Because the bottom line, going back to Eagle92's thread title, is that we're all volunteers, and we do **not** have to go through training again if we really don't want to.