MattR

I'd say there can be passion without religion, look at PETA, or the vitamin junkies at Whole Foods.. Passion can be a good thing, art, running, gardening, one's spouse, boy scouts.... Passion isn't the problem, the problem is when passion spills over into telling others how to live when they don't agree.

The sad part was I didn't even realize this until my son was close to Eagle. At the time I thought I had a long way to go. Totally clueless as a youth. Now, I fully support Eagle coaches

The only MB I had left to do for Eagle was Cit in the World, and I was living overseas at the time....

I should learn to keep my mouth shut. I went to the meeting about rebuilding the camp and I gave them a synopsis of everything we talked about here, and they loved it. The good news is they want to start off small and slowly change it over a few years. The bad news is I have to figure it all out. Stay tuned.

One scout from my troop went and he enjoyed it. Only negative was the miles to get to some events. He couldn't do some of the events because of the time required to get there. Maybe 20,000 cheap bikes spread all over the place next time? What was great was he had no problem with the heat. At summer camp he ended up at the medic with pretty severe dehydration. It wasn't that he wasn't drinking enough water but wasn't getting enough salt. I had electrolyte tablets but he didn't like the taste as his stomach was already upset. He did ok with gatorade. When he was getting ready for jambo his

How about a game called "human pin ball." I'm not sure what the rules are but it sounds about right. We did human foosball and it was great. I tried a version of quidditch with 3 balls with webelos. That was a bad idea. Two boys looking at two different balls running into each other.

A few years ago I hit the same realization that BD had, it may be better to spend time on those that want to get something out of the program. Maybe it would be better to send email out to all of the existing families and do roses and thorns with them. What do they like? What would they like to see improved?

JoeBob, if you combine the Bikini Girls with the Scouts then the cars will not get cleaned. There may be some clocks that get cleaned.

Bears? I've seen bears open tents wherever they want. They just run a claw down the side of the tent. What does a tent have that a hammock doesn't? Maybe the bear wants to sleep in the hammock? Or is a hammock too much like a tarp? That begs the question, why not tarps?

I'd like to echo Packsaddle's opinion (not the whango tree thing, which is probably better then pack singing), only not just for the current circle of death. Back in January I put up a thread that referenced a bible story about how arguing to pulverize your opponent is not only wrong (people got swallowed up by the earth!) but also a waste of time. Arguing to understand each other and learn from each other, however, is fine. The difference is subtle but we need to back off, or at least be courteous when we cross that line. Since January we've crossed a lot of those lines. What we're argu

My only suggestion is be a facilitator and not a professor. Our roundtables are horrible. Half of us only go because we know there's an after-meeting with golden foamy liquids. But, we are slowly working with the commissioner to improve.

Summer backpacking sounds like an interesting use of this. I don't know much about them but am curious. I use a syl-nylon tarp and sleep on the ground. It would be nicer to just move it all up a couple of feet. I've read that you can sleep on your side or even stomach if you sleep at an angle to the tarp. Doesn't that make it harder to get insulation underneath? Can you hang a down blanket underneath? My pad, which isn't that big, is really big compared to a lot of things I carry and getting rid of that would be a real bonus..

"Would you agree that the advancement part of the program is easier for people to teach than the leadership part?" Yes. I tell my scouts that the scout spirit requirement is the hardest one for them to get checked off. They don't believe me until they ask me to check it off. "I'm thinking the easy cop out is to simply make check marks in boxes than it is to sit down and work with boys developing their character and leadership abilities." It's even harder when you're not quite sure how to work with the boys to achieve this. My point is only that I barely understand how to do it ri

Jblake, I agree with you, absolutely. The selfish should be balanced by the selfless. That's a well rounded scout. What can the BSA do? Based on JTE and the Venture rewrite, I don't see anything useful. I like what you're ideas are, but they can't be requirements and check boxes. As you said, a culture change is needed. The only way I can see that is if the adults truly understand what the methods are and also how to implement them. I'd like to see better training or information for scoutmasters. The scoutmaster handbook is a nice introduction but it could go a lot deeper into

I don't think it's a tradeoff on advancement mill vs servant leadership, I think it's more the expectation and goals of the SM. If the SM wants every kid to get Eagle then the shortest path is an Eagle mill. If the goal is to have a ton of adventure then there's a different path. If the goal is to have boy led then servant leadership is important. The challenge with the last option is it's difficult to implement. Part of this is the lack of training for adults and part is it just takes time working with kids. This, to me, is the crux of what scouts is about. To be a servant leader, or tru

Given it would be the same project, 1.5 months is doable. You can't use any of the work you've done but you can use the plan. So my guess is any money that anyone has given you can't be used. So you need to find more donors. You asked about whether it showed enough leadership. That's always a tough call. It's not enough if someone gave you a plan and all you did was provide labor. I would say going around to collect donations would be good. Talk to the organizations that deliver them and find out what they need. They may ask for diapers. You don't know. You can also do a drive to collect from

When do you turn 18? I had a scout in my troop do a project without getting Council signatures and he is now doing it over. If you have the time then don't worry, you can just do the exact same plan again, only get the signatures first. If you don't have the time, you're at the Council's mercy. Tough lesson.

EagleScout441, jblake47 sure has a harsh way of saying things. However, if you look at what he said with the idea that he's really trying to help you be a better scout and not slam you, there are a lot of good ideas. I'll add my two cents as well. I noticed that the original topic was that you wanted ideas on how to get the patrol method working better. Upon discussion this changed into the fact that you were being bypassed for being SPL by someone younger and less qualified. How about digging a little deeper? Danger ahead: This might hurt but my intentions are to help you do your best.

I'd be interested in what the patrol activities are.

How many morning slots are there?

I would think you're right. Do you think the PL could decide, along with his patrol, when to do patrol activities and when to do individual activities? Or would it be better to have the camp specify that? Say, patrol activities in the morning and individual in the afternoon.

Thank you for your ideas. Here's my summary. Key components are challenge, patrol based and cooking, fun, and hands on. The challenge can be found from learning new skills, having skill levels, competing with other patrols, awards, team challenges. The week is one massive challenge. Merit badges can be a great source of skill challenge but it can certainly be augmented (not to get the MB, but just to add more to it). So, build the tower and not just a model, and race the canoe. Patrol leader decides the program for his patrol. There is plenty of flexibility for how hard, lazy, challenging

No offense taken. I'm just collecting ideas for now. One thing I've figured out with most scouts is that if I can give them some ideas that are completely different from what they're used to, I'll get much better ideas from them. So I will be asking them. I'm really just trying to come up with a generic model, the actual activities would be based on scout input plus a reality check (money, staffing, resources,...) I'd like to see a patrol based camp. It would just be great for helping a troop develop patrol method. There is a tradeoff with what the younger and older scouts can and want to d

Well, what they don't want to do is sit in a class room setting. I'd even try something along the lines of do the fun stuff at camp and save the classroom work for back home. Even nature MB might be fun if it's not writing essays. EagleScout441, I'm all about the adventure. We can do all of that but the caving. JoeBob, I like the advancing level idea. What about building patrol camaraderie? Wasn't there some camp in New Hampshire that did a week of patrol based activities? So they'd sign up for shooting one afternoon and go do that together. Combine that with the levels and the young

If you had the opportunity to change your summer camp and you wanted to make merit badges less of the focus, how would you set up the program? I might have such an opportunity.