MattR

Oh man I give up. Pl and SPL elections.

I thought he meant troop elections.

Welcome to the forum, @SM101. What exactly is the problem you're trying to resolve? At first it sounds like you're deciding whether the scout is eligible for the the OA but at the very end you state this has to do with elections. The OA has specific requirements that you must follow but, as for elections, you own those. You can make any requirements you like.

Welcome to the forum, @2275. Camp staff is usually really good training in leading with a good attitude. I always encouraged scouts to work at camp.

I'm starting to see another view of advancement. Rather than FCFY I'd suggest thinking about how FC can help meet the goals of scouting. Advancement is, after all, considered a method in the BSA. It's just one of several tools to help reach a goal. So first of all it would help to define what your goal is. If it's to get eagle then sure, do it as fast as possible. If it's to develop character then it gets more complicated. @astrila, maybe your question should be changed from when to advance to why and how to advance. This leads to other questions: Who teaches the skills, how are they taug

Yeah, I had my butt kicked in private (and, to repeat, I needed it) In principal I really agree, but a challenge for one scout might look like an impossible wall to climb for another. One of the scouts on my recent trek said he wished he'd done a lot more high adventure trips, he now appreciates the challenge. He grew up. But previously he spent a lot of time finding excuses not to try. I'm not sure I was so different. Part of this is doing a better job of teaching scouts how to fail with grace. Some scouts have no problem with it. "Well huh, I just screwed up, time to try plan B." Mo

Welcome to the forum, @SubSM. I have an eagle scout from my troop that is currently on a sub. Nobody, and I mean nobody, saw that coming. He was a great scout but wasn't exactly interested in rules and regs. I have talked to him since and let's just say he really grew up.

The best scoutmaster is the one that does a great job of motivating your kid. And yet kids are different. When I was a scout I would have told you I wanted the laid back SM, but I also know in hindsight that once in a while I needed my butt kicked. My best lessons were when an adult challenged me just the right amount. Sometimes that was more than just a simple question. Lao Tzu also said: "Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt." I mean, he did write a book called The Art of War. Not exactly scout stuff . What we really need is

I never see more than about 1 in 3 or 4 families really get involved and it's getting worse. So expecting all 5 families to help out is a bit impractical. Using the boys troop might not be ideal but if it' a way to get more girls involved then I think it's worth it. Five girls might look like enough but I think it needs to be much more. Two patrols at a minimum. Three would be better. So, twenty scouts. As for web 3, I think teamwork is a more important skill to learn up front. As others have said, start with an adult as PL, show them the process you want them to follow for planning and p

I just got back from a trek run by the summer camp we were at. It wasn't so much cooking our food (more like rehydrating) but it was a challenge that we all shared. In that respect it was similar to patrol cooking. Selling this idea of shared challenge seems to be harder now than years past. The response from the scouts was great, though. This was one of the best trips I've been on as the mix of scouts was about as ideal as one could hope for. Everyone was positive even though there was some suffering. (We even got a few frost points!) The teamwork was incredible and so the leadership req

So Paige could get eagle by not doing much more than asking for it? She could squeeze in just before Sydney. Zing! Such poetic justice. But Paige likely is a bit more humble and probably doesn't care. More poetry. To each his, or her, own.

@SSScout: silly rabbit, God is everywhere, as is your Faith and Chaplaincy forum

I had a scout bring marijuana to summer camp. His tent was inspected after another scout said he smelled it. It was the right thing to do but that's an extreme case. For medicines and cell phones being found I agree that it should have been clearly explained ahead of time, as none of the scouts were intending to do anything wrong. Even if it wasn't explained it would have been better to just explain it that night and give everyone the option to make things right. I'm a bit surprised the council doesn't collect prescription medicines. At the same time, telling a scout that he can't take his ove

Now I have to ask scouter terry for a groan emoji.

I'm going backpacking next week with my troop. There is so much snow in the mountains that we need to bring snow shoes, and warmer clothing, and a big pack. Frost points the end of June, just what I want. Anyway, I went and borrowed a big pack. I'm thinking I'm getting too old for this. New thought: Now I'm more like the younger scouts on the hike - not quite sure if I'm going to make it. Reminds me of my first backpacking trips. I have a smaller pack that works just fine for a weekend (without snow) and a recent external frame pack that is super comfortable but doesn't hold much more tha

I don't think anxiety is the same as home sickness. I tend to agree with Ian, this is beyond our abilities. As they tell us in first aid training, don't try and solve problems above one's training. That doesn't mean just bring him home and give up. The goal is still to get him comfortable camping. You just have to find plan B.

Someone recently mentioned VOA. I always thought it was Voice Of America but apparently it also has to do with the OA.

I agree with those that say don't beat yourself over this, @CarlosD. First of all, while the scout may have gone to the emergency room, it wasn't an emergency. The ER is where you go when you're in so much pain you can't fill out the insurance info, or you might die if left un attended. A swollen knee is not that. Urgent care would have been fine. Urgent care is also the place where broken arms are put in a cast. Would you be upset over a broken arm on a campout? For your first campout as SM, yeah, I guess. But you'll get used to it. I had a troop guide sledding with a new scout and he fi

Welcome to the forum, @CarrieScouter.

I suspect that you can add a tag when you create a thread but that option runs out after some amount if time, just like how long you can edit a post. The reason for these limitations is to prevent spammers from posting something respectable, waiting until after the moderators decide it's not spam, and then going back and adding links to, porn sites, ads, and all sorts of other garbage we see. Anyway, I think moderators can add tags at any time. Send us a PM and we can probably help you. I added the tag "tag test" to this thread.

I think it was from a recommendation on this forum that I took my troop to a patrol cooking summer camp. I was impressed with the results. Cooking for a whole week helps the scouts get in a groove. It really did help teamwork. They did like the food better as well. And yet, my troop doesn't do patrol cooking at summer camp anymore. I think the biggest problem was the lack of support from the camps we went to. There was a stretch of 6 or 7 years where we tried every other year and it was always a disaster because the camps didn't understand what the patrols needed. Honestly, what do you do when

I think you're looking at my comments a bit differently than I intended. What I meant was that in order to participate with my troop I needed all those skills. My tent had ropes that required whipping and tying knots. We had no stoves, and hence had to build fires at least twice per campout. We had no patrol box so all the requirements for cooking, including make a list of required utensils, made sense because the PL just handed out utensils to each patrol member. I did have a stalking and tracking requirement. It did turn out to be useful when playing some games. I see what you're say

I can promise you that BSA is not trying to use 4 to start all girl's troops. If they want 4 digits give them 4: 0422. This is all based on one person at council saying something. Kind of like the one person in another thread saying the insurance won't cover an activity, or that there's a limit on blade lengths. People pass on rumors. If you want 422 then tell them so and if they complain ask them to show you the official documentation that states all girl's troops will begin with a 4. 3 digits is hard enough to sew on a sleeve. Anyway, have fun with it.

If the rules for voting went back to the way they were it would have little impact on how many are nominated from my troop. It's been a long time since we've had more than 3 people nominated and that was when we had 70 in the troop. My troop usually nominates the best scouts. The scouts that screwed around a lot as younger scouts typically have a lot of work to do to fix the name they made for themselves. Most don't make it no matter how hard they try and the ones that do really are the better scouts. So I'm not sure it's about making it harder to get in. I remember when my SM encouraged

Welcome to the forum, @towheadedviking.